The Crusades-XIII.doc

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MISPERCEPTIONS
The Crusades of 21st Century have been going on for a decade; yet the gains and the losses of holy warriors have not been determined precisely and  because of that the observers have misperceptions about these aspects of the war. The contributory factors towards distortion of perceptions are numerous out which three are mentioned herein.
One, the war has not yet ended; therefore conclusive assessment cannot be carried out. Two, the periodic assessments carried out by the holy warriors have not been made public. Three, the analysts have resorted to filling in the gaps in information with their own wishes.
The list of misperceptions is also long; again only three are discussed. irstly, many observers in the !f"#a$ region, the most active front of the war, say the %& has lost 'ra( )ar and is at the brin$ of defeat in !fghanistan. *ven those boasting of supporting the Crusaders +wishfully assume that the %& has lost !fghan )ar. The reality is to the contrary.
*lsewhere, the Crusaders have made 'srael safer than it was ten years ago and that was one of the ma-or aims of the war. 'srael has become far  more arrogant to the etent that it has no shame in bloc$ing even humanitarian aid to the besieged #alestinians. &imilarly, spea$ing for  /ashmiris has become a cogni0able offence as is evident from the arrest of  r ai.
+emocrati0ation of 'ra( has tilted the balance in favour of 'ran and that is wrongly perceived as setbac$ to the %& in the region. 'n fact, that fits" in the Crusaders nefarious design of &hia"&unni conflict and for which !rabs are being armed through profitable deals worth billions of dollars.
*ntire 'slamic )orld, barring few eceptions, has unconditionally surrendered before the might of %&. The defeat is so comprehensive that rulers of 'slamic countries have abandoned all ideas of putting up any $ind of resistance. The word ihad has been accepted synonymous to terrorism.
The uslim )orld is virtually afflicted by third degree of sub-ugation  by Christian )hites. irst degree of sub-ugation began in seventeenth century when uslim armies were defeated, their lands con(uered, their  $ings terminated and replaced with representatives of /ings and 4ueens of  the *urope. This was forced sub-ugation, but under apparent acceptance the resentment simmered beneath.
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&econd degree began after uslim countries were granted independence in the wa$e of &econd )orld )ar, but their native rulers remained loyal to their old masters. ost of them accepted sub-ugation willingly and those who intended to act differently were coerced or  eliminated. This was indirect sub-ugation during which the resentment was  partial; restricted to the ruled only.
Third degree sub-ugation set in as result of -oint venture of the %nited &tates and its *uropean allies after 6711. This meant corporate coloni0ation carried out on the noble sounding pretet of promoting democracy and  protecting human rights in uslim lands. !ctually, it aimed at installing +democratically elected puppet rulers to serve interests of the )est.
This means re"con(uering of the uslim )orld by unleashing democratic offensive in combination with use of military means and clandestine operations where necessary. The li$e"minded politicians are funded to establish )est"friendly regimes and made to believe convergence of interests and thus willingly obey commands of foreign masters.
&ub-ugation through peoples representatives en-oys legitimacy and acceptability for the rest of world community. 't cannot be condemned and undone as it seems to have been accepted by the enslaved people on the  basis of democracys principle of ma-oritys right to choose. The submission of the representatives of the ma-ority implies total sub-ugation; willing and voluntary.
The Crusaders first create +representative rulers li$e ali$i, /ar0ai and 8ardari and then sit with them to wor$ out the modalities of sub-ugation. They dictate terms bearing in mind the degree of sovereignty to be granted. They then determine the type and si0e of security forces the sub-ects can have; trained and indoctrinated by the )est. The sub-ects re(uest for stay of  occupation forces up to a certain date which, of course, is always renewable. !rab &pring is the latest and refined version of this strategy in which countries are con(uered mostly with the money.
uslim unity has been made unattainable, even symbolic unity in the form of O'C has become redundant. 9ulers in uslim )orld are willing to serve the Crusaders instead of uslim masses. 'f anything that has hurt the Crusaders that have been the acts of +terrorism perpetrated by the non"state actors. These irritants are now tac$led by the %& using clandestine warfare.
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the cost of war has negative impact on respective economies. The latter will  be discussed separately; here a few words about the former.
The body"bags are no big deal in the )est contrary to the impression created by some analysts in this part of the world. 'n cruel capitalist system  based on materialistic values, human beings are saleable, purchasable, ependable and disposable commodity. 't is the poor who is saleable and the rich who purchases and epends or dispose them off. 't is the money which matters and the western governments are not short of the funds re(uired for  recruiting soldiers and mercenaries to ensure continuous running of the war  machine.
Therefore, it can be said that this aspect of the argument is only partly correct; only some minor allies from *urope have lost urge to wage the +holy war; the %& remains as eager as ever before. The reason is the war  itself has become a business enterprise, in which resources of targeted nations are plundered; the %& has made it corporate business to attract as many partners as possible.
The urge to plunder is part of )hitemans psyche; as was evident in recent rioting in ritain wherein a millionaires daughter was involved in looting. This urge was in her blood; the only difference was that her father  had accumulated +fortunes under the cover of capitalist system and she too$  the +law into her hand to do the same. The urge to plunder persists and so the desire to wage war.
't is all about capitalist system and democracy is the device to  preserve it. 'n affluent societies it is done through opinion"ma$ing process for which lot of capital is used in power"politics. 'n poorer countries the rich avoid the lengthy process of opinion"ma$ing and instead they resort to direct approach of opinion"purchasing as and when so re(uired.
The lac$ of urge for war is also because uslim )orld presents no target worthy of an all out offensive by the superpower. The choice is more or less limited to 'ran, though the Crusaders can pic$ and choose without fear of any combined reaction from the +%mmah. The voices li$e <addafi have been almost silenced and others li$e !ssad stand in the line of fire.
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'n short, it can be said that contrary to this distorted perception it is uslims who are not sure of what to do; they are afraid of uttering the word of -ihad what to tal$ of waging it. 'n the absence of courage and wisdom to choose the right course uslim rulers have sleep"wal$ed to stand by the side of perpetrators of death and destruction in 'slamic )orld.
Third misperception is that the war is no more economically feasible for the superpower and the looming recession has been caused by this war. 't is not so, the %& would have suffered economic stagnation sans the war; it would not have been easy for the wasps of the )est to compete with busy  bees of China in collecting and building +honey reserves.
'n fact, the war provided temporary relief to the military"based industrial sector of the %& economy. 'ra(i oil is in full control of the western companies, while 'ra(is have been left to bleed through sectarian and ethnic militancy. *ast Timor has been separated from 'ndonesia for !ustralia to eploit its resources. The oil rich &outhern &udan is now an independent state with Christians in ma-ority. ?ibya has been punished for daring to chec$ profiteering by western oil companies.
The war has always been a business for those who waged it and modern warriors have made it more profitable. One has to spend @investA to earn profits and the %&"led Crusaders are doing that and earning handsome  profits. Bow come it can be termed as financial constraint of any $ind 'f  #a$istan could fight this war for ten years for meager payments, why cant the %& do the same
The reference to #a$istan brings the discussion to the presently main theatre of the war. The !mericans prefer to call it !f"#a$ region, but it is  primarily confined to #a$istan. There are numerous misperceptions about the war in the contet of #a$istan out of which some are mentioned.
The first misperception is very significant and basic in nature. 't relates to the (uestion as to whose war it is. The patriotic #a$istanis disown this war and thus earn the title of anti"!mericanism and etremism. They merit punitive action and punishment and they get it. The !merican touts, lobbyists and puppets own it as +our war and they are called realistic and moderate. They (ualify for appreciations and rewards. The misperception about the ownership of the war lies herein.
#a$istani rulers installed through %& sponsored deal, openly own the Crusades and vow to continue waging it for indefinite period. 8ardari eploited !mericas war by stic$ing to the promises her spouse made to
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deliver more on war and by virtue of that he managed to enter the #residency in 'slamabad.
!E# owned the war to earn favours of the %& and crush its political opponents comprising religious elements; despite the fact that its founders have been $nown for their vocal anti"!mericanism. Today, its leaders are staunch supporters of pro"!merican policy. 4 has been endeavouring the same and was facilitated by the enlightened usharraf to establish contacts with the )est.
Of late, #?"4 has re"-oined the pro"%& gang of rulers and it soon used tric$s learnt out of the war. 't raised hoa of bombs and terror attac$s to save brilliant son of <u-rat who is accused of stealing, not cattle, but billions of rupees in E'C? scam. The two gangs led by 8ardari and Chaudhries from <u-rat ma$e a deadly combination of looters and thieves.
They own this war not for the love of peace and prosperity of #a$istan and its people, but for political gains. They believe that success in power   politics in #a$istan depends a lot on support of !merica. Those who disagree with this eplanation must pause and ponder about the bloodshed in /arachi.
