Axial

David Frum reputedly coined Bush's "Axis of Evil" phrase, linking together three countries (Iran, Iraq, and North Korea) whose most obvious common traits were that they were all on Bush's enemies list and none of them had had anything to do with 9/11.

When 9/11 did happen, Bush's first instinct was to pack the bin Laden family on a jet and send them safely back to Saudi Arabia, the country most directly involved in 9/11, since both the plotter and most of the participants were from that country. Moreover, Saudi Arabia had spent decades financing the radical madrassas that have so successfully exported a radical jihadist mentality to Pakistan and other countries. If one wanted to single out an "Axis" (a dumb idea, anyway) responsible for much of current terrorism, it would run through Saudi Arabia and Pakistan.

The Wahabi brand of Islam promoted by the Saudis is deeply reactionary, fostering both resentment of the modern world and rejection of it. By rejecting the very things that would permit Muslims to adapt to the modern world (education of girls, for example) they condemn their adherents to remain poor and backward.

It is unclear at the moment whether the Mumbai attacks were orchestrated by these people, but if Pakistan's fingerprints are on it, India can probably not let this go unpunished. Pakistan will be left with hard choices - to fight, and lose catastrophically against India, or to take on the radicals, including much of its own intelligence services in what is likely to become a significant civil war.

Westerners, and especially Americans were principal targets, so we have a major stake in this as well. What useful role can we play? That is also unclear.

If we had had a non-idiot president on 9/11, he would have made Saudi Arabia a main focus of his war on terror. The bin Ladens and other Saudi princes would have been detained as enemy aliens, and Saudi Arabia would have been given a harsh choice - reform utterly, surrender all the financiers of terror, and suppress the jihadist preachers or suffer a war of revenge.

The Saudis understand wars of revenge, but they know regime change is bullshit.

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