flypaper...or fly-creator?

Talking Points Memo has a response to the flypaper theory floating around about our presence in Iraq -- the theory that the fighting in Iraq has become a theater of the war on terror--in that we are attracting the terrorists to Iraq and fighting them there (you can see the analogy to flypaper). Marshall points out that this theory reeks of simplicity.

But isn't the main fallacy that there isn't some finite number of "terrorists" out there whom we can draw to one place, kill or arrest, and then be done with it? I mean, let's be honest: Is there really any shortage of these dudes? Are they gonna run out?

Do you remember Afghanistan? Not this 'Afghanistan', but the last 'Afghanistan.' The US-Pakistan-backed jihad against the Soviets made Afghanistan into a sort of jihad Club-Med where young Saudis could go for a few weeks or months of firing guns and fighting for God. (Of course, some stayed on rather longer.)

Good point, indeed.