Look, I tend to skip the intermediate steps. I should know better.

The anti-war premise is that the war in Iraq is "creating" large numbers of new terrorists.

In point of fact, almost every person identified in the terrorist leadership was in that business long before the invasion of Iraq. Zarqawi is a good example.

If anyone is "new," it's the mentally-impaired, drugged, and ignorant cannon fodder recruited for use in suicide bombs. If they weren't in Iraq, they'd be in Afghanistan, or wherever else they could try to kill Americans.

Of the terrorist faction in Iraq (a small number compared to the Sunni insurgents), about half are foreigners, including much of the leadership.

Terrorists are entering Iraq from other locations. This is not "creating" terrorists. It's picking the battlefield. I thought the WWII analogies would be clearer.

If we had never invaded any country except Afghanistan, these same people would be pouring in there. The main difference is that they would be pouring in from Pakistan and Iran instead of Syria. The other difference is that a victory of democracy in Iraq is going to have a much larger positive influence on the Middle East and radicalism than Afghanistan will.

I guarantee you, if we had only invaded Afghanistan, the Left would be just as hard over against that war. A lot of liberals claiming they would have supported that war without the invasion of Iraq are lying in their teeth.