't is not because of the misdeed of obscurantist militants; the product of mulla, madrassa and mos(ue. 't is the noble wor$ of enlightened moderate networ$ of +dons, dens and devils lin$ed to democratic system, which politicians vow to defend at the peril of their lives. The bloodshed is  perpetrated entirely by three partners of ruling coalition government who  pretend to be symbols of peace and moderation.
espite owning the war they $eep as$ing for paltry rewards from every !merican passer"by. 'n fact, they are willing to wage this war as long as they are allowed to rule the country and plunder its resources. or these  puppets, li$e their masters, the war @politicsA is a profitable business.
The difference is that their masters consider it fair in war to plunder  resources of the adversary, but #a$istani rulers loot their own country and countrymen. inancially, they have made the ?ender of the ?ast 9esort @&tate an$A as ?ender of the irst Choice.
They have divorced politics from morality on the pretet of  reconciliation. They love immoral ways and shun the rest. They say there are no permanent friends or enemies in politics. 'f that be true then 4uaid"e" !0am was lowest of the low politicians and 8ardari is master politician and so are <u-rati cousins.
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#a$istan !rmy and '&' were afflicted by this right from the beginning and because of that it can be termed as mother of all misperceptions. 't has numerous babies; legitimate and illegitimate. One may start counting from the notion of +frontline state and $eep listing li$e the +status of non"E!TO ally to +strategic dialogue, +#a$"%& friendship, +promotion of democracy, and so on.
They consider themselves as frontline soldiers of lone superpower, but the %& has been treating them as potential adversary. !fter rendering +meritorious services as an +ally for ten years they are at the verge of being formally declared as an enemy. Countdown has begun with introduction of   performance related mode of determining the aid grants.
#a$istan !rmy was employed by the %& as regular labour in war on terror. 't has been performing mostly the dirty and than$less errands after  having been enticed with prestigious sounding status of non"E!TO ally. The events since beginning of this year have forced #a$istan !rmy and '&' to be selective in performing various tas$s.
'n turn their employer was constrained to downgrade their status from regular to casual labour. This means there will be no fied emoluments. The  payments will be wor$ed out with the help of performance chart on rates determined by the employer. The relegation has annoyed the !rmy and '&',  but 8ardari"led +democratic government wont mind wor$ing as casual labour.
eanwhile, the %& has established an elaborate infrastructure for  carrying out multi"purpose clandestine operations inside #a$istan. 't was only after the shoc$ treatment administered through !bottabad and ehran  Eaval ase attac$s that !rmy and '&' wo$e up to the agony of what had  been inflicted upon them while they were in the fit of ecstasy in the lolling embrace of the superpower.
They are now busy in assessing the damage caused by the massive influ of C'! contractors and the locally recruited agents. Once the complete  picture emerges it will be horrifying. 't will reveal that !mericans have  penetrated all wal$s of life; armed forces, bureaucracy, civil society and especially the E<Os. On political front, the %& has created an army of  stooge politicians.
 Eo one $nows better than senior commanders of #a$istan !rmy as to how 8ardari managed to enter the #residency. Be has no shame in ac$nowledging that he is there because of !mericans and !rmy leadership
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had facilitated that arrangement. Be considers himself under obligation to deliver better on !mericas holy war as was promised by his deceased wife.
The !rmy leadership, especially the CO!&, carries a blot and burden of guilt which must not hamper their performance of basic duty regarding defence of #a$istan. !nti"state elements must be incapacitated and endeavour be made to balance out the sin of E9O deal by remaining on guard against the damage 8ardari could cause due to his commitment to his asters.
There should be no doubt that 8ardari would stand with the !mericans if he has to choose between his masters and #a$istan !rmy. !nd, the situation wherein he has to ma$e such choice may not be too distant in future. The undoing of the damage as urged above would undoubtedly re(uire elaborate plan and its sustained implementation to dismantle C'!s spying and subversive infrastructure.
!nother misperception was deliberately created by the %& regarding 'ndo"#a$ ties. #a$istani rulers were pressed to resolve all disputes with 'ndia, including /ashmir, through bilateral tal$s. any analysts argue that  bilateral composite dialogue is the only way forward for establishing peace in the region.
#a$istani rulers pretend to believe it despite $nowing well in their  hearts that this dialogue has nothing to do with resolution of disputes and instead it is aimed at preparing #a$istan to accept regional hegemony of  'ndia or at least reconcile with the status (uo favourable to 'ndia.
9esultantly, sufferings of !fghans have been reported fairly accurately  but those of /ashmiris ignored to earn goodwill of 'ndia. uring last ten years more than fifty thousand /ashmiris were $illed by 'ndian occupation forces and ten thousand went missing. #a$istans surrender before the will of  the Crusaders on this count has made /ashmiris to pay dearly.
Those #a$istanis who own this as +our war condemned the role that #a$istan played in !fghans war against the &oviet occupation forces. They term it a big mista$e committed by 8iaul Ba(. Once the ongoing war ends, it could dawn upon them that #a$istans policy in this war has been far bigger   blunder, but that would be too late to reali0e.
The -ihadis, the militants, or the terrorists are dubbed as anti"#a$istan and anti"'slam. The puppet rulers are not prepared to accept that these angry men are not against #a$istan but against rulers pro"!merican stance in the
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ongoing war. They are convinced that this war is waged against the uslims and that argument cannot be brushed aside.
'n the end it must be said that by owning someone elses fight out of  fear it does not become +our war. 'n other words, one does not become an ally by running cowardly away from confronting a bully; a global bully. 'n doing that one only lends oneself to be an easy prey.
11th &eptember, 2=11
TEN YEARS OF TERROR 
Ten years after 6711, many !mericans doubt they are winning the war  on terrorism, according to a poll released on 6 th &eptember which shows the country split on whether the %nited &tates or etremists have the upper  hand. The <allup poll said 5> percent of respondents believe neither side is trumping the other, compared to 52 percent who argue the %nited &tates and its allies are winning, while -ust nine percent of respondents say the terrorists are ahead.
'rrespective of which side has the upper hand, the masses in 'slamic )orld have lived under perpetual terror perpetrated by either side. This li$ely to continue as is evident from the recent statementG espite being on a  path to defeat since OsamaHs bin ?adenHs death, al"4aeda continues to pose a security threat in cities from ?ondon to umbai, %& &ecretary of &tate Billary Clinton said noting that the %& is ta$ing +seriously the terror threat ahead of 6711 anniversary.
&he said the death of Osama bin ?aden has put al 4aeda on the +path to defeat but +we must be clear about the threat that remains. +Cities such as ?ondon and ?ahore, adrid and umbai have been attac$ed since 6711, Clinton said. Thousands of innocent people, most of them uslims, have  been $illed in these attac$s and even the best of efforts have not guaranteed +perfect security.
)hile al"4aedaHs core leadership in !fghanistan and #a$istan has  been wea$ened significantly, the terror group can still conduct regional and international attac$s and inspire others to do so, Clinton noted. The threat has become more geographically diverse, with much of al 4aedaHs activity devolving to its affiliates around the world.
%rging Eew Ior$ers to be eyes and ears of vigilance in the coming days, Clinton said the %&, which has thrived as an open society, cannot afford to +live in fear, sacrifice our values, or pull bac$ from the world in the face of such terror threats. +Closing our borders, for eample, might $eep out some who do us harm, but it would also deprive us of new entrepreneurs, ideas, and energy. These things help define who we are as a nation and our  global leadership depends on them.
Clinton said !merica cannot afford to ma$e the mista$e of not adapting (uic$ly enough to new and different $inds of threats, as it did  before the 6711 attac$s. &he said !merica will continue to $eep up the  pressure on al"4aeda and its networ$ and +face down the murderous
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ideology that fueled bin ?adenHs rise and that continues to incite violence around the world adding that +precise and persistent force can significantly degrade even an enemy as elusive as al 4aeda.
The %& will continue to go after al 4aedaHs leaders and commanders, disrupt their operations, attac$ their finances, recruitment and safe havens and bring them to -ustice. +)e need effective international partners in government and civil society who can etend this effort to all the places where terrorists operate, Clinton said.
Beavily armed police were on alert in and around Eew Ior$ City on 6th &eptember after %& officials warned of a +credible but unconfirmed  bomb threat around the 1=th anniversary of the 6711 attac$s. 'n remar$s at a security conference in midtown anhattan, City police commissioner  9aymond /elly cited evidence found in Osama bin ?adens compound in !bbottabad after his death suggesting he hoped to stri$e on the anniversary. +or that reason alone, we need to ta$e precautions as if an actual plot is underway, he said.
+/eep in mind, we have threats all the time, he said on his wee$ly radio appearance. +On the 'nternet, every day, there are threats of people,  particularly around big sporting events and religious holidays, and around commemorations of things li$e 6711. !nd each time the EI#, with the ', we increase our security, which obviously we have done for this.
On riday morning, the mayor rode the subway down to City Ball to help assure commuters the city was prepared. +)e dont want al"4aeda or  any other organi0ation to ta$e away the freedoms without firing a shot, he said after getting off the train near the roo$lyn ridge. loomberg urged  Eew Ior$ers to -ust Jgo bac$ to wor$. !nd leave it to the professionals.
