As for doing what Osama wants, I am pretty sure even he did not wish for so many of his troops to be exterminated by American munitions, nor for the Taliban to be ousted from the Afghanian government. So I am at a loss to understand what this idea means that we are playing to his script.

How about this:

The events of September 11 indicate that whoever was behind it - say Bin Laden for short - is willing to use people like pawns, to be sacrificed, and probably isn't worried about the idea of getting killed. Whatever it takes.

The Taliban in Afghanistan and the foreign Al Qaida volunteers are just more pawns. Getting killed was what they were there for, the same way bombs and ammunition are there to be exploded. And that is probably just as true of Bin Laden as the others. These people mean business, and the hijackers of September 11 show the price they are willing to pay, collectively and as individuals.

What appears to be the objective is to split the world in two, with America and a few reluctant and payroll states on its side, a lot more sitting on their hands, and the mass of the world's population seeing America as the enemy, and most of the world's Muslims manipulated into being on the other side.

And that is what it is shaping up to look like. A war by America on Iraq will be just what is needed, from that point of view. It gets rid of Saddam, who has been a serious block to the setting up of an Islamic Republic in Iraq. It is likely to mean that the Americans get thrown out of Saudi Arabia by the present regime there, in a desperate attempt to hold on to power, though before too long there is be a change of regime there, and an Islamic Republic. And things go on from there.

Sooner or later America pulls out from its involvement overseas, and a whole row of dominoes topple.