their one-eyed chief Molla Omar are still at large. Nor has al-Qaeda's leadership structure been compromised. The most critical of the developments has however been the confirmation of what many had long suspected: "President Bush has made a complete hash of the battle against the Jihadis."

An American response to terrorist threat of al-Qaeda variety was always perfunctory. It was only after the US' embassy bombing in East-Africa that Bill Clinton ordered firing

things: to remove the only potential hindrance to zeonists' aspiration of greater Israel. President Bush, a born-again Christian, and his team comprised of evangelicals and Christian Right proved credulous enough to buy the neo-con recipe -an invasion of Iraq. As revealed in his testimony before 11 September Enquiry Commission Richard Clarke, the counter terrorism chief of National Security staff, stated that al-Qaeda threat sounded by him then vanished like bubble and

OVER last several weeks there have been enough developments for both sides in the war to think that al-Qaeda might be winning it, after all. The evidences abound that even with al-Qaeda's leaders on the run the terrorist threats are evolving and getting scarier. Madrid mayhem is a pointer. Though there is no iron-clad evidence, there is plenty of speculations that those who were caught in connection with the train blasts worked for al-Qaeda in the past. Much of Europe was already known to be logistical base for Islamic militants. Madrid bombing suggests that now it is also theatre of operation.

Even if Saddam Hussain now languishes in US custody - more than two years after the fall of Kabul Americans have no clue where bin Laden is and al-Qaeda cells keep issuing audio tapes calling for Jihad. One issued a month ago took credit for Madrid train blasts. Another issued a fortnight earlier in the name of al Jawahiri called for the overthrow of Pakistan's Pervez Musharraf who launched controversial Wana operation in the country's tribal belt at America's behest. As for Taliban most of its leaders including

of a few cruise missiles at the suspected hideouts of Bin Laden in Sudan and Afghanistan. Bush administration considered them ineffective and therefore preferred a new approach. Such as invasion of Afghanistan. The adventure led the US to another disquieting development in the battle against al-Qaeda. The US 'liberated' Afghanistan using the soldiers of Northern Alliance and an assorted warlords as mercenaries and risked few American lives. When a pliant Hamid Karzai was installed as ruler of 'new Afghanistan'the US lost interest and moved on to Iraq.

In fact, Iraq was central to the agenda of neocon ideologues behind Bush administration. They assiduously laboured to co-opt the top man to back their scheme of the oilrich strategic hub of Middle East, floated in the imagination of those supporting the invasion. Henceforth, the new president paid only erratic attention to al-Qaeda.

As portrayed by Clarke both in his testimony and in his book Against All Enemies' Bush White House was totally nonchalant to al-Qaeda threats before 9/11 inspite of being adequately forewarned and then obsessed with punishing Iraq regardless of what the evidence showed about Saddam's al-Qaeda ties or lack of them. In the immediate aftermath of 9/11 the mood was that of revenge and President Bush like any other American looked for someone to shoot at.

Even if the warning of an impending terrorist threat was aptly vindicated Bush tried to use the World Trade Centre attack to pursue his own agenda. Clarke says that the counter terrorism officials were asked repeatedly to find any evidence that linked Saddam Hussain to 9/11 attacks. Bush's principal occupation was then to find an excuse to invade Iraq.

Of course, the architects of Iraq invasion were also solidly behind the president. According to Clarke he was rebuffed by Paul Wolfowitz, the deputy secretary of defence, when the former tried to focus on al-

the real threat, elsewhere.

However, as a result of the prevailing perception in the US the al-Qaeda's possible role in 9/11 attacks and its potentials remained obfuscated from the full view of the administration. Also with the shift of the battle front in the war on terror Osama's outfit was given a new lease of life in the wilderness of Afghanistan-Pakistan border. The US' anti-terror policy also afforded al-Qaeda a field day it needed so badly to reorganise and re-equip

Qaeda threats in a top level meeting convened in April 2001 to discuss terrorism. To Wolfowitz a little terrorist in Afghanistan was a much lesser threat than a state-sponsored terrorism orchestrated by Saddam. Ronald Rumsfeld, the defence secretary, also argued at a cabinet meeting that Afghanistan, the home of Osama's terrorist camp, did not offer "enough good targets. We should do Iraq," Bush himself wanted FBI and CIA to hunt for any evidence that would point to the involvement of Iraqi strongman. Many opinion polls demonstrated that a huge proportion of Americans genuinely believe that Saddam was behind 9/11. Although there is no evidence to that effect, Bush White House successfully sold the lie thus deflecting Americans' attention from

itself. Thanks to the US' obsession with Iraq al-Qaeda seems to have already made good of the losses its suffered in Afghanistan and reorganised globally to be able to strike afresh. They could not be dislodged from their seeming new sanctuary in Pakistan's inaccessible tribal areas bordering Afghanistan.

So elusive is the terror threat today - so deeply burrowed in the globe's darkest crannies - that even a wily old commander like Pervez Musharraf seemed non-plussed about what exact targets his soldiers were engaging in South Waziristan last month. While his 'high value target' conveniently slipped away from the cordon the Pakistani troops formed, a fierce resistance of the militants could turn the operation a fiasco.

The ascendancy of al-Qaeda becomes all too clear when every western official now concedes that in the aftermath of the horrific Madrid attacks the Islamic terrorists have the will and capability to strike at more western capitals in the months ahead. Such attacks are now regarded as virtual certainty. Even with Iraq under occupation it is hard to see that Iraq invasion has helped make the world a safer place. Neither has an occupied Iraq proved any safe place even for the occupation forces. In the month of April alone 120 American G-1s were killed in anti-US uprising.

The world knows by now that the US' claim of WMDs in Saddam's Iraq was a hoax. Even Saddam was a secular tyrant who kept the Jihadis at bay, the new Iraq has become the breeding ground of every Islamic extremist group in the world. Should the Americans impose genuine democracy in Iraq it will then perhaps pass to Khomenie-style Shia cleric because of the country's Shia-majority population. And if they do not do that fighters from all over Middle East and North Africa are already flowing into Iraq to fights Jihad againstAmerican occupiers.

Still worse is the perception that the invasion of Iraq was an unjustified act of aggression. It has hardened anti-American sentiment throughout the Muslim world. Far from making the world a safer place the Iraq invasion has actually helped create an environment in which Islamic extremism can thrive. It has, in fact, been George W. Bush's gift to al-Qaeda which again seems to be riding the crest of the waves in a vast swath stretching from Pakistan to Europeto Iraq.

Brig (retd) Hafiz is former DG of BUSS.