From The Asia Times
By Ehsan Ahrari

While the “war on terror” inside the United States is being reduced to winning the hearts and minds of Americans to vote for the Republican Party in November’s congressional elections, major issues are percolating – and they don’t bode well for stability in West Asia.

On Tuesday the latest version of the strategy to fight terrorism was released, coinciding with President George W Bush’s warning to Iran over its nuclear program.

The new strategy, featured in a report that was drafted in 2003 and updated this March, focuses more on decentralized networks of extremists than on al-Qaeda, and singles out Iran as a potential source of unconventional weapons for terrorist groups.

The report also acknowledges that while the United States succeeded in undermining global terrorism after the September 11, 2001, attacks on the US, the “enemy has adjusted to US defenses”. “America is safer, but not yet safe,” it warns.

Despite Bush’s claim that Iraq had become the “central front” of the “war on terror”, the report’s emphasis is less on Iraq than on small terror groups “springing up around the world”.

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