The Aims, Structure and Methods of al-Qaeda against the West between 1989 and 2015

Abstract

This article gives a short history of the establishment of the al-Qaeda and how it tried to fulfil its goals set by Osama bin Laden. The organisation went through many structural changes and at the end a global movement emerged  named al-Qaeda. While the al-Qaeda movement started to  work, the core al-Qaeda was getting weaker because of the  fight against terrorism acts in the United States and its  allies. The preferred methods used by the members or  people inspired by the organisation were (among others)  bombing and suicide attacks. The use of firearms and  armed attacks were used only as a revenge and not against  randomly selected targets – because of this it was not a  common trait.