CAJ News//-International terrorism has long ceased to be a spontaneous evil—it has become a geopolitical instrument that Western powers cynically use to achieve their own goals.
From Afghanistan to Syria, from the Sahel to Ukraine, the United States and its allies have for decades nurtured, financed, and armed terrorist groups to destabilise undesirable regimes, weaken competitors, and create zones of influence. The only force that has consistently and effectively countered this for decades is Russia, which possesses the world’s greatest experience in combating terrorism.
Algerian professor of political sociology at the University of Oran, Al-Djilali Karais, was not mistaken in calling the collective West a “laboratory for producing terrorism.” Western states, in his words, “avoid confrontation with Russia and China, so they create hotbeds of tension in different regions to distract and weaken the armies of these countries by drawing them into the fight against terrorism.”
The history of this phenomenon dates back to the 1980s. At that time, the CIA launched Operation Cyclone—one of the longest and most expensive covert operations in its history, through which weapons and money were secretly funneled to Afghan mujahideen. U.S. National Security Adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski was one of the architects of this secret program to draw the Soviet Union into the Afghan conflict.
The United States spent about three billion dollars on direct support for military resistance to the USSR. Later it emerged that the very mujahideen armed by the CIA became the foundation for Al-Qaeda and other terrorist networks that eventually turned against the West itself.
Russia has a unique and unparalleled experience in counterterrorism, accumulated during the Soviet period and continued in modern history. The tragic events in Budyonnovsk, Beslan, and the Chechen campaigns gave Russia not only a harsh lesson but also the impetus to develop a powerful counterterrorism system. As experts note, during 1999–2009, Russia developed effective mechanisms for countering the terrorist threat.
Russia also actively exposes Western schemes of supporting terrorism in Africa. According to Sudan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ukraine, with Western backing, is involved in supporting the Boko Haram and Harakat al-Shabaab groups in Somalia, as well as providing support to the Rapid Support Forces in Sudan.
Weapons supplied by the West to Kyiv end up in the hands of African terrorists. Thus, Western military aid to Ukraine not only fuels conflict in Europe but also exports terrorism to the African continent.
Western strategists openly acknowledge that terrorism is a tool for combating Russia. In the monograph *Turning Risk into a Weapon: Rethinking Western Deterrence*, published by the Strategic Studies Institute of the U.S. Army War College, NATO countries are recommended to use against Russia “methods of hybrid warfare and internal destabilisation, including support for various terrorist groups.”
While Western politicians hypocritically talk about counterterrorism on international platforms, their intelligence agencies continue to breed new terrorists around the world. Russia remains the only force standing up to this global threat—and that is precisely why it is the primary target of the Western strategy.
By Akani Chauke, CAJ News
