According to the New York Times, the latest US National Intelligence Estimate reports that the US occupation of Iraq has fuelled terrorism:
The intelligence estimate, completed in April, is the first formal appraisal of global terrorism by United States intelligence agencies since the Iraq war began, and represents a consensus view of the 16 disparate spy services inside government. Titled “Trends in Global Terrorism: Implications for the United States,’’ it asserts that Islamic radicalism, rather than being in retreat, has metastasized and spread across the globe.An opening section of the report, “Indicators of the Spread of the Global Jihadist Movement,” cites the Iraq war as a reason for the diffusion of jihad ideology.
The report “says that the Iraq war has made the overall terrorism problem worse,” said one American intelligence official.
This is stating the obvious, but I guess that in a political environment where the Administration believes it "creates its own reality" (and orders dissenting reports rewritten to suit), the obvious clearly needs to be stated. America's war in Iraq is not making the world a safer place. Instead, it is exposing the rest of the world (but not America) to greater and greater danger.
Unfortunately stating the obvious doesn't necessarily have much effect in the U.S.
ReplyDeleteIt may be one of the freest countries in the world when it comes to information but free information alone doesn't make a democracy. You've got to be in receipt of it and use it for that to happen.