Billmon: The Flytrap

Be sure to scroll down for the picture.--Dictynna

A growing number of Islamic militants from northern and sub-Saharan Africa are fighting U.S. and Iraqi forces in Iraq, fueling the insurgency with foot soldiers and some financing, U.S. military officials say . . .

A small vanguard of veterans are also returning home to countries like Morocco and Algeria, poised to use skills they learned on the battlefield in Iraq, from bomb making to battle planning, against their native governments, the officials said. (emphasis added)

The New York Times
As Africans Join Iraqi Insurgency, U.S.
Counters With Military Training in Their Lands
June 10, 2005

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Some time before the Iraq war, I found myself musing out loud to someone close to the inner circles of the Bush administration . . . I voiced some worries about what might happen if an occupied Iraq became a target for international terrorism. Wouldn't U.S. soldiers become sitting ducks? . . .

And what he said surprised me. If the terrorists leave us alone in Iraq, fine, he said. But if they come and get us, even better. Far more advantageous to fight terror using trained soldiers in Iraq than trying to defend civilians in New York or London. "Think of it as a flytrap," he ventured.

Andrew Sullivan
Flypaper: A Strategy Unfolds
September 6, 2003