mbs: with the word 'expected,' you gloss over the reality that no political leader could sustain such a position from his own domestic standpoint, ergo he/she would have no negotiating position because he/she would be declared illegitimate by 95% of the population. We would have discovered that Al Gore really won the election after all, or somesuch excuse for finding a new leader. Victimhood might be good politics for Cuba, but it could not be more untenable for any purported superpower.
NN: As this inconclusive murder of civilians in the name of destroying terrorism continues, the ongoing deaths involved in many ways are backdated to morally justify the S11 attacks as merely "tit-for-tat." Since fighting terrorism is inherently a political endeavor in the end in isolating and delegitimating them, the bombing campaign is a rather costly psychic venting of national spleen.
mbs: to some extent yes, but we're back to the empirics, about which we cannot know at this point -- how many bad guys does the bombing kill or serve up to U.S. ground forces & allies.
nn: If we could drop a bomb and kill Bin Laden and the top Taliban leadership, I wouldn't shed a tear, but that's not what is possible
mbs: I would say difficult but I doubt it's impossible. It's true that even if it happened, the network would still be a threat to the U.S. hence decapitation would not be a solution. But it sure couldn't hurt!
NN: No, we needn't have negotiated immediately, but there were a host of techniques available to isolate Bin Laden and track his thousands of compatriots in now (and maybe only now) friendly countries willing to assist us. It is the forfeiting of that essential cooperation that we will suffer due to the killings of Afgani civilians.
There is a part of me that is almost relieved that the US has lowered itself from the temporary moral high ground it attained after S11, since Bush might have been far more dangerous on the international stage in coming years if he had help onto it with a more strategic approach. But the American population is going to suffer far more terrorism with far less sympathy internationally than we would have without this stupid bombing campaign. Nathan Newman
mbs: you appear to be dovetailing with Carrol on the 'will it work' question. I think it might, but we will know with some certainty in about a year, I would say. I doubt the value of the counter-factual -- the legalistic approach -- but we can't test it because it ain't gonna happen.
mbs