Here’s an unusually thoughtful essay on the global war on terror.

«President Bush may reduce all of this to the terrorists looking for an “excuse,” but al Qaeda and the jihadist movement grew out of a complex and convoluted anti-western, dare we say anti-Christian and anti-Jewish, narrative that began with the defeat of Soviet empire in Afghanistan and now promises the defeat of America, Israel, and the west.

The growth of dissatisfaction and terror, the summary of the National Estimate argues, is not only about Iraq: Corruption, repression, and inner battles within Islam and Muslim states are the sources of the spread and growth of today’s jihadist movement.»

Most world powers have always persuded a rather brutal foreign policy. The U.S. isn’t an exception and will be far from the last country to do this.
The Jihadis will not be defeated by force of arms, but by demonostrating to the world that their solution to mid-eastern problems is wrong-headed. Neither party in the U.S. is addressing this correctly and so: eternal war.