We need to pay more attention to small but growing Islamist terrorist groups, such as the Caucasus Emirate and Boko Haram. The Caucasus Emirate and other Islamist terrorists in the Caucasus have engaged in numerous attacks on Russia and are now starting to go after Western nations and interests. Boko Haram, based in northern Nigeria, has shown that it will go to any lengths to weaken the Nigerian government, including attacking Western influence in Nigeria, exemplified by Boko Haram’s attack on U.N. headquarters last August.
Both organizations are threats to the United States, even if only indirectly at the moment. They seek to attack and weaken our allies, enlist many for their cause, and create fertile breeding grounds for the training of terrorists. At The Heritage Foundation, we recently released papers on both Boko Haram and the Islamist terrorists in the Caucasus, which shed light on these dangerous groups and what we can do to stop them.
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P. Forster
