-To remove the Taliban and replace it with a tolerant and inclusive -government that isn't half run by al-Qaeda. That's half of the war against -al-Qaeda, and good in itself.
I'm happy to see the Taliban be destroyed and I doubt that a Northern Alliance government overseen by the US and UN (with proposed muslim troops from Turkey, Indonesia etc.) will not be better in policy towards people than the Taliban. The problem is whether they can legitimately extend that rule given ethnic tensions.
But the fallacy of the whole war is that the civilian murders necessary to achieve it will have done nothing to stop terrorism and may increase it. Bill Maher was lacerated for referring to US bombing as "cowardly" but that is the image it had and to the extent that we critiqued cowardly terrorism, it has inspired as far as I can tell mostly a "pox on both your houses" attitude in much of the muslim world and beyond.
To the extent that the US needed to lead a moral challenge to the legitimacy and support of the Al Quaeda stye terrorism, that has been lost.
Militarily conquering Kabul was a foregone conclusion from day one that the bombing started. But it may define pyrric victory.
-- Nathan Newman