TO REPEAT...

Those paying attention knew this but it's nice to have the MSM print it:

In Afghanistan, the Taliban and al Qaida resurge
By WARREN P. STROBEL and JONATHAN S. LANDAY
McClatchy Newspapers

Today, the United States and its allies are struggling to halt advances by a resurgent Taliban and al Qaida fighters in large swaths of this still desperately poor and unstable country.
"Things are going very badly," admitted an official with the allied military forces, who asked not to be identified because the issue is so sensitive. "We've arrived at a situation where things are significantly worse than we anticipated."

Indeed, a growing number of analysts, many of them former top government counterterrorism officials, argue that the very notion of a "war" on terrorism is the wrong strategy.

In relying overwhelmingly on bombs and bullets, they say, the United States has alienated much of the Muslim world, driving away even moderates who might be open to Western ideas. The West has largely failed to offer a positive vision or deal with the root causes of Islamic extremism.

The "tactical firefighting" of disrupting terrorist cells and stopping attacks "works pretty well," said Magnus Ranstorp, a terrorism expert at the Swedish National Defence College. "But it's not resolving the strategic problem. The ranks keep on coming."

The U.S. intelligence community reported more than a year ago that al Qaida's leaders, weaned on the conflict against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan, would be replaced by a new generation of terrorists trained on the battlefields of Iraq.

"The terrorists have found in Iraq a better sanctuary, training ground and laboratory than they ever had in Afghanistan. They have also been given what they desire most: American targets in close proximity," former White House counterterrorism officials Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon wrote in their 2005 book, "The Next Attack."