Good point tim.

A disconcerting stream of intelligence points to the "top tier" al-queda" being CIA assets in the first place http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/binladen_cia.html

which would indicate that this entire "terrorism" scenario was "made in the USA" from which the military industrial complex has benefited greatly.

It is blindingly obvious that the kickass policies after 9/11 would make more terrorists; the Middle East is now a terrorism factory with a growth rate second to none and superb export capacity.

The Iraq and Afghanistan wars helped accelerate a threat that would have build up inexorably ANYWAY in the muslim world, because Islam suffers from deeply entrenched problems, and that the many muslim-initiated wars all over the world will eventually bring the collapse of this culture.

The Iraq and Afghanistan wars at least put the heat in muslim countries themselves and plays the role of a magnet located far from western countries where islamofascist forces will be patiently defeated.
Muslims living in muslim countries will at the end understand that continuing to finance or "understand" islamism leads to total destruction. But they haven't payed the ptice for their support to islamism yet :
Remember that only when devastating destructions were imposed on german and japanese cities did the population in the Axis countries painfully understand that their fanatical drive was going nowhere.
Until today, the muslim world has been largely spared this sort of massive destruction, so muslims feel secure to continue with the hate ideology of islamism .

At least it's good to know that there are some government agencies in America that are capable of realising the truth of the situation; and that they are not continuing to propagate the outright lies of the war criminals Bush and Blair and their ilk.

While there is no doubt that Iraq has added fuel to the fire, there were many Islamist terror attacks prior to 9/11. The reality is that this war has been waiting to happen for a long time, in part because Al-Quaeda switched sides and attacked the US rather than doing the dirty work on behalf of the US. The Iraq war has merely brought this evil into the open.

Islam is going through its waking up period, with over 1bn supporters, many of whom subscribe to different strands - just look at Iraq and how the Sunni and Shia war is causing untold chaos.

25% of UK Muslims supported 7/7, so let us not forget that even though they are the minorty many Governments have been elected with just this amount of popularity :-)

We have stark choice, fight the evil of extremist Islam now, or leave the chaos for our children to pick up. I for one do not want to see any UK or indeed EU country fall into the evils of Sharia law, which is exactly what will happen if we continue to appease it.

David #7.

Most religions are quite evil, but it depends on how the majority of the believers follow them. For example the Catholic Church tells people in Africa not to use condoms, they claim condoms carry AIDS. They even had warnings to that effect put on condom packets in one Central American country. The result is that millions are now dying every year as a result of dogma. This in my view is also religious terrorism, the only difference is that there are no bombs going off.

We are facing a wave of religious extremism, Islam is the most prominent right now and has be far the worse moral code. However we also need to keep our eyes open to the same threat from other faiths. We have managed to avoid religious states forming in Europe. Although most countries come from the Christian tradition. I would imagine most people do not want the Church to make a come back, far less any form of Islam.

the author of the original article: Mark Mazzetti-9/24/06-titled-"spy agencies say Iraq war worsens terrorism threat"/nytimes, used un-named sources.
who is Nedra Pickler, in washington? did they write
this article for the Scotsman together? is Nedra Pickler his source for this non/secret part of a secret
document? i find it very interesting how much play
a story using un-named(cowards) sources gets, written by those who want to undermine the efforts
to stop any terrorist from killing as many non-muslims as possible.

Rod #8
You say only part of the story : The pope does not say that people must not use condoms, he says people must not have sexual relations before marrying and should stay faithful to his/her spouse. That's very different indeed.
And I'm giving my opinion as an outsider here : I am buddhist....:)

Islamic theology is based on Total Surrender to Allah in all ways,& the belief that Mohammad "absorbed" the Word of Allah in direct contact with Allah,which makes any questioning or debate with the Religion,impossible.All that the Prophet said is true,according to thier Theology.Now transfer all that into Politics & u have an Ideology that cannot in any way in any sense compromise with Countries that believe in Freedom of Choice, seperation of Religion & the State, & above all Personal Freedom.In fact the West is facing a real Nightmare in dealings with the unacceptable face of Islam

I'm completely surprised by this report, Not! All that stupid war in Iraq has done is to take our focus off the real enemy, Islamic extremist that want to kill indiscriminately. Now we have given them a rallying point. We look like invaders. It time to get some “intelligents” in the war on terror. And for me that means keeping Bush and his eejits out of it. Sandy is you the bloke that lives on the eastern shore of Maryland? It's almost duck hunting season.

