And I fear that the only thing that will cure the Muslim people of their current love affair with terrorism (for even though the terrorists are few, those who openly sympathize with their barbarities are many and their critics are virtually silent) is the savagery of total war.

The only alternative is the kind of limited, surgical war that America has been waging in Afghanistan and Iraq. The cost of such a war is not trivial, but it is also not total.

But if America and Britain lose heart and do not complete this kind of war, the terrorists will regard our retreat as proof that they were right and Allah supports their actions. More terrorism will surely follow, and the war we failed to complete now our children will have to complete later -- and under far less advantageous circumstances.