war on terrorism

FOR MANY, it may seem like the news of the day is "All Iraq All The Time." But don't forget the United States is still waging a fierce war against al Qaeda and other terrorist groups around the globe. President George W. Bush reportedly still keeps a running tally of the 22 Most Wanted terrorists and their dispositions in his desk drawer.

The CIA's top counterterrorism official, Cofer Black, has been given the mandate to track these terrorists down and kill or capture them.

IS THE UNITED STATES about to become midwife to democracy in the Muslim Middle East? President George W. Bush has certainly given unprecedented speeches on the inalienable right of Muslim men and women to be free, and on December 12, Secretary of State Colin Powell announced a new $29 million pro-democracy U.S.-Middle East Partnership Initiative. "America wants to align itself with the people of the Middle East," declared Powell, and the initiative places "the United States firmly on the side of change, on the side of reform, . . .

THE IMPORTANT THING about Al Gore's decision not to run for president in 2004--other than the decision itself--is the debate it will unleash inside the Democratic party, both during next year's run-up to the primaries, and in the 2004 primaries themselves. That debate will be about war: war against Iraq, the war on terrorism, indeed war itself as a tool of national security and a path to democratization. And it will be a lively, emotional, instructive, and perhaps even bitter debate, exactly the sort of debate the Democratic party needs.

With Gore gone, Sen.

IN THE KINGDOM OF SAUDI ARABIA, the trappings of monarchy obscure the police state that keeps the Saud family in power. But beneath the veneer of gracious luxury, internal security has never been more important than it is today to a regime that constrains the press and commerce, struggles to provide the generous benefits promised its citizens, and has made the country a breeding ground for Islamic extremism. Enmeshed as we are in an alliance of necessity with the Saudis, Americans should be asking: Who runs Saudi internal security?

THIS MORNING'S front page article in the Washington Post, "Report Cites Al Qaeda Deal For Iraqi Gas," should not come as a surprise. Over the past months, we have had several detailed reports of links between Iraq and al Qaeda.

THERE IS NO MYSTERY, and there is no need for complicated theorizing, about the scandal that has struck the family of Prince Bandar bin Sultan bin Abd al-Aziz, the ambassador of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in Washington. U.S. authorities are investigating a financial link between Prince Bandar's wife, Princess Haifa, and two of the September 11 hijackers, Khalid al-Midhar and Nawaf Alhazmi.

DEMOCRATS ARE HAVING a nervous breakdown--needlessly. Sure, they lost the 2002 election badly, but it wasn't a catastrophic defeat. They lost for a simple reason: Voters caught on that they weren't serious about the war on terrorism, including regime change in Iraq. So the one thing Democrats need to do is adopt a tough position on fighting terrorists. Then they'll be competitive again.

Bush at War
by Bob Woodward
Simon & Schuster, 349 pp., $28

Fighting Back
The War on Terrorism from Inside the Bush White House
by Bill Sammon
Regnery, 400 pp., $27.95

LET'S GET RIGHT to the scoreboard. The winners in Bob Woodward's account of President Bush's response to the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks are Secretary of State Colin Powell, CIA director George Tenet, and, to a lesser extent, national security adviser Condoleezza Rice and her deputy, Stephen Hadley. And Bush himself, who Woodward believes figured out quickly how to be an effective commander in chief.

NOT SURPRISINGLY, top Bush administration officials have no confidence that Saddam Hussein will cooperate with the latest U.N. resolution requiring him to disarm. Any foolish optimism in that regard was dispelled when Iraq continued its longstanding practice of firing on allied aircraft patrolling the no-fly zones and when it submitted a hostile, almost psychotic nine-page letter to the U.N. that left unclear whether Baghdad had accepted the terms of U.N. resolution 1441.

WE ARE NO LONGER an equally divided, 50-50 nation. America is now at least 51-49 Republican and right of center, more likely 52-48, maybe even 53-47. The terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, created a new political era, and the midterm election on November 5 confirmed it. Sure, a shift of 20,000 or 30,000 votes in a couple of states would have kept the Senate in Democratic hands.

EBOLA VIRUS KILLS QUICKLY. It hails from a family of hemorrhagic fevers that trigger massive internal bleeding. Seven years ago, during an outbreak in Africa, doctors stumbled on a possible cure. Part of the idea came from a group of Russian virologists who had worked for years on even more malignant strains of the virus.

"A few weeks ago, we were doing some work on my back porch back home, tearing out a section of old stacked rocks, when all of a sudden I uncovered a nest of copperhead snakes. . . . A copperhead will kill you. It could kill one of my dogs. It could kill one of my grandchildren; they play all the time where I found those killers. You know, when I discovered those copperheads, I did not call my wife Shirley for advice, as I usually do on most things. I did not go before the city council. I did not yell for help from my neighbors.