The Soviet war on Afghanistan in the 1980s brought extremists mostly from Muslim states to the landlocked country.
The invasion
made the country a safe place for terrorism to breed. The fact that al-Qaeda
network used Afghanistan as a platform to advance its vicious goals is clear to
all.
The war in the country led to catastrophe one after another.
The extremist ideology in Afghanistan gave birth to other groups whose
brutality superseded that of al-Qaeda. Daesh, also called ISIS/ISIL.
Abu Musab al-Zarqawi is quite a familiar name. Al-Zarqawi,
who ran a terrorist training camp in Afghanistan, went to Iraq to quench his
thirst for more bloodshed by brutalizing Iraqi civilians and soldiers after the
United States invaded the country in March 2003. In fact, the war on Iraq
spread the area of activity by extremists.
The chaos that followed the civil war in Syria also brought
extremists to the country from dozens of countries, including Chechens from
Russia. They poured into the country from Indonesia and Malaysia in Southeast
Asia to those in Western European countries.
The wars in Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria are an eye opener
about the dangers of extremism.
Now those extremists who used Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan as
their battlegrounds, may seek to find a way to Ukraine, especially as the
domain of their action has been greatly reduced in these countries. They are
adventurers who have thirst to kill and don’t care who is right or wrong. This
is in addition to far-right extremists from Europe and North America who are
already seeking to enter or may have entered Ukraine to fight the Russians.
In a report on March 03, Brookings said, “When foreign
fighters deploy, violence against civilians goes up.” It added, “Far-right
militias are already declaring they plan to exploit the war in Ukraine.”
Also, in a report on February 25, one day after Russia
invaded Ukraine, the New York Times reported, “The Russian attack on Ukraine
has prompted a flurry of activity among far-right European militia leaders, who
have taken to the internet to raise funds, recruit fighters and plan travel to
the front lines to confront the country’s invaders.” The Times used the SITE
Intelligence Group, a private organization that specializes in tracking
extremist groups, as its source.
Before it is too late and extremists turn their guns against
Ukrainians all must work hard to end the conflict. Failure to silence the guns
in Ukraine could turn the country like Syria, Iraq or Afghanistan.