#13--no steve, i'm the lass from Pennsylvania that believes you may need a proper education.

Sorry, Sandy, I meant to say "are you the bloke". The last Sandy keep talking about geting his shot gun out of the closet to shoot terrorist. Sandy, I did a spell and grammer check on your post as well and you may want to join me in a "proper education". Overreaction to Islam is not the way forward. It's a religion of 1 billion people, what you say may be true, but the west will have to come up with a policy that does not include perpetual war.

#15--my comment about "proper education" was not meant for your spelling or grammer. i was referring to your statement about" the real enemy,
islamic extremists". they are in every country, & were training in Iraq. after 9/11 Pres.Bush could have done nothing like clinton/algore did for 8yrs, & let the terrorists come at us again, here.
do you have an idea as to what Pres. Bush SHOULD
have done differently? i really would like to know.

#16 from what I have read there has been no evidence to link Iraq to terrorist post 9/11, that is, until we invaded Iraq on crap intelligence about nukes. In my opinion, Bush should have avoided Iraq, focused on Afghanistan and worked with world leaders to gather intelligence on Al Qaeda so that policing in a real sense could have been properly funded and carried out. Now we're seen as war mongers with a dubious agenda and an enemy of Islam. Who in the region will want to risk working with us now? His policies are not working, it's sad this admin. can't see their follies. It's time for a change. BTW, Sadam was locked down by US and UK fighter jets flights over the no fly zones. No, this Iraq war was stupid and no amount of spin will make me think otherwise.

Well, uh, lets see now, if I can remember.....
Was anybody happy when we pulled down the statue of Saddam? Was anybody happy when we eliminated his two diabolical sons? Was anybody happy when we found Saddam in his hidey-hole and tossed his butt in jail? There is no doubt in my mind that we shouldn't still be there, but "some" of the original objectives were met. Oh yes, remember, this current administration is on its way out. Can we hope for an improvement in the next one? One that will try to extricate us from this mess? I'm hoping that the majority of Americans are waking up to see the light and will vote accordingly.

"bill, england / 6:59am 25 Sep 2006 It is blindingly obvious that the kickass policies after 9/11 would make more terrorists."

My, aren't you the smart one! Truth is military enlistments and volunteer rates rise when a war is on. Because the UK and France declared war on Germany, and us Commonwealth folks from Canada to India joined - Nazi volunteers soared!

Bad mistake? Should we all have avoided war because initially the Nazis "only got stronger?"

It happens in every conflict, and once 9/11 happened and the counter attack happened, any body with any military background knew that was going to make - in the short term - more Islamoids, islamofascists, Salafi Jihadis, whatever they care to think of themselves as.

The alternative is to have Lefties groveling and apologizing to Victim race Muslims on behalf of Oppressor race Brits, Russians, Filipinos...for 101 Muslim grievances...and maybe then through submission to their anger, and seething almost rabid rage - they would accept Lefty apologies and reparations offers ...and..Peace...beautiful peace...would break out!

Yeah, that will happen!

The other thing is pre-Iraq, there were some 60 Islamic terrorist groups operating globally, not just Al Qaeda, as the story implies. And pre-Iraq, there was plenty of "self-igniting" Jihadis inspired by Jew-butchery, Indonesian Christian butchery, whatever. Now the Holy warriors and wannabes - some 25% of the Muslim population of your place the UK that support violence against infidels like 7/7, can get inspiration and lessons in bomb-building and head-chopping from the Internet.

