The source of al-Qaeda is no mystery. Their reactionary ideology is fueled by Western allied, Saudi/Gulf state oil revenue, some of which went towards religious "scholars" for past last 30 years who promulgate fake ideologies (at least since the 1979 Siege of Mecca). They are paid to manufacture chaos around the oil kingdoms to their benefit.
The West has gone along for decades. Why? First, because they were useful against the Soviets, a strategy first developed by Jimmy Carter's NSC chief, Zbignew Brezinski and carried on by subsequent administrations. Even today, that strategy is still evident in places like Central Asia and the Caucasus, where the Russians still have geopolitical interests. Who says that the Cold War ever ended? al-Qaeda generates chaos to justify repressive Gulf State royals/dictatorships, so that oil/gas can keep flowing at jacked up prices.
That principle forms the underpinning of the petrodollar system, which supports demand for US dollars on the global marketplace. Basically, the Saudi's and other allies sell their oil in dollars to support its value, even as its number increases in the world market. This allows our government to effectively subsidize government spending, money printing, and higher debt loads, all while exporting our inflation to other nations who are forced to use dollars to trade for fuel, food and other essentials. This is what makes the dollar the world's reserve currency. It is basically enforced by military power, which explains our high expenditures for defense. Nations who do not go along are threatened with destabilization, regime change and aerial bombardments. This system has been in place since we went off the Bretton Woods system in the early 1970's. These oil-generated revenues are then used by the Saudi's to purchase arms, $34 billion worth in a single year from the US alone. Those monies go to further grease Western politicians and their counterparts in the Gulf states.
As I've pointed out before, al-Qaeda and the war in Syria are conveniently preventing new sources of gas from being developed in the Eastern Mediterranean that are in direct competition with gas producers like the US, Saudi, Qatar, Iran, and Russia. The British and the French would rather continue getting oil from their puppet governments in Qatar and other petty Persian Gulf states, where they have significant financial investments.
An increasingly independent Russia on the other hand is developing the Nord Stream pipeline, which will connect the Caucasus region with energy-starved markets in Germany, Italy and Eastern Europe. The West's strategy is to foment revolt in those regions to stop the development of pipeline projects that serve to create more independence from the petrodollar system, with its artificially increased prices. NATO sees Russia's actions as a direct challenge, which explains the increasingly tense relationship between the two superpower nations. That is why no one in the West is in a hurry to resolve the problem in Syria and Iraq. Every day this chaos continues means billions in extra revenues for Western oil conglomerates and their friends in the Persian Gulf states.
al-Qaeda is being used to create a string of squabbling petty states ruled by warlords in Asia and Africa keen on implementing medieval style Sharia law. They are authoritarians who want to exterminate religious minorities like Christians, but yet can be easily played against each other using ethnic and tribal animosities. More broadly speaking, control is maintained by way of chaos, with the purpose of suppressing challengers to this global order, where transnational corporations are the primary actors, as opposed to strong representative nation-states, which for 500 years has served to improve the lot of world civilization against the forces of feudalism and reactionary political ideologies.
The drone program is pure Hollywood propaganda, to make the president look like an action hero, "doing something", plus it helps al-Qaeda recruit more willing dupes to their putrid, reactionary ideology. The largely fabricated "war on terror" is used to justify more useless, current government friendly IT "security" industries manned by insiders getting favorable contracts, greased with tax money. Hence the cycle is completed.