real planning, no real objective apart from being seen to take action. And then he allowed Donald Rumsfeld to high jack the War on Terror, so Afghanistan was put on a back burner as we prepared for Iraq. Afghainistan is very different than Iraq in a couple of different ways. 1) Most Afghanis want troops there. 2) Unlike Iraq, Afghanistan was involved very heavily in terrorist training. What to do then? There should have been more troops there from day 1 patrolling the Pakistan/Afghani border. There have to be enough tropps to protect schools/women/etc...Rebuilding is the goal, but one cannot rebuild without a basic level of security. It appears to be a damned if you do, damned if you don't scenario. Jonathan Steele's first appearance in two months (aside from the Yeltsin obituary, presumably archived) is a welcome return. I've no idea how much of that time was spent in Kabul but clearly this is no off-the-cuff effort (they never are with Steele) and not written from a cosy study in Hampstead either. Every paragraph is informative and suggests at least as much more could have been given as space permitted ... indeed, he could probably have written a book. Originally the idea behind the Afghanistan intervention was to catch bin Laden and put him and his lieutenants in a cage (or worse). This seemed to necessitate taking out the Taliban, which led to replacing its government in Kabul. In the process, the US took its eye off the ball