It Sounds So Simple...

Stephen Hadley is still trolling around Asia and he has a plan for crushing the Taliban and other Islamic extremists:

"In Pakistan, we need to be doing what we do in Afghanistan, having forces up on the border," he said. "What we and the Pakistanis and Afghans can do is share intelligence" and "coordinate our activities on the border." Ideally, he added, Pakistani forces would drive guerrillas west "so they flee into our arms and the Afghans'."

But Hadley strove not to take sides in the quarrel between the two nations, which have a long and complicated relationship. After a 2 1/2 -hour dinner with Afghan President Hamid Karzai Sunday night, Hadley expressed understanding of the Afghan argument that Pakistan is the source of its problems with guerrilla attacks but did not fully endorse it.

It does sound easy, but obviously it is not because four years after 9/11 Osama and Mullah Omar are still wandering around.