What we have got from Iraq and Afghanistan is laptops, documents, and thousands of high-value terorist brains to pick. That intel leads back to their money, recruiters, and lawyers in places like London and the American ACLU. We get who their associates are, their travel networks, explosives procurement sources, and "spiri

TO ALL YOU DARLING READERS:

The OIL BARONS love it when they see so many of you scurrying about trying to make moral sense of the mess in the mid-east--they roll around on the floor, holding ther sides in wild laughter as they listen to you hurl accusations at on another regarding relgious and cultural differences.

These OIL BARONS have been succcessful in that they have drawn attention away form themselves as evidenced by your silly bickering-- which--has nothing to do with the main causal factor--which is --OIL, OIL, OIL !

#20 - Alex- at last some sense.

If there was no oil - we'd leave them all alone, in fact we'd build a ruddy big wall and keep them all out of "civilisation".

ASs it is, the barons greed for the oil, hence wars are being fought on their behalf and we have to swallow this muck about spreading "democracy and freedom".

Chris #19
Well said, Chris.
The fact is, muslims around the world have been until now largely spared the utter destruction of the type that was imposed on Germany and Japan from 1943 to 1945.
When Teheran, Damascus, Ryad, Mecca, Quetta, Tangier, Medina, Mecca and Cairo among others begin to reap the harvest of their support to the hate-ideology of islamism, they may begin to have second thoughts about it...

It doesnt take a rocket scientist to see that when you illegally invade someone's country, they will come after you. Every normal human being knows that Iraq war is illegal, immoral, and based on lies cooked up in the White House.

Is it any surprise that the Americans are not educated about what's going on in their name?

Look at the magazine headlines on the left hand side of this MSNBC article which shows exactly why the yanks are so far gone;

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3037881/site/newsweek/

#24 - LOL!!!!!!!

"My life in pictures" !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Poor yanks.

#24 LOL, thanks, explains it all.

#24 - that's why your average american has no clue about afghanistan, but could tell you all the colours of oprah's handbags!!!!!!!!!!!

My life in pictures......hilarious.

#24 - really not surprising - there's an election right around the corne, so the "news" can ruddy well wait!

Careful what you wish for....
The problem is no average American needs to know about Afghanistan. America is huge, affluent and the average Amercan doesn't care......... They don't travel because they don't need to. They don't actually need to import much but they do because they can afford to. Give it five years and the US industrial and economic machine will have reduced much of their dependancy on oil and they will have as much oil as they need from their own country. Bio fules, converted coal will be much more prevalent.
My view is they can stomach the situation at the moment because there has not be another 9/11
SO UNTIL somebody rocks their boat then it is best to be nice stay out of trouble I say. If the US REALLY got angry then all that would be left of the trouble maker would be a big hole.
What the oil producers (IRAN, SAUDI, VENEZEULA) need to worry about is when the US DOESN"T want their oil then they will have less revenue and will be in real danger of being flattened if they try or support any aggresive action in or on the USA.
Just now the USA is like a grumpy tiger - just imagine what it could do if it was really pissed off.

ooooooh, scary, Ken.

Do you think the people of the world would stand idle while the US rips holes in it? I doubt it.

The US has stuck its neck out and the rest of the world are tying the knot in the rope. The invasion of soverign nations in search of their resources, until you are no longer dependent on foreign oil, will not be tolerated.

If you think the oil barons will just roll over and accept bio fuels and alternate energy, then you're naive.

The US economy is in freefall, the housing bubble has burst, you're committed to unpopular wars on far away continents, a compliant media keeps you uninformed, millions of poor people struggling to make ends meet and a government that faces deep seated embarassment at continuing revelation s of ineptitude in all quarters.

You're right, the USA is like a grumpy tiger and when all the sh*t i've listed above finally hits the fan, they'll have their reason to be "really pi**ed off", as you put it.

It's time america reeled its neck in and focused on helping the poor of their nation reach a sustainable level of well being and bring down your several trillion dollar national debt while begging the rest of the world's forgiveness for the evil the current and prior regimes have inflicted upon the planet and the peoples of the planet.

Empires fall, Ken. Yours will be no different.

