"The Iraq conflict, while not a cause of extremism, has become a cause for extremists," CIA director Porter Goss told a congressional committee yesterday. “ Goss warned: “Islamic extremists are exploiting the Iraqi conflict to recruit new anti-U.S. jihadists. Those jihadists who survive will leave Iraq experienced and focused on acts of urban terrorism."
What is happening to this nation when the CIA chief begins to sound like John Kerry?
Goss's comments sounded as if he has been reading last year's bestseller, Imperial Hubris: Why the West is Losing the War on Terror, by an anonymous CIA agent and Al Qaeda expert. (The role of the Iraq war in spawning new terrorists was something I discussed in Terrorism & Tyranny in 2003 and in Bush Betrayal.)
Goss's comments are perhaps the most serious theological deviation of the Bush era. Perhaps the CIA director has forgotten that positive thinking and blind allegiance are America's best hopes in the Global War on Terrorism.
