THE “WAR ON TERROR” must end.Even the phrase itself is ill conceivedand used for domestic political pur-poses that obscure the true nature of

the problem. Conceptually, the term constrainsthe response to the real threat solely to militarymeans. In particular, the war against terror inAfghanistan cannot be won and its continua-tion may damage our real national interests inthe region. It is the spread of radical Islamicideology that is the source of our difficulties—and that cannot be countered militarily.

This is not to say that, after the attacks onSept. 11, 2001, the U.S. should not have retali-ated against the Taliban, which, at that junc-ture, ruled Afghanistan (and soon may do soagain) and which gave, at a minimum, a hometo those who planned the attacks. The Ameri-can response in Afghanistan following 9/11was planned and executed brilliantly, and allthe warnings from those who, with trepidation,remembered the USSR’s disastrous efforts inAfghanistan, were wrong—at least for the timebeing. Since then, however, it has been a differ-ent story, as the U.S.’s postwar strategy hasbeen deeply flawed. Simply put: an effectivestrategy cannot be formulated in the absenceof coherent and consistent policy objectives.Today, the U.S. is bogged down in tacticalresponses to Taliban initiatives. Littleby little, the Soviet experience is be-coming more and more relevant.

To formulate a coherent poli-cy, the problem and its originsfirst must be understood,something that seemed tobe lacking in the ideolog-

ically driven Bush Administration. After thewithdrawal of Soviet troops was completed in1989, it took three more years for the Mu-jahidin to overthrow the Soviet-backed Afghangovernment. The Mujahidin then turned tofighting among themselves and destroyed anysemblance of civil society. Everyone appears tohave forgotten the relief with which the worldgreeted the Taliban when theyseemed to emerge from no-where in 1994-95. Moham-mad Najibullah, Afghan-istan’s former president,was castrated and hungfrom a lamppost in

1996 and the nation was declared an Islamicstate that henceforth would be ruled under theSharia. The Taliban brought peace and the ruleof law. Only later did the world come to under-stand what that meant. Interestingly enough, theTaliban never have been very popular in theMuslim world. Only Pakistan, the United ArabEmirates, and Saudi Arabia recognized the Tal-

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Falling into the“ . . . The U.S. is bogged down in tactical responses to Taliban initiatives.

68 USA TODAY ★ MAY 2009

iban as Afghanistan’s legitimate government.It was the Taliban, of course, that gave

refuge to a man whose name haunts us still.Explains Charles Allen in God’s Terrorists:The Wahhabi Cult and the Hidden Roots ofModern Jihad: “Mullah Omar’s Taliban Gov-ernment had given sanctuary to a Yemen-bornSaudi national who had earlier helped channel

vast sums of Saudi Arabian petro-dollars intothe war against the Soviets. His name wasOsama bin Laden and he had recently beenjoined by an Egyptian doctor named Aymanal-Zawahri.”

Al-Zawahri became the principal ideologuefor world jihad, and bin Laden will remain ahero in some parts of the Muslim world for gen-

erations to come. The Talibandid not come out of no-

where; many were Pash-tun children orphaned

by the war against theSoviets and its af-

termath, and were

brought up in the hundreds of madrassahs inPakistan funded by Saudi Arabia. They weretaught the intolerant and militant form of Islamthat goes under the name Wahhabism. ThePashtuns are the dominant ethnic group of theTaliban and the tribal areas of Pakistan.

Wahhabism, born in Arabia in the 18th cen-tury, and now the dominant form of Islam inSaudi Arabia, has long and deep roots in Indiaand Afghanistan. The history there is quitecomplex, but one branch is the Deoband schoolthat was established in India in 1866 by an off-shoot of the Wahhabis. This branch particularlyis important for understanding the recent historyof Pakistan—which only became independentof British India in 1947—beginning when thedictator Gen. Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq came topower in 1977. Allen puts the impact of Ziasuccinctly: “General Zia came from a tradition-alist clerical background and was determined toIslamicize his country.” The General created anauthoritarian Islamic state that had little supportfrom the people of Pakistan. “Many Deoband-trained idealists joined the Pakistan Army andthe civil service, where General Zia’s patronageensured their rapid promotion,” notes Allen.

