The former director of MI5 testified at Britain's Chilcot Committee investigating the Iraq war:
'â??Our involvement in Iraq, for want of a better word, radicalized a whole generation of young people â?? not a whole generation, a few among a generation â?? who saw our involvement in Iraq, on top of our involvement in Afghanistan, as being an attack on Islam,â? said the former official, Baroness Manningham-Buller. '
Whether the Iraq war radicalized Western Muslims who would otherwise have avoided terrorism or whether it simply served as a useful cause celeb isn't clear, what is clear is that the war turned Iraq itself into a huge training ground for terrorists where before it was not. The U.S. waged war ostensibly on the grounds of safeguarding itself against terror but instead inadvertently created a serious terror enclave in the heart of the Middle East. It took an enormous expenditure of blood and treasure to patch that self-inflicted wound and it's still not clear if that wound is completely closed yet.
This record of unintended consequences is worth considering in light of the continued arguments for a new U.S. war in the Middle East. We have a decidedly poor track record in this regard. I'm not sure why the third time would be the charm.