Former Bush AG: It Was Jihad

In his April 21 column in the Wall Street Journal, former Attorney General Michael Mukasey said if we want a reason to relax a week after the Boston Marathon bombing we can take solace in the fact the two bombing suspects were killed or captured.

But he says if we want to look at this situation honestly, there’s nothing to relax about, because the Boston Marathon bombing was just a small part of a larger jihad that has been launched against the West, and the U.S. in particular.

Looking at things in light of jihad, Mukasey says our first concern needs to be how the FBI’s High-Value Interrogation Group (HIG) will operate. This group did not formally exist until after the failed underwear bomber had to be interrogated following his would-be terror attack on Christmas Day, 2009. Moreover, this group only came into being because Obama did away with the CIA interrogation program that would have handled terror suspects like the Tsarnaev brothers under President George W. Bush.

Mukasey wonders how well HIG will do in light of the fact that the FBI spent Obama’s first term changing their training materials, guidelines, and practices, so as not to offend Muslims. How now shall they interrogate them?

After all, according to Mukasey, the elder Tsarneav brother–now deceased–“is the fifth person since 9/11 who has participated in terror attacks after questioning by the FBI.” That’s not a good track record.

Mukasey says we should also worry about whether the Boston Marathon bombing suspect will be treated with kid gloves, as was Ft. Hood shooter Major Nidal Hasan. The heinous acts committed by Hasan are still classified as “workplace violence”–a description which Mukasey sees as a denial of reality.

Finally, Mukasey asks if these smaller terror attacks–small compared to 9/11–are “the new normal” in the U.S.? Have we successfully ended the threat of 3,000 dead all at once in exchange for 3 dead here and there at a time when we least expect it?

“Make no mistake,” writes Mukasey, “it was jihad.”