[Q]Since America began its occupation, Iraq has become the mecca for every angry, hate-crazed Arab extremist who wants to liberate the Middle East from the "despoiling" grasp of the infidels.
"Increasing numbers of Saudi Arabian Islamists are crossing the border into Iraq, in preparation for a jihad, or holy war, against U.S. and U.K. forces, security and Islamist sources have warned," The Financial Times said yesterday, quoting a Saudi dissident who noted that Saudi authorities are concerned that "up to 3,000 Saudi men have gone `missing' in the kingdom in two months."[/Q]
[Q]"The dynamics have really changed," said an administration official on the reconstruction team. "Now we're dealing with a guerrilla war, not terrorism."
Osama bin Laden was inspired to attack us partly by his hatred of the American military presence in Saudi Arabia. Now foreign zealots from Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Syria, enraged about the American military presence in Iraq and Afghanistan, are slipping over the Iraqi border to help Saddam loyalists.
Bush officials, who before the war also overdramatized the connection between Saddam and the Ansar al-Islam militants in northern Iraq, have now become spooked about hundreds of fighters coming back from Iran to attack Americans.
The Qaeda and Ansar zealots, along with old Baath soldiers and new foreign recruits, are intent on keeping Iraq in anarchy, even as Afghanistan also slips back into chaos, with a reconstituted Taliban fighting machine killing 90 in the last month.
The democracy dominoes are not falling as easily as Paul Wolfowitz and other neocons had predicted.[/Q]
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/08/20/opinion/20DOWD.html?ex=1061956800&en=3dd6c20c85a24df8&ei=5062&partner=GOOGLE
"Increasing numbers of Saudi Arabian Islamists are crossing the border into Iraq, in preparation for a jihad, or holy war, against U.S. and U.K. forces, security and Islamist sources have warned," The Financial Times said yesterday, quoting a Saudi dissident who noted that Saudi authorities are concerned that "up to 3,000 Saudi men have gone `missing' in the kingdom in two months."[/Q]
[Q]"The dynamics have really changed," said an administration official on the reconstruction team. "Now we're dealing with a guerrilla war, not terrorism."
Osama bin Laden was inspired to attack us partly by his hatred of the American military presence in Saudi Arabia. Now foreign zealots from Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Syria, enraged about the American military presence in Iraq and Afghanistan, are slipping over the Iraqi border to help Saddam loyalists.
Bush officials, who before the war also overdramatized the connection between Saddam and the Ansar al-Islam militants in northern Iraq, have now become spooked about hundreds of fighters coming back from Iran to attack Americans.
The Qaeda and Ansar zealots, along with old Baath soldiers and new foreign recruits, are intent on keeping Iraq in anarchy, even as Afghanistan also slips back into chaos, with a reconstituted Taliban fighting machine killing 90 in the last month.
The democracy dominoes are not falling as easily as Paul Wolfowitz and other neocons had predicted.[/Q]
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/08/20/opinion/20DOWD.html?ex=1061956800&en=3dd6c20c85a24df8&ei=5062&partner=GOOGLE