The Flypaper Strategy

Whether it was by design or by accident, you could make a good case that this is a good sign, in two aspects. First, it means if terrorists are going to Iraq, they aren't coming here. And in National Security terms, that's goal number one right? Second, it also means it's getting harder for the Islamofacists to take their violence on the road. If the best they can do is attack Marines or the U.N. in their own back yard, their global reach is much diminished. And third (even though I said there were only two aspects), even though it's agonizing and painful to watch, it's a lot better to have these jihadists taking on Marines than schoolchildren in New York. As one subscriber put it to me in San Francisco last weekend, "The military is good at taking 18 year old kids and turning them into killing machines." It's true. And in this case, we certainly don't want Iraq to become another Lebanon. But if having the military there means the terrorits now come to us, instead hiding in our own communities, the "flypaper strategy" will make finding them and killing them a lot easier in the long run.