Whenever purity is paramount, terror is close at hand.

From the beginning of al-Qaeda, there were reformers and there were nihilists. The dynamic between them was irreconcilable and self-destructive, but events were moving so quickly that it was almost impossible to tell the philosophers from the sociopaths. They were glued together by the charismatic personality of Osama bin Laden, which contained both strands—idealism and nihilism—in a potent mix.

Al-Qaeda was conceived in the marriage of these assumptions: Faith is stronger than weapons or nations, and the ticket to enter the sacred zone where such miracles occur is the willingness to die.

When a[n Afghan Arab] fighter fell, his comrades would congratulate him and weep because they were not also slain in battle.