“A significant number were subsequently re-cruited into Pakistan’s greatly expanded In-

ter-Services Intelligence agency.”Is it surprising then that Pakistan

finds it difficult to crack down againstthe Taliban today in the tribal areas?

It often has been reported thatpro-Islamist and anti-American

sentiments pervade the Pak-istani armed forces and

the Inter-Services Intelli-

Afghan Trap Little by little, the Soviet experience is becoming more and more relevant.”

BY GERALD E. MARSH

USA TODAY ★ MAY 2009 69

gence organization. Yet, there is another reasonthat Pakistani efforts against the Taliban areminimal—money. “After the 9/11 attacks, thePakistani military concluded that keeping theTaliban alive was the surest way to win billionsof dollars in aid that Pakistan needed to sur-vive,” according to a New York Times Maga-zine article in which a retired Pakistani officialwas interviewed. “The military’s complicatedrelationship with the Taliban is part of what theofficial called the Pakistani military’s ‘strategicgames. . . . Pakistan is dependent on the Ameri-can money that these games with the Talibangenerate. . . . The Pakistani economy wouldcollapse without it.’ The official summed it upby saying that ‘The U.S. is being taken for aride.’”

The Taliban continue to receive financialsupport from the narcotics trade and petro-dol-lars from the countries of the Persian Gulf. TheWahhabi interpretation of Islam is the basis formuch of this support. R. James Woolsey, for-mer Director of Central Intelligence, wrote that,“over the long run, this movement is in manyways the most dangerous of the ideological en-emies we face. . . . Al Qaeda and the Wahhabisshare essentially the same underlying totalitari-an theocratic ideology. It is this common Sal-afist ideology that the Wahhabis have beenspreading widely—financed by three to fourbillion dollars a year from the Saudi govern-ment and wealthy individuals in the MiddleEast over the last quarter century—to the ma-drassas of Pakistan, the textbooks of Turkishchildren in Germany, and the mosques of Eu-rope and the U.S.’’

Moreover, as stated in an open Senate SelectCommittee on Intelligence hearing concerningthe “World Wide Threat’’ by former Directorof National Intelligence and then Deputy Sec-retary of State John Negroponte: “There areprivate Saudi citizens who still engage in thesekinds of donations [in which money is trans-ferred back door to terrorists].”

The influence of Saudi and Middle Easternmoney is felt by India as well. Lashkar-i-Tayyaba, accused by India of being responsiblefor the Mumbai attacks that took place in No-vember 2008, was formed in 1991 in the Ku-nar province of Afghanistan by Hafiz Muham-mad Saeed, a Pakistani cleric who is a followerof the Ahle Hadith Sunni tradition of Islam,which, according to Farhan Bokhari writing inthe Financial Times, “bears close resemblanceto the Wahhabi Sunni traditions practiced inSaudi Arabia.” Perhaps Woolsey got it rightbut, if we face an ideological threat, a primarilymilitary response will not succeed in changingpeople’s minds.

The Obama Administration, which has in-herited the post-American invasion mess madeof Afghanistan, basically has conceded that thewar is not winnable in military terms. Hence,the objective is to secure an Afghanistan thatwill not be a base for Islamic terrorism. Sinceany withdrawal or negotiated settlement is like-ly to leave the Taliban in control of most of thecountry, this goal, too, appears, unachievable.

What then are the real interests of the U.S.in the subcontinent? America naturally sup-ports India, the largest democracy in the world.Pakistan, though, is quite worrisome. It is a nu-clear-armed country and, if its secular (and un-stable) government falls to radical Islam, theworld well could face its worst terrorist night-mare. Thus, whatever strategy is followed inAfghanistan must enhance the stability of secu-lar government in Pakistan.

The power of petro-dollarsFirst, petro-dollar funding for terrorism, par-

ticularly to Pakistan and Afghanistan, must becut off. This will not be easy given the struc-ture of oil markets and the world’s dependenceon Middle Eastern oil. The Saudis, because oftheir vast reserves and spare capacity, essential-ly control that market. Although far from beingthe intellectual center of the Arab world—a po-sition long held by Egypt—Saudi Arabia isconsidered, even by the Iranians (who are notArabs), to be the leader of the Arab and Mus-lim worlds. According to Turki al-Faisal—for-mer director of Saudi intelligence and onetimeambassador to the United Kingdom, Ireland,and the U.S.—Pres. Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nijadof Iran wrote a letter in January 2009 to KingAbdullah of Saudi Arabia explicitly recogniz-ing this leadership. This preeminent status isbased on one thing only: oil and the money itgenerates.

