Replies

I live in Germany, so I can address this issue.

So, “Junior” (like a thousand other young punks)...bought off on the agenda by his local Islamic scholar in some German town. They buy him a ticket, and off he goes without talking to dad or any family member. A week later, he texts them that he’s walking across the Turkey-Syrian border.

So a week into this deal...”Junior” gets basic training episodes via ISIS and realizes it’s a bunch of losers. The toilets don’t flush...they eat crap....they pray or talk religion twelve hours a day...a couple of wounded guys walk around with no leg or major head-wounds. So by day ten usually....about a quarter of the new guys are losing enthusiasm fast. They have to figure some quick way to walk out of the camp (retrieving their passport hopefully) and walk back across the border into Turkey. They get word to the folks in Germany that they really screwed up and need some help in getting back. The parents do this....but most of the time...the German authorities figure out the deal and arrest the kid.

The kid will sit there for hours and tell them precisely every single detail. It’s a miserable deal and he realizes how he was naive in believing this nutty garbage.

The Germans are trying to figure the way to handle this. Originally, they were going to jail every single person that came back....maybe up to five years. Now? There’s some talk that if the kid shows some realization that it’s all a fraud...maybe use some mental health folks and put the kid through a mental rehab episode....to make sure he’s not joking. Then try to make use out of the kid later in talking to other punks who might fall for the religious scholar garbage.

I would make a guess that after 30 days in Syria....more than sixty-percent would like to walk out and give up. But lately....they’ve been confiscating the passports and eliminating any chance to comeback....threatening to shoot them if they try this escape.