Something new to worry about

NJot just problems today, but problems for tomorrow too! A whole new generation of little Osamas! This, from Salon's War room (again).

...the Financial Times today has a story showing how Rumsfeld -- and Bush, too, of course -- has already done more than his part to strengthen anti-Western militants by handing them such a fine training ground: The cauldron of violence and chaos that is Iraq. Saudi officials, the FT reports, are growing concerned about insurgents who went to Iraq for training and military experience, and who are now returning to Saudi Arabia -- and have been found as far away as Western Europe -- now with finely-honed skills they developed fighting the U.S. in Iraq.

A senior European intelligence official told the FT: "The big trend for the coming 20 years will be the Iraqi jihad veterans. They are being seen as the extreme threat for the coming period. One key challenge is to establish who they are and where they are going, in order to make sure that the same mistake is not made as was made with the Arab Afghan veterans who fought against the Soviet Union." This is frightening because of the obvious ramifications for global terrorism; but as Juan Cole discusses today, there are also potential implications for oil and the world economy as jihadists return from Iraq to the Saudi kingdom...