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Does that mean we can all now agree that Iraq is no longer "the central front in the war on terror?"

The conflict in Iraq is drawing fewer foreign fighters as Muslim extremists aspiring to battle the West turn their attention back to the symbolically important and increasingly violent turf of Afghanistan, European and US antiterrorism officials say.

The shift of jihadis to Afghanistan this year suggests that Al Qaeda and its allies, armed with new tactics honed in Iraq, are coming full circle five years after US-led forces ousted the Taliban mullahs.

Until the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Afghanistan was the land of jihad: hallowed ground where fighters from across the Muslim world helped vanquish the Soviet Union in the 1980s, fought alongside the Taliban in the 1990s, and filled terror training camps overseen by Osama bin Laden. Loss of the Afghan sanctuary scattered the networks and sent bin Laden fleeing toward the Pakistani border region, where many antiterrorism officials believe he remains.

After the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003, jihadis from the Arabian Peninsula, North Africa, and Europe flocked to confront the US-led coalition in Iraq. Although foreigners have been a minority in the Iraqi insurgency, militants such as Jordanian Abu Musab al-Zarqawi played a major role in large-scale suicide attacks and kidnap-murders.

But insurgent leaders in Iraq are now mainly interested in foreign recruits ready to die in suicide attacks, antiterrorism officials say. Moreover, the conflict is dominated by sectarian violence between Sunni and Shi'ite Muslims. In contrast, an accelerating Afghan offensive by the resurgent Taliban offers a clearer battleground and a wealth of targets: US and other NATO troops, and the Western-backed government.

As Iraqis have solidified control of their insurgency, the movement of foreign jihadis to Iraq has "significantly declined in recent months," said Pierre de Bousquet de Florian, director of the DST, France's lead counterterrorism agency. "There is less need for them in Iraq, because there's a need above all for kamikazes and there are not an infinite number of volunteers," Bousquet, whose agency works closely with US, European, and Arab counterparts, said in an interview. "The Iraqi insurgency is now very well organized around Iraqis. . . . Those who want to fight, but not necessarily to die as martyrs, go elsewhere."

Simultaneously, Bousquet said, antiterrorism agents have detected a new flow of militants heading to Afghanistan

Losing Iraq would hurt. Losing Afghanistan would be devastating.