I am not at all impressed by the smartness of this part of the column. And that’s an understatement.
He leaves out Karbala too !!!!!!
The reason why OBL wants the US out of Saouda Arabia is that he wants power there. Stop treating political movements that mention god or allah like other political groups who don’t.
The main goal for the radicals is NOT to extend their influence outside the countries where live many Muslims: to want power in these countries.
Turkey: put “the fear of god” in the moderate Turkish.
Morocco: stimulate hatred between Jews and Muslims.
Saoudi-Arabia: same as Turkey.
Bali: get the (Australian) tourists out of there and put a threat on the moderate Muslims there. Stimulate war between christians and muslims (Moluccas).

“But other recent targets of Islamic militants have been Turkey, Morocco, Tunisia, Saudi Arabia and Indonesia, not one of which supported the war or sent troops into Iraq in the after-war. “

Crikey. I think the West would have lost WWII if there’d been this shoddy an analysis of the various rivalries. Just like not every anti-Nazi group was motivated in the same way and all part of the same ideology --- De Gaulle and French Communists were hardly after the same ultimate goal, neither were Stalin and Tito --- so there is no grand unified “Islamic militants” driven by exactly the same worldwide agenda and all taking identical orders from a cave in Pakistan. Of course groups will occasionally work together --- just like De Gaulle might have shared occasional intelligence or even fed arms to the French communists; to infer beyond that anything but that both groups see value in occasional tactical partnerships is STUPID STUPID STUPID.