#olice staged a show of force at <rand Central Terminal, #ennsylvania &tation and the Times &(uare subway station because of a  previously planned counter"terror drill with rail agencies. The EI# formed a 0one around the )orld Trade Centre for a &unday observance that #resident Obama and former #resident <eorge ) ush plan to attend. !long with etra officers K the department wont reveal an eact number K the security also will include hundreds of surveillance cameras trained on the site, /elly said.
eanwhile, the %nited Eations riday mar$ed the anniversary with a solemn commemoration in the <eneral !ssembly Ball, music, poetry and a vow to intensify the battle against terror wherever it is perpetrated in the world. uring the ceremony the Eew Ior$ City &ymphony orchestra played
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music and soloists 0uri oyo and avid Or respectively sang &till ' 9ise and !ma0ing <race. 'nter"faith leaders read a poem by aya !ngelou, after which they lit a candle together, followed by a minute of silence.
The epartment of Bomeland &ecurity said on F th &eptember +There is specific, credible but unconfirmed threat information, as #resident arac$  Obama ordered boosted counterterrorism efforts. +)e have ta$en, and will continue to ta$e all steps necessary to mitigate any threats that arise, the department added in a statement.
! )hite Bouse official confirmed that Obama had +directed the counterterrorism community to redouble its efforts in response to this credible but unconfirmed information. ederal officials in )ashington, spea$ing on condition of anonymity, said there was a potential terrorism threat involving bomb"laden vehicles against either the capital or Eew Ior$.
!C Eews cited intelligence officials as saying the potential plot involved three individuals who entered the country by air last month with the intention of carrying out a vehicle"borne attac$ on or around the 6711 anniversary. 't said the plot was hatched by al"4aedas leader !yman al" 8awahiri. !lthough there was no immediate change to the official %& national threat level, Eew Ior$ authorities immediately announced sweeping etra measures, including vehicle chec$points.
! counter"terrorism official said intelligence pointed to possible car   bomb attac$s and added the threat information came from #a$istans tribal areas. *arlier, %& military bases had raised their alert levels, but officials would not say whether this was related to the new threat report.
eanwhile, %& &ecretary of &tate Billary Clinton on riday said that al"4aeda was behind a specific, credible but unconfirmed report of a threat to harm !mericans, notably in Eew Ior$ and )ashington. Bowever, she said )ashington would wage a +relentless campaign against it and, later this month, would set up <lobal Counter"Terrorism orum to gather officials to identify threats, devise solutions and share epertise.
The group, to be co"chaired by the %nited &tates and Tur$ey, will also include !lgeria, !ustralia, Canada, China, Colombia, enmar$, *gypt, the *uropean %nion, rance, <ermany, 'ndia, 'ndonesia, 'taly, apan, ordan, orocco, The Eetherlands, Eew 8ealand, Eigeria, #a$istan, 4atar, 9ussia, &audi !rabia, &outh !frica, &pain, &wit0erland, the %nited !rab *mirates and the %nited /ingdom, the &tate epartment said.
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!mericas response to 6711 shows that +you dont mess with the %nited &tates and that when attac$ed, +we will come and get you, efence &ecretary ?eon #anetta said on riday. +The people who attac$ed us on 6711 were trying to wea$en !merica, trying to hurt !merica. !nd instead they strengthened us, #anetta told an audience of police and emergency wor$ers.
The above etracts from the some of the news reports of last two days amply reflect the mood of the nation that initiated and continue waging a war of +holy terror on +fascist terror. This mood on the eve of tenth anniversary of 6711 is miture of fear and resolve, hope and apprehension, commemorations and celebrations and so on.
The observers around the world reviewed the ten years of war  analytically. Their views are certainly not impartial; nevertheless, some analyses are reproduced herein. These views have not been edited, abridge or paraphrased.
THE PRICE OF !,11
! review by oseph * &tiglit0 published on &eptember =D. Be is %niversity #rofessor at Columbia %niversity, a Eobel laureate in economics, and the author of reefallG ree ar$ets and the &in$ing of the <lobal *conomy.
The &eptember 11, 2==1, attac$s by al"4aeda were meant to harm the %nited &tates, and they did, but in ways that Osama bin ?aden probably never imagined. #resident <eorge ) ushs response to the attac$s compromised the %nited &tates basic principles, undermined its economy, and wea$ened its security.
The attac$ on !fghanistan that followed the 6711 attac$s was understandable, but the subse(uent invasion of 'ra( was entirely unconnected to al"4aeda K as much as ush tried to establish a lin$. That war of choice (uic$ly became very epensive K orders of magnitude beyond the L>=bn claimed at the beginning K as colossal incompetence met dishonest misrepresentation.
'ndeed, when ?inda ilmes and ' calculated the %nited &tates war  costs three years ago, the conservative tally was L3":tn. &ince then, the costs have mounted further. )ith almost := per cent of returning troops eligible to receive some level of disability payment, and more than >==,=== treated so far in veterans medical facilities, we now estimate that future disability  payments and health"care costs will total L>=="6==bn. ut the social costs
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reflected in veteran suicides @which have topped 1F per day in recent yearsA and family brea$ups are incalculable.
*ven if ush could be forgiven for ta$ing the %nited &tates, and much of the rest of the world, to war on false pretences, and for misrepresenting the cost of the venture, there is no ecuse for how he chose to finance it. Bis was the first war in history paid for entirely on credit. !s the %& went into  battle, with deficits already soaring from his 2==1 ta cut, ush decided to  plunge ahead with yet another round of ta +relief for the wealthy.
Today, the %& is focused on unemployment and the deficit. oth threats to !mericas future can, in no small measure, be traced to the wars in !fghanistan and 'ra(. 'ncreased defence spending, together with the ush ta cuts, is a $ey reason why the %& went from a fiscal surplus of 2 per cent of <# when ush was elected to its parlous deficit and debt position today. irect government spending on those wars so far amounts to roughly L2tn K  L1D,=== for every %& household K with bills yet to be received increasing this amount by more than := per cent.
oreover, as ilmes and ' argued in our boo$ The Three Trillion ollar )ar, the wars contributed to the %nited &tates macroeconomic wea$nesses, which eacerbated its deficits and debt burden. Then, as now, disruption in the iddle *ast led to higher oil prices, forcing !mericans to spend money on oil imports that they otherwise could have spent buying goods produced in the %&. ut then the %& ederal 9eserve hid these wea$nesses by engineering a housing bubble that led to a consumption  boom. 't will ta$e years to overcome the ecessive indebtedness and real" estate overhang that resulted.
'ronically, the wars have undermined the %nited &tates @and the worldsA security, again in ways that in ?aden could not have imagined. !n unpopular war would have made military recruitment difficult in any circumstances. ut, as ush tried to deceive the %& about the wars costs, he under"funded the troops, refusing even basic ependitures K say, for  armoured and mine"resistant vehicles needed to protect !merican lives, or  for ade(uate health care for returning veterans. ! %& court recently ruled that veterans rights have been violated. @9emar$ably, the Obama administration claims that veterans right to appeal to the courts should be restrictedMA
ilitary overreach has predictably led to nervousness about using military power, and others $nowledge of this threatens to wea$en %& security as well. ut the %nited &tates real strength, more than its military
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and economic power, is its +soft power, its moral authority. !nd this, too, was wea$enedG as the %& violated basic human rights li$e habeas corpus and the right not to be tortured, its longstanding commitment to international law was called into (uestion.
'n !fghanistan and 'ra(, the %& and its allies $new that long"term victory re(uired winning hearts and minds. ut mista$es in the early years of those wars complicated that already"difficult battle. The wars collateral damage has been massiveG by some accounts, more than a million 'ra(is have died, directly or indirectly, because of the war. !ccording to some studies, at least 13D,=== civilians have died violently in !fghanistan and 'ra( in the last ten years; among 'ra(is alone, there are 1.Fm refugees and 1.Dm internally displaced people.
 Eot all of the conse(uences were disastrous. The deficits to which the %& debt"funded wars contributed so mightily are now forcing the %& to face the reality of budget constraints. %& military spending still nearly e(uals that of the rest of the world combined, two decades after the end of  the Cold )ar. &ome of the increased ependitures went to the costly wars in 'ra( and !fghanistan and the broader <lobal )ar on Terrorism, but much of  it was wasted on weapons that dont wor$ against enemies that dont eist.  Eow, at last, those resources are li$ely to be redeployed, and the %& will li$ely get more security by paying less.
!l"4aeda, while not con(uered, no longer appears to be the threat that loomed so large in the wa$e of the 6711 attac$s. ut the price paid in getting to this point, in the %& and elsewhere, has been enormous K and mostly avoidable. The legacy will be with us for a long time. 't pays to thin$ before acting.
CAN THE US MOVE BEYOND THE NARCISSISM OF !,11
!rticle of <ary Iounge published in The <uardian on &eptember =DG 'n the immediate aftermath of the &eptember 11 attac$s the then national security adviser, Condolee00a 9ice, called in her senior staff and as$ed them to thin$ seriously about +how Nto capitali0e on these opportunities. The  primary opportunity came from a public united in anger, grief and fear  which the ush administration sought to leverage to maimum political effect. +' thin$ &eptember 11 was one of those great earth(ua$es that clarify and sharpen, 9ice told the Eew Ior$er si months afterwards. +*vents are in much sharper relief.
