“They can buy guns” ...
In a front page article in The New York Times — "How a Secretive Branch of ISIS Built a Global Network of Killers" — Rukmini Callamachi and her colleagues "pulled back the curtain on the [Islamic States] machinery for projecting violence beyond its borders”, covering ISIS recruitment, training, assignment of its terrorist minions to countries around the world ... and planning targets, building bombs and procuring assault weapons. She interviewed Harry Sarfo, a German recruit to Emni, a “core part” of ISIL that exports terror abroad who has been cooperating with authorities for some time.
“For America and Canada, it’s much easier for them to get [recruits] over the social network, because they say the Americans are dumb — they have open gun policies,” [Sarfo] said. “They say we can radicalize them easily, and if they have no prior record, they can buy guns, so we don’t need to have no contact man who has to provide guns for them.”
The Trace, an authoritative blog dedicated to gun issues, summarizes other reports that coincide with it:
Experts contacted by the Washington Post’s WorldViews blog said they believe it's the first time ISIS or a former member has shared its assessment of American gun policies, though there's been other evidence that Islamic terrorists are aware of the loopholes in U.S. laws. Ninety-five percent of the fatal terror attacks in the U.S. since 9/11 have involved guns, and the so-called “terror gap,” which allows people on government watch lists to purchase firearms from licensed dealers, remains open after multiple bills addressing it all failed in Congress earlier this summer.
Trace’s report highlighted a 2011 video by Adam Gadahn, a self-styled Al-Qaeda spokesman who was raised in California, where told supporters:
“America is absolutely awash with easily obtainable firearms,” Gadahn says in the video. “You can go down to a gun show at the local convention center and come away with a fully automatic assault rifle without a background check and most likely without having to show an identification card.
“So what are you waiting for?”
(Ed. correction: Purchases of fully automatic assault weapons must be specifically approved by the ATF. However, semi-automatic weapons are not and Gadahn’s description of the gun show loophole so cherished by the NRA is spot on.)
… Which are the Weapons of Choice ...
There have been 17 attacks of jihadist terrorism in the US since 9/11. Of the 28 deaths, 25 were due to firearms. (The other three were caused by IED’s along the route of the Boston Marathon.)
Dr. Louis Klarevas teaches Global Affairs at the University of Massachusetts. His specialty is counter-terrorism. He concludes that for sheer lethality, guns are reliable — they can kill efficiently. Moreover, they are affordable and readily available. In four of the six deadly incidents of jihadist terrorism since 9/11, the attackers bought their firearms legally. (The other two involved a gun stolen and one borrowed.)
As jihadist terrorists continue to set their sights on Western targets, one thing has become abundantly clear: Firearms have become their weapons of choice.
...
When all lethal domestic attacks since 2002 — regardless of motive — are tallied up, the numbers show that all but one involved guns. In total, firearms claimed 95 percent of the lives lost to terrorism in America over the same period. On the issue of deadly domestic terror in America, religion and skin color are not common denominators. Guns are.
... So We, Too, Should Buy Guns, Right?
There is a symbiotic relationship between ISIS’s plans to buy their weapons of choice locally, in gun-zone America, and the NRA’s marketing and development program.
Gun manufacturers, particularly those producing big ugly guns (as the Gun Rightists like to stylize assault rifles), must be getting ready to tool up production. It’s good business.
Simply said: The Bad Guys will be buying lots of guns, people. So to be safe, the Good Guys will be urged to buy more guns too.