If you consider the big picture' then 9/11 was inevitable. Perhaps the twin towers as a target were not, but some form of significant attack was probably unavoidable in the USA; it is the last great imperial power left on the planet and thus a convenient target for anyone wishing to strike at the heart of western democracy.

By shattering the security of ordinary America, a chilling shock wave has reverberated around the world challenging our perception of terrorism. One of the images engraved in my memory, apart from the images of those tumbling towers which left me speechless, was the image of George Bush's face when he was delivered the news by one of his aides. It was a cruel juxtaposition, to see him white with shock and engaged in the most harmless of political acts, reading to school children, whilst New York was in chaos and shock. One could only feel sympathy for him. It was no longer in someone else's country and a distant issue for the military to deal with. It became very real and brutally personal - we were on notice.

Have we lost focus? The answer is certainly, yes. There is no doubt that the decision to invade Iraq has mired the US into a protracted conflict where a traditional military ethos is defunct. Afghanistan as a campaign has been largely more successful, simply because traditional warfare techniques are able to be applied. Engaging smaller groups of fighters in rugged terrain has also suited the special forces of the US, the British Special Air Service and even my fellow country men from the New Zealand Special Air Service. These rules do not apply in urban environments and it became abundantly clear that there were insufficient troops on the ground for an occupational force, meaning extended tours for invasion force troops and redeployment. Further, the US has limited experience in maintaining an occupational force for extended periods in an extremely hostile environment. The British had the Northern Ireland experience to their advantage, but from the outset seemed to be anticipating a shorter period of occupation due to the specifics of their location.

The collision course between the Middle-East and the West has been brewing for some time. Flamed by Islamic fundamentalism, Western interference in the Middle-East has been resented since the Second World War. The trouble is, and always has been, our thirst for oil and the support for Israel as a sovereign nation has meant we have a vested interest in interference at some level. Unfortunately the tactics employed by the Bush administration have been nothing less than inadequate, both administratively and militarily. They have ignored the history books, which will tell them that and evolution towards democracy is both lengthy and bloody and in so doing have lost the support of most American people and obscured their ability to see believable objectives. The public, though loyal to their military, demand greater results than wounded servicemen and women served with empty rhetoric.

Learn more about this author, Nathan Hook.
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