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Ten years later the %& response to the terror attac$s have clarified three thingsG the limits to what its enormous military power can achieve, its relative geopolitical decline and the intensity of its polari0ed political culture. 't proved itself incapable of winning the wars it chose to fight and incapable of paying for them and incapable of coming to any consensus as to why. The combination of domestic repression at home and military aggression abroad $ept no one safe, and endangered the lives of many. The eecution of Osama bin ?aden provo$ed such -oy in part because almost every other !merican response to 6711 is regarded as a partial or total failure.
'nevitably, the unity brought about by the tragedy of 6711 proved as intense as it was fleeting. The rally around the flag was a genuine, impulsive reaction to events in a nation where patriotism is not an optional addendum to the political culture but an essential, central component of it. Baving been attac$ed as a nation, people logically felt the need to identify as a nation.
ut beyond mourning of the immediate victims friends and families, there was an element of narcissism to this national grief that would play out in policy and remains evident in the tone of many of todays retrospectives. The problem, for some, was not that such a tragedy had happened but that it could have happened in !merica and to !mericans. The ability to empathi0e with others who had suffered similar tragedies and the desire to prevent further such suffering proved elusive when set against the need to avenge the attac$s. 't was as though !mericans were uni(ue in their ability to feel pain and the deaths of civilians of other nations were worth less.
'ts a narcissism best eemplified by former vice"president ic$  Cheneys answer when as$ed -ust last wee$ on what grounds he would ob-ect to 'ran water"boarding !mericans when he maintained his support for  !mericas right to use water"boarding. +)e have obligations towards our  citi0ens, he said. +!nd we do everything to protect our citi0ens.
Bowever perverse that seems now such views had great currency at the moment, following the attac$s, when many of the mista$es that would shape %& foreign policy for the net 1= years were made. Terrorism will do that. +Terror is first of all the terror of the net attac$, writes !r-un !ppadurai in ear of &mall Eumbers. 'f nothing else the ush administration had fear on its side. +The net time the smo$ing gun could be a mushroom cloud, said 9ice. +They only have to be right once. )e have to  be right every time.
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The trouble is they got very little right. road sweeps of people from  predominantly uslim countries resulted in the +preventive detention of  1,2== people; voluntary interviews of 16,===; and a programme of special registration for more than F2,=== K but not a single terrorism conviction. ! decade on the %& ability to crush al"4aeda still depends almost entirely on its ability to negotiate with #a$istan and doing a deal with the Taliban in !fghanistan, where last month there was the highest %& military death toll since the war began. !nd thats before we get to 'ra(.
!n effective response to 6711 that would have truly satisfied the !merican public in that moment probably did not eist. ! combination of  diplomatic pressure, targeted intelligence"led operations and a more enlightened foreign policy was what would have been and has proved to be most successful. ut following the attac$s, when declarative sentences were the only ones heard and those who urged caution and restraint were compared to Eeville Chamberlain, something more urgent, punitive and impressive was insisted upon.
*ven now, the case against bombing !fghanistan is often met with the (uestionG +&o should we have done nothing !s though anything short of a military response does not (ualify as a response at all, and as if doing something that did not wor$ and left untold innocents dead is better than doing something that would have been more effective but less dramatic.
issent to this logic in the %& was initially was -ust thatG dissent K  minority views dismissed, ridiculed or even vilified by the mainstream. &hortly after the attac$s !C news anchor Ted /oppel introduced !rundhati 9oy, 'ndian novelist and opponent of the !fghanistan war, thusG +&ome of  you, many of you, are not going to li$e what you hear tonight. Iou dont have to listen. ut if you do, you should $now that dissent sometimes comes in strange pac$ages P
ut as time went on the number of dissenters started swelling. The most important single factor that shapes !merican attitudes to any war is whether they thin$ they will win, eplains Christopher <elpi, professor of   political science at u$e %niversity who speciali0es in public attitudes to foreign policy. !s the 'ra( war floundered unity gave way to the acrimony, mistrust and mutual recrimination that characteri0es %& politics today.
The response to 6711 did not create these divisions K a year before the attac$s the presidential election was decided by the courts K but it deepened,  broadened, sustained and framed them for more than half a decade before the economic collapse. 't was the central issue in the 2==5 election and cast
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the 2==F election in terms of hope K Obama K against fear, cCain and #alin. 'nternationally Obamas victory mar$ed the countrys belated, more nuanced, more enlightened response to 6711, signalling !mericas readiness to meaningfully re"engage with the rest of the world and the treaties that govern it.
&adly that change in tone, style and to some etent substance has also  proved inade(uate. True, Obama $illed in ?aden, and his administration  plans to draw down troops in 'ra( and !fghanistan and has retired the phrase +war on terror. ut they have maintained many of the most problematic elements of that war, including <uantQnamo ay, etraordinary rendition and military commissions, while intensifying the war in !fghanistan.
eanwhile on the right, the hubris displayed by 9ice that !merica could simply bend the world to its will and whim has since given way to denial and occasional bouts of impotent rage. 'slamaphobia is on the rise, uslim has become a slur and 'ra(, apparently, was a success.
'n 2==5 a ush aide @widely believed to be /arl 9oveA chided a Eew Ior$ Times -ournalist for wor$ing in the +reality"based community, meaning people who +believe that solutions emerge from your -udicious study of discernible reality P Thats not the way the world really wor$s anymore. )ere an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. !nd while youre studying that reality K -udiciously, as you will K well act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and thats how things will sort out. )ere historys actors P and you, all of you, will be left to -ust study what we do.
ut thats never been how the world wor$s. !nd over the last 1= years reality has caught up with the rhetoric.
!,11 AND ITS $REAT TRANSFORMATIONS
Riews of Cliff &checter published on &eptember =6. !uthor is the #resident of ?ibertas, ??C, a progressive public relations firm, the author of  the 2==F bestseller The 9eal cCain, and a regular contributor to The Buffington #ost.
On &eptember 11th, 2==1, on what was a perfect morning"right up until the very moment a oeing D>D"223"*9 slammed into the Eorth Tower  of the )orld Trade Centre, ' stood on the corner of elancey and 9idge &treets in downtown anhattan.
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' was wor$ing on an election campaign K it was primary day in Eew Ior$ K and little did ' reali0e that politics, culture and our entire tra-ectory as a nation was about to change forever. ' had been alerted to the first crash by a friend calling my cell phone, but it was as ' was staring at the gaping hole in this Eew Ior$ City landmar$, in horror, shoc$ set in as ' saw a second  plane approaching.
' can see it all in slow motion these days K the airplane seemed to glide in almost effortlessly, and as ' and others around stood unable to move, a loud eplosion echoed through the canyons of lower anhattan as a fireball erupted that almost seemed to reach where ' was standing. 't was, for  lac$ of a better term, surreal.
or me, the -ourney forward from that day would be a difficult one. ' was born and raised in anhattan and was young enough that ' couldnt remember the city without those two awe"inspiring landmar$s. 't is what ' would use to figure out where ' was going whenever ' came up from the subway system.
' had to process the $nowledge that ' had been in the Eorth Tower  only 1> hours before the attac$. ecause ' had been delivering campaign literature to a volunteer who lived in the neighbourhood and thought to myself, +' havent been in the Twin Towers for a while.
)hat stic$s with me most, though, is that after seeing the second  plane hit, a lan$y, salt"and"pepper"bearded man standing net to me who was holding his bi$e at his side, saying, +this is terrible; were going to be at war tomorrow. Be wasnt far off the mar$. Be only underestimated the wars.
The result for me was that for a few years after the tragedy, any images or even tal$ing about 6711 gave me a deep feeling of dread in the pit of stomach. The result for my country, however, was worse. !nd were still living with it every day.
#erhaps that is why it is fitting that this past wee$ former Rice #resident ic$ Cheney has been on his media tour to promote his memoir, openly bragging about the use of torture, warrant"less wiretapping and other  illegal actions that he approved while in office.
't is therefore interesting that in interviews, one"time friends of the former R# turned antagonists, such as #resident <eorge B ) ushs  Eational &ecurity !dvisor rent &cowcroft and &ecretary of &tate Colin
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#owells Chief of &taff Colonel ?awrence )il$erson, have said that they dont recogni0e ic$ Cheney anymore.
ecause Cheney, as much or more than anyone else in the post"6711  period, used the loopholes in our system, the lac$ of nerve in )ashington and fear created by that day to transform this nation slowly into something we would not have recogni0ed as recently as the late 6=s or dawn of the 2===s.
)e became a harder people. ?ess forgiving. ore on edge. Eo longer  our brothers $eeper. ore fanciful.
!long with #resident ush, Cheney made it mundane to operate  prisons overseas, beyond the reach of due process. Bouse <O# a-ority ?eader *ric Cantor thought nothing of demanding budget cuts to offset the costs of helping those whose lives were destroyed by Burricane 'rene. The response of Teas <overnor 9ic$ #erry to a drought in his state is to pray for  it to go away.
eanwhile, #resident Obama, whose campaign of hope and change was eactly the antidote to the cultural angst that became the norm in post" 6711 !merica, has not only continued many of the ush !dministrations civil liberties violations. Be has actually added a few gems of his own that even ush didnt try, such as condoning the assassinations of !merican citi0ens without due process.
