Ghastly

Are you a typical liberal idiot who believes we can coexist with Islam? If so you really need to read this article in the U.K. Telegraph. It tells the story of Islamic fanatics--whether Taliban or al Qaeda or whatever doesn't make any difference--who wrap pre-teen boys in bomb vests and then tell them that the explosion will only kill Americans, not the boy.

Now, I don't have any problem with adults wanting to be suicide-bombers. I'm not even opposed to teenage males who overtly and knowingly choose to sacrifice their lives for the Cause.

But I sure as hell have a problem with adults telling pre-teens Allah will protect them from the blast of the bomb the adult wants the kid to carry. That's some really sick shit.

Let me put it more clearly: If you believe this tactic is in any way reasonable or justifiable, you're a crazy, twisted, sick son of a bitch.

The mission was as simple as touching two wires together, the little boy was promised. The resulting blast would kill the American infidels – but God would spare him from the flame and shrapnel. He would be unharmed and free to run back to the men who had fitted his bomb vest.

Minutes before he was due to execute the attack, however, he realised the lies of his recruiters seeking to turn him into a human bomb.

"I saw it was a very black thing they wanted me to do," he recalled. "I began to cry and shout. People came out of their houses and asked what was wrong. I showed them my vest. They called the police who took the bombs off me."

Afghan security officials say the boy's story is not unusual. In the past year insurgents have used a wave of child suicide bombers, some as young as 10, since small boys can pass through checkpoints and security cordons more easily than men.

A senior Afghan intelligence official estimated that more than 100 had been intercepted in the past 12 months, including 20 from the Kandahar area in the south. The insurgents seek to exploit the innocence of their recruits and turn it into a weapon.

The largely illiterate boys are fed a diet of anti-Western and anti-Afghan government propaganda until they are prepared to kill, he said. They are also assured that they will miraculously survive the devastation they cause.

"They are often given an amulet containing Koranic verses. Mullahs tell them, 'When this explodes you will survive and God will help you survive the fire. Only the infidels will be killed, you will be saved and your parents will go to paradise'."

The Taliban denies using children as bombers, saying its battlefield code forbids military use of pre-pubescent boys. But Nato and Afghan security officials said the tactic is widespread. Child bombers have been used by the Haqqani network, a group aligned with the Taliban.

Boys are frequently chosen from the madrassas, or Islamic schools, in Pakistan's tribal areas, where poor families send their sons for a free education.

"They send them because they can't feed them sometimes. They have 10 sons and they can't feed them," said the Afghan official.

Gul Khan, who looks no older than 10, said his father had insisted he go to a madrassa in Pakistan.

"Each day they were preaching that we would tie bombs on to our bodies and attack foreigners in Afghanistan," he said after escaping and being arrested at the border.

"They told us the bombs would not kill us, only the Americans would die and you can come back to us."