Daily Times (Pakistan)

“This is the key to moving forward,” said Peter Bergen, a specialist on radical terrorism at the New America Foundation. Part spy-craft, part history research, the project is an attempt to re-create the successes in Iraq in 2007 and 2008, ...

... is to succeed in the complex, mostly political operations that will be necessary to contain and roll back the insurgency, it is going to require a capable, motivated civilian government to do that,” author and journalist Steve Coll said.

... to follow productive paths that lead away from terrorism,” Glassman said in a speech at the New America Foundation, a Washington-based think-tank. ...

Al Qaeda is killing more Muslims than what it calls ‘infidels’, something that is going to be a ‘game changer’ for the terrorist group, according to Peter Bergen of the New America Foundation. He was speaking at a one-day conference on Al Qaeda organised by the Foundation and the New York University Centre for Law and Security. Al Qaeda, Bergen said is losing public support in Muslim countries and one thing is certain: will never become Hezbollah or Hamas.… more

Failed policies and poor strategic choices have overstretched the American military and economy, argues Anatol Lieven, professor at the Department of War Studies, Kings College, London...

 ...In his view, the invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq demonstrate the desire of the US to remain a global hegemonic power. This, he said, is being challenged by the resurgence of Russia and China, and the failure of the Iraq war. The current economic crisis and the upcoming presidential election in the US may prompt a change in the American policy. more

According to Anatol Lieven, writing in the International Herald Tribune, the fear is that by the time a new US administration has begun to work out its plans, it will be next spring, which may be too late, some Pakistanis feel. “If the government here cannot do something serious to help the population economically within six months, it will be finished,” a newspaper editor told Lieven. The new president Asif Ali Zardari is seen as too pro-American. His government’s prestige… more

... While counter-terrorism officials no longer consider Osama Bin Laden a threat to the West, his popularity in the Muslim world has waned. Terrorism expert Peter Bergen writes in the new issue of Time magazine that the jihad has moved beyond Bin Laden and Al Qaeda. According to former CIA official Marc Sageman, two decades since its founding in Peshawar, Al Qaeda remains a source of inspiration for certain extremists around the world, but it is far from clear that Bin Laden commands them. If Bin Laden… more

The United States decided against striking Al Qaeda locations in Pakistan in 2006 because it was afraid the strike would destabilise General Pervez Musharraf and his government.

According to Peter Bergen of the New America Foundation, who is also the CNN’s terrorism expert, “America has handed $10 billion to the Pakistani government since September 11, 2001. Yet the Taliban and Al Qaeda remain headquartered in Pakistan. A U.S. military official in Afghanistan with access to intelligence information told me this… more