Adjusting to a post-Cold War world.(international security and terrorism prevention)

The publication of the 9/11 commission's report provides an opportunity to reflect not just on the lack of preparedness for the history-altering terrorist attacks but also on the realities of the post-Cold War world.

The nearly 600-page report from the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States paints a disturbing picture of a government largely unprepared for the suicide assaults on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. But what it points to in the future is even more chilling. The report reminds us that Osama bin Laden and his fellow extremists are cold-blooded fanatics and that no negotiations, compromise, or appeasement will placate them.

The 9/11 commission report will be debated and dissected for some time to come, helping us to better understand the vast challenges we face. Perhaps it, along with the daily news from Baghdad, will at last pour cold water on the assumption that we are in another fledgling Cold War-like struggle. The current antiterrorism campaign is not about deterrence, containment, or chesslike moves on a global board.

Historical analogies are instructive. Munich and Vietnam still hold lessons about appeasement and protracted conflicts in peripheral areas. The battle against Islamic fundamentalist terrorism is not another Cold War, however. Yes, it will drag on for decades, like the Cold War, and resemble aspects similar to the Soviet standoff. Public diplomacy--how America spreads its message of hope, democracy, and tolerance to the world--will certainly be rekindled. Our antiterrorism struggle will necessitate alliances and occasional cooperation with unsavory regimes--all aspects of the former East-West rivalry--but it is not analogous.

The ...