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It is true that the goal of this war is somewhat vague. But that's because our enemies are indistinct. We don't have a convenient troika of Hitler-Mussolini-Tojo to fight against this time. It's also the case that this war must involve subterfuge, and by its nature we cannot give away who our enemies actually are because it will alert them that we're coming for them (if, indeed, we are). This war is anomalous in many ways, but we've never fought against anything like this before. We don't have a fixed nation opposing us; we're fighting against an international movement with no real home. Since our enemy is unique, our way of fighting it must be too (or we'll lose). A clean object to the war, so as to permit a clean recognition of when it is over, would certainly be nice; but circumstances are not cooperating. You can't always have what you want. That said, we have to walk a fine line here between taking on too much and doing too little. There are traditional enemies we probably are not going to take on in this war: for instance I think it is virtually certain that we will not radically change our relations with North Korea. We won't ignore them, but they're not going to get the kind of ultimatum that I suspect Iraq will get. Nor will we seek out battle when lesser means will serve our purposes. The goal here is not to fight, as such, but to accomplish the political goal of minimizing the chances of future attacks against American citizens. Steve Den Beste and others see a wide array of enemies, and, if I may summarize, seem to want to capitalize on our momentum and vanquish them as well. But I think that by adding countries like Iraq to our to-do list, instead of focusing on Al Qaeda havens in Somalia, Sudan and/or elsewhere, we would dilute our efforts and prolong the emergency we seek to end. But ending the emergency is not the goal; removing the danger is the goal, and the emergency is a means towards that end. The emergency should continue as long as it is needed to accomplish that goal. We don't strive for peace as such. Peace is the absence of conflict; we'll get peace when we've eliminated all the relevant sources of conflict, but doing that probably will require at least some non-peaceful activities. Thus is the paradox of life. Way, way back in late September (it really does seem a long time ago to me), Matt Welch wrote a good piece, "Keep Hope Alive", urging dispirited "lefties" -- but surely the rest of us as well -- to formulate war aims. I'm not sure any of us ever adequately followed up on that. I think it's high time we did; before we settle into a permanent state of war abroad and emergency at home, let's at least decide that's what we want, and why. I think that there won't be a permanent state of war (more like a low level conflict which might last ten years). The initial state of war now looks to me like it will last perhaps 3 years. Of course, we citizens will get the opportunity for a reality check every two years; that's part of how our system works. (In 1968 voters made just such a reality check about Viet Nam.) I also think that the objectives of this war are actually pretty clearly understood, but I'm not sure our government has done a good job of communicating them. Let me take a swing at it. Here's a tentative list of objectives:
On that basis, it's a mistake to focus too closely on the 9/11 attacks and on those who launched them. By the same token, the fact that Iraq has not been shown to have been directly involved in this particular attack doesn't mean we have no right to pay attention to them now that we've made the transition to war. Even if Iraq was not actually involved, it surely sympathized -- and more importantly, it has a clear potential of being involved in future. Germany was not involved in the Pearl Harbor attack, but we fought against Germany nonetheless. By the same token, Iraq may well end up being part of this conflict because it 
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