Al Qaeda in Eastie?

The Boston Herald has some of the better circumstantial public evidence about Al-Qaeda, courtesy of an East Boston street gang. Opinion leaders - especially those opposed to the war in Iraq - have made the rather dubious case that Al-Qaeda is unlikely to cooperate with those whom it disagrees politically with.

The Eastie gang La Mara Salvatrucha is now suspected of having links with Al-Qaeda terrorists. What could a bunch of violent Salvadoran punks have in common with Islamic militants? Their politically aims are very different, and the gang members are certainly not Muslims. The connection, of course, is money. If Al-Qaeda can pay, then they can enlist the services of any disreputable group, and possibly of rogue nations.

This is not new evidence to the CIA. But for those of us who are following the war on terror with increasing consternation, a warning flag goes up every time we see Al-Qaeda reaching out to militants of other stripes. If they can cooperate with Salvadoran toughs, they can cooperate with Pakistani nationalists ("We'll sell you two nukes if you promise to use one of them on India"), Iranian clerics ("We'll give you what you need for a dirty bomb because you're the lesser of two satans"), or North Korean nutjobs ("IslamoFascoCommunism? Sounds good to me!").

Every time Al-Qaeda twitches, it's another nail in the coffin marked "Good Reasons To Invade Iraq". We are now inextricably stuck in a conflict while our main enemy is gaining allies and moving toward our borders. We are no longer fighting in self-defense, and we have ruined our credibility with half the world. The leaders we still get along with are in places like Pakistan, China, and Russia. They don't blame us for invading Iraq; that's exactly the kind of thing they would do.