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I think that it would behoove us to simply decapitate and wait. If a movement emerges that we could support, then do so. If not, let it stew until the Afgani people do something about it. Decapitate again as necessary. To impose order merely sets us up for an endless morass and bogs down our strained resources. We are doing it in Bosnia. Haiti was a real winner. Try doing the same thing in Pakistan for example, or Myanmar, Zambia, Angola, Iraq, Iran... Our national government simply does not possess the power to do what you suggest and still meet its primary commitment of national defense. It does however have the power to assist an indigenous movement. That is why Osama Bin Laden's murder of Shah Massoud was so significant. I don't doubt that he had help on that one and we had better work on investigating that carefully. Any guesses?

So, IMHO, we must rely upon the Afgani people to find that leader. Not to do so is in my judgement immoral and therefore likely to backfire.

Our national government simply does not possess the power to do what you suggest and still meet its primary commitment of national defense.

Which may (underline that, gang) have been one underlying and (appropriately enough) unenunciated reason why President Bush, a few days ago, made a point of saying that among our aims in the present crisis nation building would not be found.

So, IMHO, we must rely upon the Afgani people to find that leader.

This has been our policy for number of years already. Bounties were offered. Now Massoud is assassinated. We can't ignore the Afghan resistance, but our reliance must be with the certain knowledge that more invasive measures are required.

decapitate and wait

That would be my preference under most circumstances, but not under these concrete ones. I don't see what "decapitation" alone would do to gain support of moderate Muslims, and to prevent future networks developing. Nor would it be immoral to pick one side in the existing tension between moderate Islam and militant Islam: picking sides is the essense of foreign policy.

I am all for waiting till the Afghani pick a leader that would be compatible with our interests; while we wait, we have to mantain an occupational force there.

In your posts you offer the choice between the Diem model and Allende model, and, naturally, prefer (as I do) the Allende model, -- that is, stage a coup d'etat, eliminate the hostile leadership, and let the local populace work out a transition to a free market democracy. However, there is nothing to say that in Chile we didn't plain get lucky with Pinochet. The "Allende model" may not be available in the case of the Arab militants, if only because they can move from country to country: they are small and mobile, and don't have to feed the population like communist central planners do. Can we get an Arab Pinochet in every potentially hostile Arab country in a synchronized fashion?

Our model should be General MacArthur model: an occupational force that stays away from cultural issues but sets up civil courts and a police force, ready to turn the leadership over to an indigenous leader as soon as he becomes available.

"I think that it would behoove us to simply decapitate and wait."

At last a statement I can agree with.

IMHO the correct course is:

-Rebuild our intelligence infrastructure;
-Work with Mossad to seek out and terminate the leadership of these organizations;
-Locate training facilities, germ and chem war plants--and destroy them utterly. Whatever it takes. Sometimes it will take a lot--see Libya's hardened and subterranean poison-gas plant.

We also need to take immediate and agressive action to purge our country of enemy aliens.

--Boris