American Footprints

Guest Post by Philip Korsnes

The Afghanistan debate often feels like a bizarre Mad Lib composed of scraps of historical analogy and far-flung case-studies. Every discussion of the way forward seems inevitably to turn on some other location or historical event. Some advocate policy prescriptions borrowed from the Iraq War; others warn of the echoing spectre [...]

Johann Hari has a fascinating piece in The Independent (h/t bf) that recounts his interviews with several British nationals that have made the journey from active participantsin jihadi/terrorist causes and back.  Hari’s quest to find out how and why certain people join terrorist groups, or espouse and propagate radical Islamist ideology, had been frustrated by the reticence and dissembling of persons active in those circles.  His [...]