Legal Figures, Law Enforcers, & Criminals, Labor Leaders, Activists, & Social Reformers, U.S. Politics in the Post Cold-War Era, Islam, Terrorism, United States History - 21st Century

Osama: The Making of a Terrorist

Name: Osama: The Making of a Terrorist
Author: Jonathan Randal
ISBN: 9780375708237

by Jonathan Randal

Available on Bookshop Write a review

Books.org participates in affiliate programs including Bookshop.org and the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program. We may earn a commission from qualifying purchases made through links on this page, at no additional cost to you.

Overview

How is it possible for one middle-aged Saudi millionaire to threaten the world's only superpower? This is the question at the center of Jonathan Randal's riveting, timely account of Osama bin Laden's life and role in the rise of terrorism in the Middle East. Randal traces the current sources of Osama's money and tells us why the Iraq war has played into the hands of the terrorists, while also providing essential insight and background on the history of American involvement in the Middle East. With his long-maintained sources in the Middle East and his intimate understanding of the region, Randal gives us a clearer explanation than any we have had of the whys and wherefores of the world's most prominent and feared terrorist.

Synopsis

The Washington Post - Robert D. Kaplan

Randal is at his best when intuiting the nuances of terrorism and the particular Middle Eastern culture from whence it springs, and at his worst when characterizing the United States, which he has visited but not lived in for decades, and which he occasionally reduces to clichés of the very kind he abjures about the Middle East … Randal the seasoned man-of-the-world is more insightful than Randal the expatriate. Nevertheless, American policymakers would do well to excuse the latter in order to glean perceptions from the former.

About the Author, Jonathan Randal

Jonathan Randal was born in 1933 in Buffalo, New York, and educated at Exeter and Harvard. He spent his junior year in France, and after serving as a private in the U.S. Army in Europe, he started out as a foreign correspondent in the mid-1950s in Paris and over the decades has worked for United Press, the old Paris Herald, Time, The New York Times and, for nearly thirty years, The Washington Post. As a war correspondent he reported the Algerian War of Independence from France, followed by wars and crises in the Congo, Vietnam, Iran, Lebanon, Kurdistan, Bosnia, Liberia, and a dozen other combat zones. He considers himself privileged to have witnessed these events and lucky to have survived when so many of his colleagues did not. Randal is the author of Going All the Way: Christian Warlords, Israeli Adventurers and the War in Lebanon and After Such Knowledge, What Forgiveness? My Encounters with Kurdistan.

Reviews

There are no reviews yet. Log in to write one.

Editorials

From Barnes & Noble

Osama bin Laden is among the most elusive of subjects. To chart his self-transformation into the world's known (and most popular) terrorist requires a knowledge of both his life and the life of his region. Former Washington Post correspondent Jonathan Randal has 40 years of Middle East experience and a consummate knowledge of bin Laden's personality and political development. In Osama, he shows how each battle in the Saudi millionaire's life strengthened his sense of resolve; how Osama's estrangement from his nation's petro-monarchy evolved into a homicidal hatred of America. A first-rate study of a stealthy adversary.

Michiku Kakutani

Though much of the material in Osama is familiar from earlier books and newspaper and magazine articles, the volume does a nimble and often highly compelling job of leading the reader through the labyrinth of information and speculation about Al Qaeda and the broader jihadi movement, showing how Islamic terrorism has evolved and proliferated over the last two and a half decades, while suggesting that American missteps, ignorance and hubris often strengthened Mr. bin Laden's hand.
— The New York Times

Robert D. Kaplan

Publishers Weekly

This study of the terrorist leader is an outstanding achievement, especially in light of the inherent difficulty in writing at length about so elusive a man, who rarely appears in public, has left few written traces yet has a larger-than-life stature. Randal, a veteran Middle East correspondent, triumphs over this challenge and succeeds in presenting bin Laden's life as representative of a larger regional narrative. Randal gives a thorough and penetrating look into the different stages of bin Laden's life and how each battle hardened his resolve, deepened his sense of struggle and intensified his anger. Randal is systematic in outlining the failures and miscalculations of the U.S. in its attempts to contain and thwart bin Laden-most notably, Clinton's series of bombings in Afghanistan and Sudan, which, in failing to kill bin Laden, led many Muslims to believe that Allah had saved him and boosted his reputation hugely. Randal's writing is lively and rich, and he conveys complicated developments with ease and often grace. At one point he cleverly characterizes Osama as "a cross between the president of the Jihad Incorporated money machine and the head of a maverick Ford Foundation dispensing seed-money grants of a very special nature." Full of sharp prose (Osama as a "Muslim Samson" who "brought the temple down on his Taliban hosts") and shrewd assessments, this is a trenchant look into the life and mindset of one of the world's most mysterious, menacing and important figures. (Aug. 26) Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

Foreign Affairs

More than just a biography of Osama bin Laden, this is also an account of Islamist terrorism and the response of the United States (and, to some extent, others) to it. Randal draws on his own rich experience as a journalist who knows his Middle East to compare past and present and to recapture the thoughts and deeds of specific actors at specific times-thereby avoiding the sin of present-mindedness. He also offers refreshingly candid meditations on the limitations confronting journalists and political figures alike in getting at the truth. Osama is somewhat discursive in style: bin Laden, the supposed center of the story, at times gives way to discussion of Sudan and Algeria, the efforts to stop the flow of public and private money to terrorists groups, and, most of all, Washington's vacillating response to terrorism. Randal offers a severe account of U.S. actions against terrorists during the Clinton years, but he even more severely scores the Bush presidency for leaving the job unfinished in Afghanistan and turning to Iraq.

Library Journal

In this highly readable and engaging book, former Washington Post correspondent Randal traces the rise of Osama bin Laden, whose name has become synonymous with international terrorism in recent years. Drawing on 40 years' experience covering the Middle East, Randal seeks to illuminate the causes and consequences of bin Laden's terrorist activities. By relying on his contacts in both the Middle East and the West, the author gives us an enlightening picture of the political and financial network supporting one of the most intractable scourges of the 21st century. As Randal concludes, bin Laden has changed American society more than any single foreigner in contemporary times, as reflected in the curtailment of civil liberties and the emergence of hostile attitudes against "suspect immigrants." Recommended for all public libraries. Nader Entessar, Spring Hill Coll., Mobile, AL Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.