Word: binning
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Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak understands the dangers of inflaming Muslim extremists. It will be 20 years ago next week that Egyptian militants assassinated President Anwar Sadat. The leader of the group responsible is an ally of Osama bin Laden. Mubarak has no desire to play so open a role in the upcoming war as to anger extremists, but he can probably contain any problem. Egyptian security forces have kept a reasonably good choke hold on domestic terrorists. And U.S. aid, flowing since the days of the Camp David accords, ensures continued ties with Washington. Cairo will probably support anything that...
...understand President Bush's predicament: he must show the American people that he defends his country. But if the objectives of a military action in Afghanistan are destroying Osama bin Laden and wiping out terrorists' bases, no air operation will work. The bases are hidden in bunkers, tunnels and mountain caves. You can't hope for a blind direct hit when you don't know where your target is. Bombs and missiles, however smart, will only crush hills into dust, and should they fall on cities, kill a lot of innocent people. Nor will it work in terms of intimidation...
...Special forces are lightly equipped and therefore can't stay in the field too long. They would be used only for surgical strikes: Army Rangers or Navy SEALs, for example, deployed to take and briefly hold an airport until conventional forces arrive; Green Beret teams helicoptered in to raid bin Laden camps tucked away in the mountains. Delta Force commandos might even attempt a bin Laden snatch operation, though defense officials are pessimistic about such a plan because his movements are difficult to track...
...given such a moment to affect the world's course, but the Taliban's supreme leader, Mullah Mohammed Omar, is that man. As American warplanes converged on the region surrounding Afghanistan, he had a stark choice to make. He could call by radio to the Taliban fighters in Osama bin Laden's personal security guard and order them to hand over their "guest" to justice. Or he could refuse and make Afghanistan the fiery center of President Bush's declared war on terror...
...from scholarly obscurity to spiritual leader of the movement and temporal ruler of the Islamic Emirates of Afghanistan. Yet Omar may find little explicit instruction there for a decision that could equally satisfy his tribal ethics, his puritanical version of Islam and his nation's interests. If he delivers bin Laden to the West, he betrays the man who helped bring him to power and sustains his rule now. If he follows his faith in Islamic jihad or his country's tradition of protecting guests, he condemns Afghanistan to another onslaught in the savage wars that have brought abject misery...