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The book author does not grasp the politics of the situation.

He correctly assesses that the problem is not criminal. This was the error made by the Clinton administration resulting in allowing states to harbor terrorist groups with no recriminations. Instead, we bomb aspirin factories and training camps.

It is indeed an Islamic insurgency, as the author suggests. However, the first step was to reverse the policies of the past and make it very clear that there would be consequences for any state that continued to harbor terrorists. Invading Iraq fit the bill.

Now we can expect that even if states do not police the terrorists within their midst, which Pakistan appears to be doing, they will at least give lip service to that effect and not advertise for the terrorists.

Remember that Afghanistan had been actively hosting Islamic terrorist camps. At least one of the perps of the first world trade center fled to Iraq. Hussein offer-red Bin Laden asylum in 1999.

This is not going happen next time.

I still contend that Bush and Blair were actually quite happy to move without U.N. consent. The Islamists were served notice that the U.S. did not feel compelled to play "mother may I" with that bankrupt body. As it was, the delays appear to have allowed Hussein to dispense with his WMD stockpiles and programs.