Watching this kind of exchange being re-played over and over and over again, I am very much tempted into thinking -- thank god, the independence movements didn't have to satisfy the stringent criteria not to be labelled "reactionary", "bankrupt", "nationalist", etc. and have to satisfy the tender consciences of some people. Else we would all still be under "tutelage", for even Gandhi would not have passed their scrutiny -- he was reactionary, wasn't he, and definitely nationalist.
By the way -- and I know people are aware of this, but the slippage in language is perhaps symptomatic -- there are plenty of foreign fighters in Iraq. Some are Americans and Brits, some are Iranians, Arabs, "Wahabis", even bad Iraqi shias. The last were "good" guys, emblems of the evil that was Saddam Hussein, until they turned "bad", emblems of the evil of reactionary Islamism.
kj khoo