?i$e many !mericans, ' find myself having followed a long and winding road over the last decade, ending up in places ' truly never  epected, only in recent years coming to terms with what ' saw that day. Of  course, for many people, the economic crash was li$e a second attac$.
ut it is where my country has gone over this past decade that is truly unfathomable. 'ts important to remember as the 1="year anniversary approaches that we may have lost our way K but buried beneath many wrong turns is a national character that has been redeemed in the past.
'n the beginning of the movie <ladiator, arcus !urelius, before  being assassinated by his son in a coup, says to the man he wishes were his son, <eneral aimus, +There was once a dream that was 9ome. Iou could only whisper it. !nything more than a whisper and it would vanish ... it was so fragile.
&uch is the nature of !merican democracy K really, any democracy. To truly honour the sacrifices made that terrible day by almost 3,=== people living in !merica, it is a dream we need to get bac$.
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TIME TO LEAVE ATTAC'S BEHIND
!nalysis by * ionne r published in The )ashington #ost on &eptember =6G !fter we honour the 1=th anniversary of the attac$s of &ept. 11, 2==1, we need to leave the day behind. !s a nation we have loo$ed bac$  for too long. )e learned lessons from the attac$s, but so many of them were wrong. The last decade was a detour that left our nation wea$er, more divided and less certain of itself.
9eflections on the meaning of the horror and the years that followed are inevitably inflected by our own political or philosophical leanings. 'ts a criti(ue that no doubt applies to my thoughts as well. )e see what we choose to see and use the event as we want to use it.
This does nothing to honour those who died and those who sacrificed to prevent even more suffering. 'n the future, the anniversary will best be reserved as a simple day of remembrance in which all of us humbly offer our  respect for the anguish and the heroism of those individuals and their  families.
ut if we continue to place 6711 at the centre of our national consciousness, we will $eep ma$ing the same mista$es. Our nations future depended on far more than the outcome of a vaguely defined +war on terrorism, and it still does. !l"4aeda is a dangerous enemy. ut our country and the world were never threatened by the caliphate of its mad fantasies.
)e as$ed for great sacrifice over the past decade from the very small  portion of our population who wear the countrys uniform, particularly the men and women of the !rmy and the arine Corps. )e should honour  them, too. !nd, yes, we should pay tribute to those in the intelligence services, the ' and our police forces who have done such painsta$ing wor$ to thwart another attac$.
't was often said that terrorism could not be dealt with through +police wor$, as if the difficult and unheralded labour involved was not grand or   bold enough to satisfy our longing for clarity in what was largely a struggle in the shadows.
orgive me, but ' find it hard to forget former president <eorge ) ushs 2==5 response to &en. ohn /errys comment that +the war on terror  is less of a military operation and far more of an intelligence"gathering and law"enforcement operation.
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ush retortedG +' disagree S strongly disagree. ... !fter the chaos and carnage of &eptember the 11th, it is not enough to serve our enemies with legal papers. )ith those attac$s, the terrorists and their supporters declared war on the %nited &tates of !merica, and war is what they got. )hat The )ashington #ost called +an era of endless war is what we got, too.
ush, of course, understood the importance of +intelligence gathering and +law enforcement. Bis administration presided over a great deal of both, and his supporters spo$e, with -ustice, of his success in staving off further  acts of terror. Iet he could not resist the temptation to turn on /errys statement of the obvious. Thus was an event that initially united the nation used, over and over, to aggravate our political disharmony. This is also why we must put it behind us.
'n the flood of anniversary commentary, notice how often the term +the lost decade has been invo$ed. )e $now now, as we should have $nown all along, that !merican strength always depends first on our strength at home K on a vibrant, innovative and sensibly regulated economy, on levelheaded fiscal policies, on the ability of our citi0ens to find useful wor$, on the -ustice of our social arrangements.
This is not +isolationism. 't is a common sense that was pushed aside  by the tal$ of +glory and +honour, by utopian schemes to transform the world by abruptly reordering the iddle *ast K and by our fears. )hile we worried that we would be destroyed by terrorists, we ignored the larger  danger of wea$ening ourselves by forgetting what made us great.
)e have no alternative from now on but to loo$ forward and not bac$. This does not dishonour the fallen heroes, and ?incoln eplained why at <ettysburg. +)e cannot dedicate K we cannot consecrate K we cannot hallow this ground, he said. +The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The best we could do, ?incoln declared, was to commit ourselves to +a new birth of  freedom. This is still our calling.
SEPT 11 UESTIONS
On &eptember 6, the !rab Eews commentedG )e are approaching the tenth anniversary of 6711 attac$s. ?i$e / and artin ?uther /ings assassinations, there are still many doubts and theories surrounding 6711.
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*very day the formal 6711 Commission report is being challenged. The suspicion that 6711 was an inside -ob is gaining ground.
#resident <eorge ) ush cast the die when he propounded the theory, +*ither you are with us or against us, meaning if you are not with the %&, you are in direct confrontation and perhaps face regime change or  destabili0ation or drone attac$s. any undemocratic despots, including ?ibyas uammar <addafi and #a$istans #arve0 usharraf conveniently  -oined the %& to win credibility and respectability for their regimes under  this new dogma.
Bowever, 6711 had profound effect on %& politics and the way the %&  policyma$ers see the rest of the world. 6711 resulted in many civil liberties  being curtailed or suspended in the name of security and illegal increased surveillance on suspects which included famous public servantsM
 Eow we come to $now that as a result of 6711 many unholy alliances were forged. ost recently we $now that ':, C'! and <addafis intelligence services indulged in rendition of suspects who were tortured and eliminated. %nder #resident usharraf many so"called suspects disappeared in #a$istan and those who provided information were rewarded. any were  -ust trying to settle personal scores. The captured persons had nothing to do with terrorism.
)hile those 3,=== innocent lives which were lost in those 6711 terrorist attac$s are being remembered and mourned on its anniversary, nobody seems to tal$ about the millions who perished and were maimed in 'ra( and !fghanistan as a direct conse(uence of 6711.
The proponents of the wars including #resident ush and ritish #rime inister Tony lair, plus those neocons have never been ta$en to 'nternational Court of ustice to answer for the war crimes K the crimes much more serious and greater in number than those perhaps committed by <addafi, &addam Bussein and ashar !ssad combinedM <iven the way the international law is administered in the world, they never will be.
PEARL HARBOUR AND !,11+ A FLEETIN$ DAY OF
INFAMY
Comments of on )iener published in ?os !ngeles Times on &eptember 1=. )iener teaches history at %C 'rvine and writes for the Eation maga0ine.
2:
 
'f you <oogle +#earl Barbour and 6711, you get more than 5 million hits. 'n <eorge ) ushs 6711 interview on the Eational <eographic Channel last wee$, he said &ept. 11, 2==1, eventually will be mar$ed on calendars li$e #earl Barbour ayG a day never to be forgotten by the people who lived through it. ut on the 1=th anniversary of the 6711 attac$s, its instructive to consider the way #earl Barbour ay was remembered on its 1=th anniversary.
'n fact, on ecember D, 16:1, #earl Barbour wasnt remembered, at least not prominently in the ma-or newspapers and maga0ines. There was a reason why the apanese attac$ in 1651 received so little commemoration on its 1=th anniversaryG 'n 16:1, the %& was fighting a new war on the /orean  peninsula, and had -ust signed a security treaty with apan, which made it a crucial ally and staging base for the /orean )ar. 9emembering #earl Barbour could interfere with the nations new mission.
The spirit of the 1=th anniversary of #earl Barbour was best epressed  by the )ashington #ost in its lead editorial that day, which discussed the importance of apan as an ally in the struggle against communism in !sia. ecause of that struggle, +the apanese !merican alliance ought to be maintained in harmony, the editorial concluded. +'t is to this future rather  than to the past that thoughts should be directed on this anniversary of #earl Barbour ay.
'n other words, dont remember #earl Barbour. Thin$ about the communists in /orea instead.
The ?! Times front page on ecember D, 16:1, made no reference to the anniversary. The lead stories reported on new +atomic artillery that could  be used in the /orean )ar, and heavy snow on the ridge route. The second section did have a column on the #earl Barbour anniversary, which opened, +This is the day on which innumerable !mericans ... will be tempted to go about boring other !mericans to death with their reminiscences of where they were and eactly how they heard the news a decade earlier. Of course this form of boredom could be avoided K by not reminiscing about #earl Barbour.
The Eew Ior$ Times had nothing about the anniversary on its front  page on ecember D, 16:1. The news there was of a possible truce in /orea, and street fighting in Tehran between thousands of communists and +anti" 9ed civilians. 't did run an editorial. The meaning of #earl Barbour, the editors wrote, was that, since ecember D, 1651, +it has not been possible for  us to deny our historic mission in modern history K resisting +aggression. 'n
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16:1, that meant fighting the communistsG +Over vast areas where hundreds of millions of people live, the human spirit is still enslaved ... and the aggressors are as furious as ever Bitler was.
ut of course Bitler didnt attac$ #earl Barbour. The country that did attac$ is barely mentioned in the editorial.
