Escaping Iraq

There is one thing jihadists want more badly than an American pullout from Iraq: they want to thrive. They want to grow in size and influence. The reality is--and always has been--that for the US to stay in Iraq is to give the terrorists what they MOST want: the metastisyzing of radical Islamic fundamentalism and its attendant terrorist networks.

Leaving Iraq is the first step towards a victory in what the prudent always realized was going to be a long, Cold War-like struggle for hearts and minds throughout the Islamic world.

Below are the words of experts, commentators, and even America's enemies who understood that invading Iraq would be a bad idea or that staying there is making things worse for America. (Links are to quotation sources.)

According to an April classified National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), reported on in The New York Times, and which represents the consensus assessment all 16 governmental spy services, the Iraq war has spawned "a new generation of Islamic radicalism" and globalized it. (Sept. 24, 2006).

The Times article continued:

The estimate’s judgments confirm some predictions of a National Intelligence Council report completed in January 2003, two months before the Iraq invasion. That report stated that the approaching war had the potential to increase support for political Islam worldwide and could increase support for some terrorist objectives.

Graham Allison, founder of Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government and a Pentagon official under Reagan and Clinton-
"Americans are no safer from a nuclear terrorist attack today than we were on September 10, 2001. A central reason for that can be summed up in one word: Iraq."

The Council on Global Terrorism graded US efforts over the past five years to combat Islamists a D+.

Lt. Gen. William Odom, a fellow of the Hudson Institute and a professor at Yale-
"Most of what we are seeing [in Iraq], and in particular the communal violence, is an almost inevitable result of having ousted the dictator Saddam Hussein.... Iran's clerics must have been equally surprised and delighted [when the US invaded Iraq]."

Dr. Hani al-Sibai, jihadist, Dir. of Al-Maqrizi Center for Historical Studies, London (2004)-
"When the United States occupied Iraq, the border was actually uncontrolled. [Iraq] is currently a battlefield and a fertile soil for every Islamic movement that views jihad as a priority...."

Abu Mohammed, Iraqi Resistance Commander: [through interpreter]
I represent the Iraqi national resistance. The resistance is a natural reaction to any occupation.... Occupation is not for developing people and making them better, it is for humiliating people, enchaining them, and taking their freedom and fortunes away. These are my convictions that make me feel that this occupation is an insult to me and my people. Since I'm an officer, the responsibility falls on my shoulders, so I have to finish this occupation."

Saad al- Faqih, Saudi exile, summarizing al-Zawahiri’s explanation to bin Laden of America-baiting-
“The American mentality is a cowboy mentality—if you confront them they will react in an extreme manner. In other words, America with all its resources and establishments will shrink into a cowboy when irritated successfully. They will then elevate you, and this will satisfy the Muslim longing for a leader who can successfully challenge the West.” (February 5, 2004)

Mamoun Abdelali, Imam, Mantes la Jolie, France: [through interpreter]
"[T]he conflict in Iraq is one of many grievances, but it serves as a kind of orientation for young Takfirs today, who decide to wage a jihad because they've read in Islamic books that Muslims must wage jihad. And many young people have gone to Iraq. They left France and went to Iraq to wage a jihad, to kill Americans, many of them armaments experts."

Reda Sayem, German Islamic radical: [through interpreter]
Any observer can see that this war in Iraq is, in fact, a farm, a school to train graduates in terrorism and fighting and revive the spirit of jihad in the Muslim nation.

Michael Scheuer, Former Chief, CIA Bin Laden Desk, Author, Imperial Hubris-
"The invasion of Iraq was a godsend to Usama bin Laden, very literally, because it validated so much of what he has said and told Muslims, that the Americans want Arab oil, that the Americans will destroy any Muslim regime that appears to be powerful, the Americans will destroy any country that appears to be a threat to the Israelis, and they're willing to invade any Muslim country if it suits their interests. So the invasion of Iraq just validated everything that he's said in the past decade about the United States."

Jessica Stern, former National Security Council member-
"The war in Iraq has split the allies, not the terrorists. It has turned Iraq into a Mecca for international terrorists, and mobilized local Shiite and Salafi jihadist groups that had previously posed a minimal threat. It has facilitated connections between terrorists and those with formal military experience in Saddam's army, the lethal nightmare that the invasion was supposed to have thwarted. Antipathy toward the United States, not only in Iraq and throughout the entire Islamic world, but in Europe as well, has become a dangerous trend exploited by terrorists." (April 7, 2004)

Sir Richard Dearlove, former director of MI-6 (Britain’s secret intelligence agency)-
“America’s cause is doomed unless it regains the moral high ground.”