"Fiddlesticks..."!! (I haven't heard that in years... lovely stuff!)

I think the war of 'Hearts and Minds' is definitely lost.... I didn't really hold much hope for it anyway, to begin with.

The 'War On Terror' has always really been with us, I think, and in Europe (Bader-Meinhof, The Red Brigades, Black September, etc), there has always been some internal unrest, for Governments to have to deal with.
These relatively 'localised' groups, were 'relatively' easy to keep track of, but still they stretched our Intelligence services somewhat.
However now, with the stirring of the hornet's nest that was Afghanistan, and later, the opening of the can of worms that was Iraq, Al Qaeda has multipled, diversified, and metamorphosed.
This has stretched them even further. International co-operation is more vital than ever, these days, and what with the 'systemic problems' our own internal services have communicating with each other (and will have, incidentally, on an ongoing basis for years to come), the order is a tall one.

To be a stranger in a strange land (as our presence in Iraq can be depicted), is one thing. But to be chasing an enemy there, that one cannot identify... and expect to 'win' against these odds, is a different proposition entirely. Whatever about Iraqi lives lost, I think we have lost far too many lives, trying to prove that we can somehow 'win' something (other than what the neo-cons had in mind).

There will always be some sort of a war on terror, in my opinion, and it has always been played more like a chess game, than like a game of 9 Pin.
Throwing the board in the air will only ever make matters worse, as the pieces tend to get scattered everywhere.
That makes the war unwinable from our side, and it puts us on the defence more.

If we accept that we never can completely win a war on terror, how then, should we define "Lost"?

Jim