The US response to the carnage perpetrated on 11 September, could be a catalyst for an unwinnable, long drawn war without frontiers. A 'shoot first ask questions later' approach could spark: a) a new confrontation between the United States and the Muslim World;
- b) a conflict between Afghanistan and Pakistan; and c) a dangerous cleavage within Pakistani society that would sow the seeds of another Algeria.
Ironies abound amidst the tragedy. The United States, looking for enemies in Pyongyang, Beijing, Baghdad and Tehran (and new allies in places like New Delhi), has suddenly realised that the threat comes from elsewhere. And what of the colossal US intelligence failure? Despite its inability to uncover the plot by 71 Americans or US-based foreign nationals (19 suicide bombers plus 52 collaborators) to strike at the country's financial and military centres, it is now eager to "smoke out Osama bin Laden" from faraway Afghanistan. There is also the bewildering spectacle of a line of unsavory Third World entities created or supported by the US, who end up on the "most wanted" list—Noriega, Saddam and now the Taliban.
When the Russians invaded Afghanistan in 1979, the CIA pumped in USD 2.1 billion over a 10-year period (with matching funds from Saudi Arabia and another billion dollars donated by the Chinese) to create a resistance that, at its height, included almost 200,000 well-trained volunteers from 20 Muslim countries, operating out of Pakistan but supported covertly by a disparate coalition comprising Saudi Arabia, Israel, Egypt, China and the United States.