!s for 1=th anniversary commemorations in Bawaii at #earl Barbour  itself, an !ssociated #ress story was headlined +)ar Eoises !gain ar  #eace of #earl Barbour and reported that +the sprawling naval base supplies men, ships and ammunition to todays area of combat in /orea.
?ife maga0ines cover story that wee$ was +Barry Trumans wardrobe, a nine"page photo essay. Time maga0ines cover story was about the rise of the 9eaders igest. ?ife did not run a story on the anniversary,  but Time did. 't reported that +for the foreseeable future, apan is solidly encamped with the free world, and +the %& must recogni0e that full and e(ual partnership is the only basis for mutual, long"term friendship in the face of a common enemy.
Thus on the 1=th anniversary of #earl Barbour, !mericans were told it was time to forget about what happened on ecember D, 1651, because we needed apans help to fight communism in !sia.
!s %C 'rvine historian *mily 9osenberg eplained it in her boo$ +! ate )hich )ill ?ive, historical memory is not fied. ?essons that seem crucial at one point can be ignored at another. emory, even of the most unforgettable events, is unstable and can be transformed by new circumstances. Eo doubt this is as true for &eptember 11, 2==1 as it was for  ecember D, 1651.
AL-AEDA ) A DECADE AFTER !,11
!nalysis by & 'fti$har urshed published on &eptember 1=; the writer  is the publisher of Criterion (uarterlyG #a$istans first 6711 was in 165F when its founder, uhammad !li innah passed away and the tremulous ecstasy of  independence that had been achieved the previous year proved short"lived. )ith the adoption of the Ob-ectives 9esolution by the Constituent !ssembly in arch 1656, the country drifted steadily towards the maladies of  mediaevalism based on the distortion of religious tenets. 'n time this melded with the ideology of terrorist groups.
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't was under these circumstances that !l"4aeda was formally launched in #a$istan on !ug 11, 16FF. efore this date it eisted as a vague nameless enterprise consisting of a loose agglomeration of -ihadi groups committed to the defeat of the &oviet occupation forces in !fghanistan. 'ts net -ihad was against the %& and this was later fine"tuned to include uslim countries collaborating with )ashington.
The second 6711 thus occurred in 2==1. The geopolitics of the world was suddenly transformed and the #a$istan"!fghanistan region became the main theatre in the war against terrorism. 'n the decade since then, !l"4aeda has been progressively wea$ened. There have been persistent reports emanating from the iddle *ast that with the death of Osama bin ?aden the outfit is tearing apart at the seams.
The most recent assessment about the fissures within !l"4aeda came after the $illing of the organi0ations number"two man, !tiyah !bd al" 9ahman of ?ibya, in a drone stri$e on !ug 22 in Eorth )a0iristan. !s <ulf   Eews commented, +if his whereabouts were revealed to the %& by someone in the ran$s of !l"4aeda, it could be an indication that discipline and morale in the organi0ation are being eroded by the targeted attac$s on its leaders. &imilar stories did the rounds in October 2=1= after rumours emerged that !tiyah !bd al"9ahman had been eliminated.
)hen the leader of the Bar$at"ul"ihad al"'slami, 'lyas /ashmiri, was target"$illed in a drone attac$ in the tribal regions on une 3, there were reports sourced to !l"4aeda insiders that his precise location that day was  passed on to %& intelligence by locals with lin$s to the *gyptian 'slamic ihad @*'A of !yman al"8awahiri. &imilarly, after the $illing of Osama bin ?aden on ay 2, a detailed write"up appeared in the oha"based daily !l" )atan saying that information about the courier to and from in ?aden had  been conveyed to the !mericans by a #a$istani citi0en loyal to al"8awahiri.
)ithin 25 hours of in ?adens death, !l"!rabiya reported that Iemeni"!merican theologian !nwar al"!ula(i had emerged as !l" 8awahiris foremost rival in the struggle for the leadership of !l"4aeda. !l" !ula(i, who has a huge following, had been enormously successful in recruiting operatives for an affiliate of the group $nown as !l"4aeda in the !rabian #eninsula @!4!#A. y mid"ay an increasing number of  influential !l"4aeda members were insisting that only a -ihadist from &audi !rabia should succeed in ?aden.
Three years earlier it was widely speculated that +!l"4aedas theologian hardliner and a member of its &hariah Committee, !bu Iahya al"
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?ibi, who escaped from agram on uly 1=, 2==:, would be the li$ely successor of Osama bin ?aden. On !pril 5, 2==F, !l"!rabiya described !l" ?ibi as +a very charismatic, young and brash rising star of !l"4aeda. Be was reported to have been $illed in a drone stri$e on ec 11, 2==6, but it later transpired that the man who died was &aleh al"&omali. On this occasion also there were suspicions that !l"8awahiris *gyptian faction had tipped off  %& intelligence about al"?ibis whereabouts.
't was under these circumstances that &ayf al"!del, a member of !l" 4aedas military committee and a former colonel in the *gyptian &pecial orces, was chosen as the interim successor to Osama bin ?aden. The disadvantage of his *gyptian roots was offset by his organi0ational abilities, eperience and military training. !l"!del had been under house arrest in 'ran for the past nine years and only returned to #a$istan a year earlier. Bis  primary role as the stopgap leader of !l"4aeda was to midwife !l" 8awahiris acceptance as in ?adens successor from the organi0ations affiliates around the world. This ob-ective, as is evident from the in"fighting within the organi0ation, has not been achieved.
!l"8awahiri is distrusted because of his trac$ record of betrayals and double"dealings. !fter his arrest in 16F1 for involvement in the assassination of #resident !nwar al"&adat, he disclosed the whereabouts of the *'s *ssam al"4amari which resulted in !l"4amaris eecution. !l"8awahiri loyalists are widely believed to have carried out the 16F6 assassination in #eshawar of !l"4aedas ideological founder, !bdullah !00am, and this year  his supporters are alleged to have provided information to !merican intelligence that resulted in the deaths of Osama bin ?aden, 'lyas /ashmiri and !tiyah !bd al"9ahman.
!nalysts are convinced that the power struggle within !l"4aeda is far  from over. The organi0ation is split along national and ethnic lines, with each group advancing its own candidates to replace !tiyah !bd al"9ahman and Osama bin ?aden. !l"8awahiri is not only distrusted but also lac$s in ?adens charisma and organi0ational abilities which had played a fundamental role in $eeping the networ$ focused. The fear of internal  betrayal has resulted in a continuous spate of defections, particularly among the ?ibyan and !lgerian members of !l"4aeda.
On onday, #a$istans 'nter"&ervices #ublic 9elations @'&#9A announced that &hei$h Iounis al"auritani, a ran$ing member of !l" 4aedas inner circle, along with !bdul <haffar al"&hami and essara al" &hami had been captured in 4uetta. This was described as +yet another fatal
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 blow to the outfit, barely two wee$s after the $illing of !tiyah !bd al" 9ahman. The '&#9 statement ac$nowledgedG +This operation was planned and conducted with technical assistance of the %nited &tates intelligence agencies with whom the 'nter"&ervices 'ntelligence has a strong, historic intelligence relationship.
e that as it may, what cannot be ruled out is that the +technical assistance provided by %& intelligence was probably information divulged  by !l"4aeda insiders. &imilar '&'"C'! cooperation has yielded spectacular  results in the decade since 6711. )hat is interesting is that several top !l" 4aeda leaders were captured in #a$istans ma-or cities, and not in its rugged conflict"torn tribal regions. These include the &audi national !bu 8ubaydah @aisalabad, arch 2==2A; 6711 mastermind /halid &hei$h uhammad @9awalpindi, arch 1, 2==3A; his nephew and husband of !afia &iddi(ui, !mmar al"aluchi @/arachi, !pril 26, 2==3A; 6711 facilitator 9am0i bin al" &hibh @/arachi, &ept 11, 2==3A; !bu ara- al"?ibi, who was accused of the two failed assassination attempts on #resident usharraf @ardan, ay 2, 2==:A; the planner of the adrid train bomb attac$ in 2==5 and the ?ondon  bombings of 2==:, ustafa Easar @4uetta, October 2==:A; 2==2 ali  bombing accomplice %mar #ate$ @!bbottabad, arch 26, 2=11A; and Iemeni national !bu &ohaib al"a$$i @/arachi, ay 1D, 2=11A.
The !rab &pring uprisings which have resulted in the toppling of  long"entrenched dictatorships in *gypt, Tunisia and ?ibya and destabili0ed the regimes in Iemen, &yria and ahrain have been fatal to !l"4aedas ideological narrative of establishment of a caliphate. !bu Iahya al"?ibi appealed to his countrymen on arch 12 to overthrow 4addafi and establish 'slamic rule and !l"8awahiris call to his fellow"*gyptians to introduce his interpretation of the &hariah have not been heeded. 't is freedom reinforced  by social and economic -ustice, not !l"4aedas mediaeval distortions of  religion, that lie at the heart of the !rab upheavals.
