As I recall it, he was NOT talking at all about the War on Terror that Hitchens assumes must be our obsession. Instead, he was talking about the pursuit of those who attacked us on Sept 11, 2001, namely ObL and al Qaeda. He was saying that if we had credible intelligence telling us where they were within Pakistan, and if we could with a high likelihood of success take an opportunity to capture or kill him/them, then we would not be turned away by any objections of the Pakistani government.

I don't think that such a scenario would constitute a big move of the Afghan war into Pakistan. I suppose that that is a possible outcome, but I don't see it as a very likely one, especially if we succeeded in capturing or killing Osama and other known al Qaeda leaders.

Greg Shenaut

But it would be a marked departure from current Bush Administratin policy.

Bin Laden and Al Qaeda are not the Taliban. You could kill Bin Laden 1000x times, sure it would look good on the front page of the Post, but it wouldn't change a thing in Afghanistan/Pakistan. Bin Laden is now only a figurehead in a decentralized, grass roots militant network. Al Qaeda without Bin Laden is just as disruptive, maybe a bit embarrassed, but not destroyed.

The problem in Afghanistan is the Taliban and other insurgents, not Al Qaeda. Bin Laden and Al Qaeda are not Afghan, the Taliban is, and the Taliban is the group rooted on the Afghan/Pakistan border.