MI5 worried about insurgency in Britian?

Independent Online Edition:

Intelligence chiefs are warning Tony Blair that Britain faces a full-blown Islamist insurgency, sustained by thousands of young Muslim men with military training now resident in this country. The grim possibility that the two London attacks were not simply a sporadic terror campaign is being discussed at the highest levels in Whitehall. Fears of a third strike remain high this weekend, based on concrete evidence supplied by an intercepted text message and the interrogation of a terror suspect being held outside Britain, say US reports. As police and the security services work to prevent another cell murdering civilians, attention is focusing on the pool of migrants to this country from the Horn of Africa and central Asia. MI5 is working to an estimate that more than 10,000 young men from these regions have had at least basic training in light weapons and military explosives.

My guess is that while they are wise to look at the possibility, there isn't much chance that a full blown insurgency, like what is going on in Iraq, will appear in Britain. However, occassional bombings seem likely for the immediate future, with an impact likely to be at least as great as that of the IRA in it's prime. Does that qualify as an insurgency? I don't know. In some ways, it is hard to justify even the Iraqi insurgency as a traditional insurgency. Despite all the damage they are doing, unlike other insurgencies or guerilla wars they don't seem to have any realistic political goals. While they might force the U.S. to leave Iraq, and propel the region into a civil war, they cannot seriously expect to be able to rule Iraq. Perhaps chaos is a good enough goal for them, certainly it would facilitate the establishment of terrorist training camps there, but it seems to me that the insurgency in Iraq is struggle for it's own sake. Political theatre performed with blood. In that sense, a similar nihilistic movement within Britain does not seem impossible. via Michael Totten on Instapundit, who also links to this post by a Lebanese blogger wondering why there is no Jihad against China:

Little says more about al Qaeda being a bunch of little punks obsessed with hitting the big guy (the US and the West) than their lack of adherence to their ideology. If al Qaeda truly wanted to make the world a better place for Muslims, the US would not be the first country they would attack. Muslims live incredibly free and profitable lives in the United States. And Muslims can be seen thriving in all areas of employment and life as shopkeepers, doctors, artists, and professors. But in China, this is not the case. Muslims are horribly oppressed by the Chinese government. The Chinese government is officially atheist and has no problem toppling every pillar of Islam. Chinese cuisine is packed with pork, and alcohol is a popular commodity (okay, that's not really a kep point). The Chinese government indirectly supports the genocide of Muslims in Darfur (albeit by other Muslims).

I suspect, what it comes down to is that Al Qaida is pretty sure the Chinese would not be agonizing about conditions at Gitmo. Terrorism can be defeated by governments who are willing to be more brutal than the terrorists they are combating, that is clear. I hope there is another way, but we should remember, if it comes to it, we know how to win.