washingtonpost.com’s article The Islamic State creates a new type of jihadist: Part terrorist, part gangster reveals that many if not most of ISIS’ European operatives/sympathizers are criminals. The jihadis explain away their violation of the Koran as a necessary “compromise” to fight the infidels – when they can be bothered. The proto-terrorists’ tendency to finance their activities by low-level drug dealing and theft is actually an advantage for law enforcement; they appear on the police radar early in their “career.” The WaPo article fail to point out a more dangerous possibility . . .
ISIS may team-up with Mexican drug cartels.
The plain truth: the Mexican cartels are multi-billion dollar international criminal syndicates with affiliates in every major U.S. city. Their tentacles and alliances stretch around the globe. China, for example, provides the cartels with the precursor chemicals to create meth for the American market – by the ton. Would the cartels form an alliance with ISIS?
The smart money says no.
Even without putting on a tin foil hat and examining the unofficial relationship between the U.S. government and the Mexican cartels, the drug thugs understand that there are rules to the game. The wanton slaughter of innocent life – so prevalent south of the border – would not be tolerated here. If you think the War on Drugs is a big deal now, a major attack or two on innocent Americans would bring down a shitstorm of epic proportions. Finally.
I’m not saying it couldn’t happen. I’m just saying it hasn’t. Then again, Mexican drug cartels are not like the Cosa Nostra. They are, in the main, a loose confederation of bad guys. The cartel-connected gangs inside the U.S. are not cartel soldiers per se. (God bless capitalism.) So it is possible that ISIS could co-opt, create and/or ally their own “gangs” inside the U.S., and then finance them through a working relationship with the Mexican cartels, who care about Americans’ terrorist problems as much as you’d expect.
If I were the U.S. government I’d be very concerned about the Muslim population in jail, where recruitment and indoctrination for and by criminals is rife. wikipedia.org:
State, federal and local prisons of the United States may be a contributor to the growth of Islam in the United States. J. Michael Waller claims that Muslim inmates comprise 17-20% of the prison population in New York, or roughly 350,000 inmates in 2003. He also claims that 80% of the prisoners who “find faith” while in prison convert to Islam. These converted inmates are mostly African American, with a small but growing Hispanic minority. Waller also asserts that many converts are radicalized by outside Islamist groups linked to terrorism . . .
Mark S. Hamm, a criminologist at Indiana State University, describes a phenomenon he calls “prison Islam.” This consists of “small gang-like cliques that use cut-and-paste versions of the Koran” to give a religious patina to violent and criminal activities. Hamm has identified five such examples since 2005, notably the 2005 Los Angeles bomb plot.
What does this have to do with guns (he asks, again)? It’s another indication that terorrism is a growing, multi-pronged threat to the safety of the American public. To your safety. Carry a gun. And expect more Americans to form militias of one sort or another, especially on our southern border. And the inevitable government backlash against same.