The story alters radically in #a$istan. Ten years after 6711, !l"4aeda may have been wea$ened but its murderous ideology still prevails. Riolent  bigotry in the name of religion is ascendant and <eorge ernard &haws warning +eware of false $nowledge; it is more dangerous than ignorance suddenly rings true. The ecstatic rhapsody of freedom that prevailed in 165D has faded and is now a mere echo of someone elses music.
WE*RE ALL TO BLAME !,11 SPECIAL
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9eview by 9obert Bathaway published on &eptember 1=. The writer directs the !sia #rogramme at the )oodrow )ilson 'nternational Centre for &cholars in )ashington, C.
This wee$end !mericans will pause from their usual &unday morning activities to remember the horror of that &eptember morn ten years ago, when four hi-ac$ed airliners cruelly shattered their comfortable sense of  invulnerability. +*verything has changed, ran the oft"repeated refrain in the days and wee$s following the &eptember 11 attac$s. )ell, not really.
To be sure, the decade since 6711 has witnessed sweeping transformations, in both the %nited &tates and #a$istan. or the 2,6DD people from DD countries @including #a$istanA whose lives were so unepectedly snuffed out that morning, and for their families, everything had changed. *vents at home and abroad since then have led !mericans to (uestion what ten years ago were unchallenged verities. The %nited &tates is in some respects a humbled nation, less confident of its power, less certain of its future.
#a$istan too is a dramatically different country than ten years ago. Riolence K including uslim against uslim, #a$istani against #a$istani K  has eploded. ! decade ago, suicide bombings in #a$istan were virtually unheard of; since 6711, according to statistics compiled by the &outh !sia Terrorism #ortal @&!T#A, 2F6 suicide bombings have $illed more than 5,>== #a$istanis. Terrorist violence of all $inds has $illed 11,5D: #a$istani civilians and 3,F6= security personnel over the past ten years.
'n a multitude of other ways as well, #a$istan is a changed and, for  many, a less happy place. !fter a growth spurt for four or five years  beginning in 2==3, the countrys economy today is stagnating, with minimal growth, rising inflation, roaring un" and under"employment, lagging  productivity, and low levels of foreign investment. Class divisions are widening, economic safety nets shrin$ing. 'nstitutions appear even more  bro$en than in the past, while corruption seems more pronounced than ever.
ut the idea that the &eptember 11 attac$s redefined history or  +changed everything for either the %nited &tates or #a$istan is nonsense. The challenges that bedevil #a$istanis today are in most instances the identical ones that frustrated them ten years ago. <ood -obs are difficult to find. &chools fail to educate. #ower shortages stifle the economy and cause  personal inconvenience. ustice is fre(uently delayed or altogether denied. The political system is uncaring and unresponsive. #ublic servants seem
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interested only in serving themselves. Eone of this is new, or the result of  6711.
#a$istanis often err in attributing most of the unfortunate developments of the past decade to the !merican response to the 6711 attac$s. )hile the %& invasion of !fghanistan has clearly produced unfortunate conse(uences for #a$istan, only some of that countrys ills can  be lin$ed to )ashingtons war on terrorism. any K growing food insecurity, for instance, or the countrys failing public health system K stem instead from unwise decisions or decades of neglect.
This is true even of the widespread violence wrac$ing the country. Consider the staggering bloodshed in /arachi, where security, according to the head of 9anger forces in &indh, is worse even than in )a0iristan. /arachis violence is not simply a development arising in recent years, nor  attributable only to the influ of #ashtuns from the unsettled tribal belt. Todays carnage has both roots and precedents in pre"6711 /arachi.
&imilarly, suicide bombings assumed epidemic proportions in #a$istan not in late 2==1 or 2==2, but only after #resident usharraf sent the army into the 9ed os(ue in mid"2==D. 'n 2==>, the year before the 9ed os(ue assault, there were only seven suicide bombings in the country; by 2==F, this number had shot up to :6. 't is simply too simplistic to blame #a$istans suicide bombings on the !merican invasion of !fghanistan.
Other forms of violence have actually declined since &eptember 11. 'ncidents of sectarian violence today are dwarfed by the years before 6711. !gain using &!T# data, #a$istan suffered 5== incidents of sectarian violence in the three years preceding 2==1; so far this year, there have been only 1> comparable incidents of sectarian violence.
'n other words, it may be reassuring but it is wrong"headed to loo$   bac$ on the period prior to the &eptember 11 attac$s as a secure, prosperous, stable era. &uch a practice fails to account for the far more comple mosaic of the past. 't also ignores long decades of poor choices by several generations of #a$istani leaders. or instance, the same groups that are now slaughtering innocent #a$istanis were in an earlier day created and nurtured  by the #a$istani security establishment. !nd recall that #a$istan suffered under a succession of incompetent and corrupt governments in the 166=s,  before !merica launched its war on terrorism.
&hould #a$istanis succumb to the temptation of blaming the %nited &tates for all their troubles, they would also neglect the astounding tolerance for misgovernment they have ehibited over the decades. #a$istans leaders
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have failed the country, but so too have #a$istani voters, who continue to cede power to the same discredited politicians and parties.
)hat is perhaps most stri$ing about #a$istani views, however, is the willful self"deceit many #a$istanis embrace. 'n the face of all evidence to the contrary, many more #a$istanis believe the %nited &tates was behind the 6711 attac$s than blame !l"4aeda. &imilarly, large ma-orities of #a$istanis are convinced that if only !merica would leave !fghanistan, #a$istan would  be rid of the suicide bombings and terrorist attac$s that have plagued it in recent years. 'ts a comforting thought, but not li$ely.
Of course it is easy and even satisfying to blame !mericas war on terror for all #a$istans troubles. ut this is sheer folly. )orse, it is dangerous. oing so encourages #a$istan to ignore its own responsibility for  its problems. ore importantly, by misdiagnosing their ills, #a$istanis will  be less able to devise appropriate strategies for overcoming their difficulties.
!lthough the 6711 terrorists struc$ !merican targets, #a$istan too has suffered as a result. oreover, the tactics that )ashington has embraced to fight !l"4aeda and its Taliban friends K drone stri$es, for instance K have  brought additional hardship and destruction to #a$istan.
*ven so, #a$istanis must not now permit the fallout from &eptember  11 to blind them to the true nature of the challenges they face. )ere they to ma$e this mista$e, the 6711 hi-ac$ers would not have attac$ed only the %nited &tates. They would have grievously damaged #a$istan as well, and eacted a horrific price on #a$istanis and their future.
MARCHIN$ TO A MELTDOWN
Riews of !shley Tellis published on &eptember 1=. The writer is a senior associate at the Carnegie *ndowment for 'nternational #eace and has served on the Eational &ecurity Council staff as special assistant to the %&  president.
Ten years after the 6711 attac$s, %&"#a$istani relations have reached a nadir. !merican policyma$ers charge that the #a$istani military has been aiding and abetting the very enemies both countries are purportedly fighting. The #a$istan !rmy and the 'nter"&ervices 'ntelligence @'&'A, in turn, accuse )ashington of disregarding both their nations sacrifices and its strategic interests, and in the process riding roughshod over #a$istans sovereignty and self"respect. On both sides, corrosive accusations about duplicity and
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 betrayal are commonplace; even as each bends bac$wards to publicly  proclaim an alliance against global terrorism.
'n retrospect, it is ironic that the tragedy of &eptember 11, 2==1 K the very event that rescued the %&"#a$istani ties from their earlier morass K  should have engendered the events that have now ta$en the bilateral relations to their deepest crisis. ut it should not be surprisingG that the %&" #a$istani partnership has been steadily marching to a meltdown ever since it was resuscitated, than$s to divergent ob-ectives, poor alternatives, and endless illusions.
or an alliance ostensibly cemented by common foes, it is surprising how divergent the %& and #a$istani ob-ectives in the war on terror have  been K from the very beginning. To be sure, 'slamabad never sought a role in this conflict. 't was brought into it, $ic$ing and screaming, against its will. On &eptember 12, 2==1, the ush administration forced <eneral #erve0 usharraf to sacrifice #a$istans clients in !fghanistan in order to support the %& military campaign against the Taliban and !l"4aeda.
usharraf responded by confronting !l"4aeda K an organi0ation that did little for #a$istans strategic interests K while protecting the Taliban K  #a$istans investment that promised security along its western frontier. <iven the success of Operation *nduring reedom, !merican policyma$ers cared little about usharrafs choiceG the Taliban were viewed as defeated stragglers who would never again trouble the %nited &tates or its allies in /abul.
'nstead, )ashington remained fiated for understandable reasons on !l"4aeda. 't was also concerned deeply about #a$istan K not the country as much as its nuclear weapons, which the %& policyma$ers feared could fall into terrorist hands with disastrous conse(uences.
