Al Qaida - Moving on Up
How’s the war against terrorism going? Fine. In fact, if you’re a terrorist, times have never been better. While al Qaida sprouted in Taliban-run Afghanistan, it now flourishes in Iraq. A new study just released by CIA think tank National Intelligence Council says Iraq has become the West Point of terrorism.
“Iraq has replaced Afghanistan as the training ground for the next generation of "professionalized" terrorists,” the NIC report said.
“Iraq provides terrorists with a training ground, a recruitment ground, the opportunity for enhancing technical skills," said David B. Low, the national intelligence officer for transnational threats. "There is even, under the best scenario, over time, the likelihood that some of the jihadists who are not killed there will, in a sense, go home, wherever home is, and disperse to various other countries."
The NIC report was no slapdash deal. It took a year to produce and includes the analysis of 1,000 U.S. and foreign experts.
"The al-Qaida membership that was distinguished by having trained in Afghanistan will gradually dissipate, to be replaced in part by the dispersion of the experienced survivors of the conflict in Iraq," the report says.
So, the next time the President brags to reporters that Iraq is better off today than it was under Saddam, one of them might want to ask him if the world is better off. The CIA clearly seems to thing not. |
