"The enemy of my enemy is my friend" - yes there can be desperate situations when you are up against the wall, and your only hope of survival is to think like that. That's one of things that I meant by "thinking like a terrorist."

But arming and training Bin Laden because he wanted to go and fight the Russian backed government in Afghanistan, or arming and supporting Saddam Hussein to help him crush his Kurdish citizens and invade Iran - those weren't back-to-the-wall life-and-death situations for America and the rest. They were examples of short-term thinking, irresponsible war games.