ONE WIN FOR THE GOOD GUYS: Yesterday, when I was cataloguing how badly things were going for the Bush administration, I confess I forgot to mention an important piece of good news. That was, the capture in Pakistan of Khalid Sheikh Muhammed, the guy described as Qaeda’s Chief Operating Officer. That certainly sounded like good news for the forces of sanity in the world, though we shouldn’t forget due-process rights and the presumption of this guy’s innocence until a court of law– and the rest of us– can actually see the case against him.
But it was a good development. It dealt directly with the issue of “bringing to justice” the alleged perpetrators of 9/11. It was made possible through solid police work, including “working” international alliances with the Pakistanis and others.
The war effort, however, is a completely different kind of endeavor on every score. And the sheer scale and chaotic consequences of this war will make small but significant victories like KSM’s arrest seem tiny by comparison.
Plus, all the indicators that I know of after studying the Middle East intensively for nearly 30 years are that the kind of war the Bushies are planning will incubate thousands more KSMs within weeks of its launching.