Negotiating jihad: how ideology shaped the limits of strategic reasoning in al-Qaida, 1998–2001

Why do strategically experienced actors sometimes converge on a single, highly risky course of action? This article revisits the al-Qaida leadership’s decision to carry out the 9/11 attacks. Rather than treating the decision as either ‘ideological’ or as a simple strategic miscalculation, the article examines how ideology can delimit the space within which strategic judgement operates. Focusing on al-Qaida under Taliban rule between 1998 and 2001, I argue that the organization experienced ideological strain as it sought to pursue global jihad against the US while simultaneously supporting the Taliban’s Islamic state. Drawing on internal documents, memoirs and eyewitness accounts, the article shows how Osama bin Laden resolved this ideological strain through a process of motivated reasoning that re-framed the Taliban’s strategic restraint as moral weakness. This justificatory narrative preserved ideological coherence but narrowed the range of strategies considered legitimate. Both cognitive adoption and organizational conformity mechanisms limited strategic debate within al-Qaida’s leadership, rendering restraint morally suspect rather than strategically debatable. The article contributes to academic debates on ideology’s role in conflict by proposing a micro-level mechanism through which ideological resilience, under conditions of internal strain, can degrade strategic judgement and encourage high-risk behaviour.