American Jihadis Douglas McCain and Troy Kastigar: From Losers to Martyrs

[DonViejo]

Michael Daly

If you can’t make it anywhere, you can make it there—that, at least, seems to have been the theory of Douglas McCain and Troy Kastigar, friends who ended up with ISIS and al-Shabab.

Why be a loser when you can be a martyr? That was the sad and screwy logic that propelled Douglas McAuthur McCain and his pal Troy Kastigar.

The same dynamic has driven other disappointed souls and threatens to drive many more, as ISIS and al-Shabab and their murderous ilk offer an exciting travel destination to those who are going nowhere.

A plane ticket can take you from jerk to jihadi. And if you can’t make it anywhere, you can make it there.

But while it seems an odd coincidence that McCain and Kastigar both managed to lose a front tooth in the course of their journeys, it is no surprise that they both ultimately reached the deadest of dead ends.

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http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/08/28/american-jihadis-douglas-mccain-and-troy-kastigar-from-loser-to-martyr.html

[hobbit709]

1. They're still losers.

[DetlefK]

2. ISIS regards foreign wannabe-islamists as too incompetent for anything but suicide-bombings.

Darn, I can't find the article.

Basically, these losers don't know anything that could be useful for ISIS. They don't really know the Koran, they don't know the language, they don't know how to maintain equipment or treat combat wounds, they have no survival skills for living in the desert, they don't have the training for fighting as infantry grunts... All these suckers are good for is getting blown up.

[Fred Sanders]

3. This is going to upset the mass media desperately trying to gin up fear in the homeland.