The solution to these dangers turned out to be usharraf. ?i$e many  before him, the glib dictator shrewdly si0ed up the %nited &tates. Be used the substantial %& assistance that had been offered to #a$istan to strengthen his own position domestically, rearm the wasting #a$istani military, and wage a campaign against !l"4aeda and some domestic sectarian groups K all the while carefully protecting the !fghan Taliban and the anti"'ndian -ihadi groups because of their value for #a$istans strategic interests.
This selective counterterrorism wor$ed as long as #a$istan continued to apprehend high value !l"4aeda targets and )ashington did not care about the other groups protected by #a$istan. !lthough the %nited &tates was aware of '&'s active support for the Taliban resurgence as early as 2==3 and
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the anti"'ndian -ihadis even earlier, these activities did not receive serious attention so long as !fghanistan remained stable and 'ndo"#a$istani crises were avoided.
)hen troubles with 'ndia threatened to spin out of control, the %nited &tates pressed #a$istan to crac$ down on groups such as ?ash$ar"e"Taiba @?eTA. ut the real strains only emerged when the #a$istani bac$ing of the 4uetta &hura began to dangerously undermine %& military operations in !fghanistan. This collision, which has grown in intensity since 2==>, finally  put to bed the internal %& government debate about whether #a$istani support for -ihadi groups was merely a +rogue '&' operation or the considered policy of #a$istans +deep state.
)hen the intelligence overwhelmingly confirmed the latter, !merican  policyma$ers were forced to confront the reality they had earlier wished awayG #a$istan, a supposedly committed ally in the war on terrorism was also !mericas inveterate adversary. 't accepted the substantial %& financial and material assistance to target enemies that threatened #a$istan, even as it aided other groups that attac$ed !merican and allied citi0ens in !fghanistan and elsewhere.
This crafty strategy derived from deeply divergent ob-ectivesG The %nited &tates sought to eradicate !l"4aeda and the Taliban because they represented violent etremist threats; the #a$istani military sought to protect at least the latter because it served the abiding rivalry with !fghanistan and 'ndia. The persistence of this policy over an entire decade led increasingly to unilateral !merican operations inside #a$istan, a deepening distrust of the #a$istan !rmy and especially the '&', and a hardening %& conviction of  #a$istani perfidy in regards to counterterrorism.
The !merican reali0ation that #a$istani strategic ob-ectives differed from those of the %nited &tates nevertheless failed to produce any dramatic alteration in overall policy because few alternatives offered a better chance of success. The %nited &tates remained reliant on #a$istan for access and the security of its ground lines of communication into !fghanistan. !nd #a$istani cooperation against !l"4aeda was indispensable.
Conse(uently, )ashington continued to solicit #a$istani cooperation through persistent bribery in the hope that the #a$istan !rmys policies might change. The %nited &tates, however, attempted to revise the nature of  that payment in order to increase its efficacy. 'n particular, arac$ Obamas administration sought to reorient the partnership by increasing the emphasis
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on civilian assistance and by see$ing elevated engagement with the civilian government in 'slamabad.
oth efforts, unfortunately, have borne only meagre fruit. The increased civilian assistance has not reached #a$istan at the levels promised and %& economic troubles ma$e high levels of future !merican aid suspect. oreover, increased %& assistance to #a$istan has only enabled the military to sustain its customary high defence allocations at lower cost and without forcing any change in its traditional strategy.
*ngaging the 8ardari government has also sputtered in part because of  the regimes own failings, and partly because )ashington could not resist dealing with <eneral !shfa( /ayani K sometimes for inescapable reasons K  in ways that further sidelined the civilian government.
The %nited &tates, therefore, has continued to press 9awalpindi while  becoming increasingly embittered that the natural harmony of interests  presumed to eist between #a$istan and the %nited &tates remains largely a mirage.
)hat has finally made the desired %&"#a$istan strategic cooperation so elusive are the endless illusions bedeviling both sides. The %nited &tates imagined that it could coa #a$istan into sacrificing its -ihadi proies through financial and military assistance, occasional compellance, and the  promise of a strategic partnership. Bowever significant these elements might have been, they have failed to satisfy the #a$istani militarys institutional interests and assuage its paranoia about 'ndia.
9awalpindi, for its part, imagined that the strategy of hunting with the !merican hounds while running with the -ihadi hares was sustainable indefinitely K even after 6711 irrevocably changed the rules of the game. Or   perhaps, #a$istans generals imagined that )ashington would not notice or  care K a supposition that however -ustified early on cannot be sustained today even if the militarys domestic and regional preoccupations outweigh its worries about !merican dissatisfaction. *ither way, these illusions undermine whatever prospects eisted for sturdy bilateral ties. They also confirm that the real surprise is not the meltdown in the %&"#a$istani relations, but the fact that it too$ so long to materiali0e.
DECADE DESTROYED
 
Comments by !n-um Eia0, a freelance -ournalist, published in The  Eews on &eptember 1=G Tomorrow !merica weeps for the destruction 6711 wrought ten years ago. &oulful remembrance of the dead will aggrieve the air. 'slamophobia will get noisier. #a$istani"!mericans will start a new decade as confused, conflicted and torn as the one before. or many, their  last names will bar them from employment. or others, life will be a struggle engaged in their attempt to fit in the !merican system and be accepted as  part of their adopted country. 't will be toughM
ac$ home in #a$istan, those with an iota of sense should mourn a decade destroyed. )hile !merica lost over 3,=== lives on &eptember 11, 2==1, #a$istan lost many more in its fight against terror, a war -ammed down upon us by #resident <eorge ) ush within hours after the )orld Trade Centre collapsed. &ecretary of &tate <eneral Colin #owell called up <eneral usharraf with a warningG +either youre with us or against us. !nother threat arrived by the thuggish bully eputy &ecretary of &tate 9ichard !rmitage. +)e will bomb you bac$ to the &tone !ge. !rmitage is the daredevil who lea$ed the name of C'! agent Ralerie #lame to the press,  but never had the guts to admit it.
usharrafs craven capitulation made him ushs pet. ! supply line of money, military hardware and bonhomie from #entagon with love to <B4 granted the generals a free rein to be overly magnanimous to themselves and their fellow fau-is. usharrafs puppet prime minister  &hau$at !0i0, falsely claiming to represent the civilian face of #a$istan,  promised #a$istan becoming the net !sian Tiger. The phony only left rubble behind.
eanwhile, a new milieu was ta$ing root destroying forever the moral, intellectual and social fabric of society. The new order ushered new actors on the scene, most of them corrupt, ignorant, illiterate, etremists and  brutal, turning !rmitages threat into reality. &audi !rabia and 'ran -umped in with their own religious beliefs wic$edly wrapped with money that attracted the poor masses li$e bees to honey.
The brain drain started. #a$istani elites began their eodus to foreign lands ta$ing with them their ill"gotten wealth. !merica and ritain welcomed them and their cache of money that would fuel further their  economies. eantime, the generals with a L1= billion booty from !merica got busy in real estate grab along with padding their personal ban$ accounts abroad dismissing fears voiced by many that #a$istan could become a failed state.
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usharraf we all $new was demonically on a roll. ut where was <eneral /ayani during all this time #romoted to a 5"star general in &eptember 2==3, he too$ charge of the Ten Corps @famous for staging coupsA in 9awalpindi. ! year later, earning usharrafs trust, he was made the chief  of '&'. %nder his watch, we helplessly witnessed the country slide dangerously down a slippery slope where a suicide bomber struc$ at will; the chief -ustice was sac$ed; E9O and a thousand other ills surfaced. /ayani succeeded usharraf as the chief of army staff a month before ena0irs assassination. Bis promotion direct from '&' chief to army chief is perhaps a first in the history of #a$istan !rmy.
<eneral /ayani must have valid reasons for ignoring the current crisis of governance. )ho $nows +Can the CO!& li$e 8ulfi(ar ir0a hold a 4uran in his hand and tell the nation that he has never indulged in any  behind the scene power manoeuvring in the past in matters of larger  institutional and national interest wrote uhammad alic$ recently. +That he is acting the way he is OE?I because he honestly believes it to be the right thing to do or is he actually scared of the weight of the wrong conse(uences of doing the right thing 't is fair to put such direct (uestions to /ayani. 't is unfair that there are no answers.
A DECADE AFTER SEPT 11/ LITTLE PA'ISTAN
BOUNCES BAC' 
Comments of ?arry Tung published on &eptember 11 in <otham <a0etteG 't was ohammad Eadeems stomach that led him to what would  be his home away from home.
+' landed in / and as$ed a cab driver to ta$e me to a #a$istani neighbourhood, said Eadeem, a native of #a$istan who did not $now anyone in Eew Ior$. +' was hungry after a long flight. ' wanted some #a$istani food.
The cab driver happened to be a fellow #a$istani. &o he too$ Eadeem to this roo$lyn neighbourhood on Coney 'sland !venue between !venues C and B where halal restaurants, grocery stores and pharmacies line the streets.
+'t was completely by accident, said Eadeem of encountering a #a$istani cab driver. +Ten years later, he is still my friend.
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+The neighbourhood in the idwood section that Eadeem eventually settled in is $nown as ?ittle #a$istan. 'ts residents came under increased suspicion and scrutiny after 6711, spurring many to leave Eew Ior$ and deterring other from moving he