01/01/2002
EDITORIAL NUMBER=0-09619

GOALS

President George W. Bush has said, "As long as the United States of America is determined and strong, this will not be an age of terror. This will be an age of liberty, here and abroad."

America’s policy is clear. The U-S will make no concessions to terrorists and strike no deals. The U-S will bring terrorists to justice for their crimes. Countries that sponsor terrorism will be isolated and dealt with. And the U-S will work to bolster the counter-terrorism capabilities of countries that require assistance.

Phase one, as White House spokesman Ari Fleischer put it, "is still well underway and is not yet complete. Phase one involves the destruction of al-Qaida, [and] the bringing of Osama bin Laden and his top lieutenants to justice."

In Afghanistan, said U-S Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, "we had an additional goal, and that was to end the Taleban as the government of Afghanistan because it was so obviously harboring the al-Qaida." That goal has been achieved. The oppressive Taleban regime is no longer in control of Afghanistan. However, said Mr. Rumsfeld, "We still have the al-Qaida network worldwide to deal with. . .as well as the other terrorist networks."

Coalition forces continue to search for Taleban and al-Qaida in Afghanistan. But that’s not all. Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld said "we want to stop the terrorist networks in the world, including al-Qaida but not just al-Qaida. And to do that, you have to go after those networks and root them out, and second, you have to go after the countries that harbor them."

General Tommy Franks, the commander of U-S forces in Afghanistan, said that the American-led coalition is conducting overt and covert operations "in a great many places." These missions, said General Franks, "are designed to do away with these pockets of terrorism."

As President Bush said, in order to defend the United States, America must go after terrorists wherever they are. This will be a campaign fought on many fronts and in many parts of the world. As President Bush put it, "This broad-based and sustained effort will continue until terrorism is rooted out. The situation is similar to the Cold War, when continuous pressure from many nations caused Communism to collapse from within. We will press the fight as long as it takes. We will prevail."