U.S. and European energy policy mustchange if the flow of petro-dollars to radical Is-lamic jihadists is to be curtailed; the only long-term hope lies in reducing the demand for Mid-dle Eastern oil. This, though, looks to be an im-possible task—even though the U.S. has vastreserves of oil in the form of shale deposits—because of the way oil markets are structured.Only a large-scale, government-funded pro-gram to help companies develop shale re-serves—despite likely price manipulation byOPEC—could alter this constraint. Despite thefact that the U.S. is spending far more in termsof money and lives to protect the oil supply,such a program would have little chance ofpassing in Congress. Instead, the nation seemsto be intent on chasing the chimera of plug-inhybrids powered by wind generators and solarpower—a fantasy of those who eschew basicarithmetic.

Prior to 2005, Al Qaeda and the Talibanwere not close; the Afghans never did trust theAl Qaeda foreigners. However, the two havecome together, at least along the Afghan-Pak-istani border, which justifiably is known as theworld’s most dangerous hot spot. It appears thatthe two are collaborating on operations and that“Taliban insurgents have adopted Al Qaeda tac-tics and techniques. This seems strong evidencethat Taliban fighters have been trained by AlQaeda veterans,” relates Marc Sageman inLeaderless Jihad: Terror Networks in the Twen-ty-First Century.

However, “the mutual dislike and distrustbetween Pushtuns and foreigners prevents the

Taliban from truly merging with Al Qaeda. ThePushtun Al Qaeda members have a dual loyaltyand, if push comes to shove, they will again be-tray the foreigners, as they did in the fall of2001.”

Since, in terms of international terrorism, AlQaeda and the Taliban have very different ca-pabilities and interests, it is important that U.S.policy be directed at driving a wedge betweenthe two. It is, after all, Al Qaeda that now hasthe international franchise on Islamic terrorism,not the Taliban. Using the differences betweenradical Islamic groups around the world to fur-ther American interests should be a generalpolicy. While such groups have similar ideolo-gies, often based on the intolerant Wahhabi in-terpretation of Islam, they are very different intheir structure, capabilities, and goals. Exploit-ing these differences can prevent a coalescingof these groups into a more coherent and effec-tive force.

Even if such a policy is successful, it maynot be—at this point—enough to stabilize Pak-istan. Whatever stability does exist appears tobe due to a deal between the Taliban and thePakistani army and the Inter-Services Intelli-gence agency: if the Taliban do not attack thestate of Pakistan, it is free to operate in the tribalareas and across the border in Afghanistan.

Given the current financial crisis, it may notbe possible for the U.S. to continue the hemor-rhage of funds that a long-term presence inAfghanistan entails. The effects of a massivefailure of the American economy, and the like-ly isolationism that such a failure would engen-der, could have far worse effects on the rest ofthe world than a withdrawal from Afghanistan.There only is one real hope: the dilemma ofmaintaining a stable secular government inPakistan must be internationalized and the U.S.needs to initiate a phased withdrawal of com-bat troops from the region. Moreover, the prob-lem of the spread of radical Islamic ideologymust be dealt with by Muslims—and the U.S.explicitly must make this clear to the Arab andIslamic world.

The spread of the intolerant Wahhabi formof Islam has been going on for far too long forWestern policies to be at its root. It is time thatMuslims stopped blaming the Christian andsecular West for the deficiencies of their ownsocieties. Only moderate Muslims can stop thespread of radical Islam and, if they continue toshirk their responsibility—as they largely havedone since even well before 9/11—there al-most certainly will be a clash of civilizations,as well as widespread suffering, not only on thepart of the West, but especially among Mus-lims. ★

Gerald E. Marsh is a retired physicist whoserved with the U.S. START delegation inGeneva and was a consultant to the Depart-ment of Defense on strategic nuclear technol-ogy and policy in the Reagan, Bush, and Clin-ton administrations. The Phantom Defense:America’s Pursuit of the Star Wars Illusion ishis most recent book.

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