--mostly just a way to paint ourselves as some kind of virtuous "guardian of civilization". Bullshit. This is not a civilization attacking us, its a bunch of loosely organized gangs of religious fanatics and power-mad tribal nutjobs. Remember, they blow up a lot of targets in Muslim countries too, even some who are not friendly to us. Understanding that will help us fight them more effectively.

Oh sure, there is some small aspect of truth to it, after all, listen to the rhetoric of Al-Quaeda, but most of that is a recruiting technique to bring in cannon fodder. And Al-Quaeda as an organizing center to an international movement has been cut out--like a tumor. Unfortunately, it has metastasized into a host of carcinomas, some like that gang in Mali, who are little more than criminal gangs.

As for these particular guys, they probably did not have any outside backing or support at all. All this trouble may have been caused because one kid was a religious fanatic, or maybe it had nothing to do with Islam. Maybe he was a loser, or just couldn't get laid and he blamed it all on AMERIKA. So he brought his little brother in on it, and ruined his life too. These guys were here for 10 years, do you really think they were a sleeper cell?

Every time some redneck biblebanger blows up an abortion clinic doesn't mean its a religious war, and when the DC sniper and his boy were killing people from the trunk of their car it wasn't the start of a race war.

Even George Bush, who actually believed his Axis of Evil nonsense, cautioned against us turning the post 9/11 era into a Muslim-hating witch hunt, to his credit.

The point is that our complex society is very vulnerable at an increasing number of choke points. Pimply teen-agers with no political or religious ideology at all can now attack our computer systems and cause enormous damage just as an act of adolescent vandalism. And of course, there are other countries (and corporate entities) in our own secular technical civilization who simply choose to do computer espionage and warfare for regular ole military and commercial reasons--the oldest excuse of all.