Ken, your views on the "average American' may be true or not. But, you have a point about the USA coming off the oil addiction, it's going to happen and Canada is already pumping more and sending it down for top dollar. I would not want to see the USA really pissed off, debate and caution would go to the wind. I my mind the biggest casualty would be the American constitution, that is, if the current nutters remain in charge. You're right Alan there is an election right around the corner and petrol prices have started to drop. No coincidence, me thinks.

Don't know what planet you are on Gerry. I work in the city and the US Economy is going gang busters - I just wish we could keep up. True, some house builders - notabley UK companies building in the US are struggling in some areas that were over developed. However, I see companies building in the south (excluding Central Florida) and mid-west doing rather well. Real estate in most areas still has modest growth of that equates to 8.5% per on an annnual basis (August figures). I see EVERY MAJOR OIL COMPANY including BP/AMOCO investing very heavily in US based exploration, coal conversion and bio fuels. This includes the big refiners and companies like Valero.
I see the sales of CITGO (the Venezeulan owned petro-chemical group) being hurt by Chavez's rantings. I also see strong investment in companies that can provide local ethanol conversion.

Gerry, LOL, I did'nt know our empire had acquired Camberley. I hope it doesn't increase the debt.

"Mandelson, UK / 6:57pm 25 Sep 2006 It doesnt take a rocket scientist to see that when you illegally invade someone's country, they will come after you."

And who gets to decide who or what intervention is "illegal invasion" ? Kofi and His Klowns at the UN?

Does that mean that any humanitarian intervention in Sudan veto'd by China and the Arab League so no UN "sanction" happens are as illegal as past interventions in Iraq or the Bosnia and Kosovo Wars the UN opposed because Russia wouldn't endorse it??

Any Leftist Human Rights NGO that calls any intervention illegal unless All-Wise Kofi says "Go!" are hoist on their own petards as they blubber about Rwanda and Sudan and demand "some country!!" invade and stop the slaughter "in the name of humanity".

If the Left is so process-driven that they advocate paralysis if any economic sanction, blockade, intervention is opposed by the Arab League, or China, or Russia, or America in the case of the Zionists - and insists on demonizing those democracies that do intervene -

Be prepared to watch the slaughter with your thumbs up your arses, Lefties....and don't whine about "Western cowardace allowing THIS to happen".

Evil Chris returns with the usual "lefty, liberal, blubber & bottoms" chit chat while thirsting for blood like a rabid, caged animal.

To kill or not to kill? Chris, that is your question.

Why can't we all get along?

I just deal with money and investments - I can't change facts.
The US market continues to be a good investment as long as you have USD available.

Gerry-30

You are the loony toon of the week.

I don't know where you get your information on the US economy. Do you think this junk up all on your own?

Unemployment in the US is at 4.7% (4.5% is considered full employment) Hope you don't have to ask why.

Housing dropped .05% last month (maybe because it drops after summer break and everyone tries to move into their new home before school starts) You think?

As far as our poor people are concerned they live a better life than 4 billion people in other nations. We help them help themselves. We are not like the socialist or communist countries. You work and you get paid.

As far as our national debt. What in the world do you know about that? How much is too much? You have no clue if our debt is in line percentage wise with other industrial countries or you would not be spouting off.

The US, just like other industrial countries don't beg for anything Gerry.

My last comment for you Gerry is that empires do fall but the US and our Western Europe allies have another thousand or so years. Deal with it.

Ken #29 & 32

Right on target Ken. It is what it is. We are what we want to be.

#19,35--well stated.
#29,32,37--thank you, but i'm afraid your "factual, common sense" comments are lost on many. but keep it up. the real world needs you.
#38,39--YOUR BRILLIANT!!!!!!

Well.....looks like our trashed economy is really screwed. We are only going to have the DOW at it's highest level for 5 years - maybe today. 100pts to go...
My 401K looks better every minute.

Gerry - just what are you smokin....... looks like you left reality in the 1930's.

Sandy #40

Thank you Sandy :) I get a bit tired of all the USA bashing that goes on. As you know, we ain't perfect but we don't do too bad.