On March 15, 2008 another bomb - the fifth in six years - shattered the otherwise tranquil ambience of Pakistan's capital nestled in a verdant plateau at the foothills of the Himalayas. This time in addition to the usual Pakistani casualties, there were American, Briton, Japanese, Turk and Canadian casualties as well. That has to be doubly painful to a people who seek international economic integration to improve their lot and pride themselves on their legendary hospitality. With this latest attempt to destabilize this rapidly developing economy with poverty and resources challenges, emerging populist democracy with a history of Military dictatorship, nuclear and missile power, and key leader of the Islamic bloc, it is important to take a fresh perspective on how do we get here and how can we get out of here. The answers have global implications in more ways then one. Other countries have successfully overcome nagging problems with terrorists - the Basque separatists in Spain, the IRA in Britain, the Baader Meinhoff in the erstwhile West Germany and the Red Brigade in Italy. How can this latest outbreak of terrorism be overcome?\ Antecedents of the Conflict\ Over the years, Pakistan has emerged as an incredibly resilient nation. Carved from India some sixty off years ago, few people gave the fledgling nation a chance of survival - situated as it was smack in the middle of the "Great Game" - a term, coined by colonial author Rudyard Kipling, that referred to the tussle between two great powers - Russia and Great Britain, to be succeeded by the USA. Yet despite its well-publicized travails and the tough region it lies in, Pakistan today has emerged, if anything, as a richer cousin of India with better infrastructure and a higher per capita GNP.\ While its status as a "frontline state" remains unchanged, the antagonists have. Today Pakistan battles hardened militants from across the border in neighboring Afghanistan where decades of civil war following a brutal Soviet Invasion in 1979 have rendered most of that tragic nation ungovernable. The remarkable historical fact is that it was Afghanistan which struck the death knell of the Soviet Empire when the invasion, economically debilitating and demoralizing for the Soviet people, was turned back in the mid-eighties - marking the first time in history that a Soviet military retreated from an invaded country. What Germany, Poland, and Hungary could not do, the Afghani people did - and this is important to understanding the psyche of the smattering of militants amongst these people. They can be the most vicious, fearless, independent, and indomitable fighters in the world.\ A hundred and fifty years ago, the Afghan people had decimated a seventeen thousand strong invading army of then pre-eminent world power, Great Britain, with only one survivor returning to tell the tale. But the early Eighties was the tail-end of the Industrial Age and tribals with small arms could be mowed down from the relative- safe confines of helicopter gunships, tanks, and Rocket-fitted armored personnel carriers. Simply put - the Afghans would need help and that help was forthcoming.\ Pakistani intelligence planned and executed the war - financing and guiding the Afghan rebel factions. The USA provided the funds, together with Saudi Arabia; the USA also provided crucial satellite based imagery and the single most important weapon system which turned the war against the Soviets - the shoulder fired "Stinger" missile. Weapons, money, intelligence and tactics cannot replace the man on the ground however. To attract fighters from the world over, it would not be sufficient to espouse saving of Afghan nationhood and independence alone. \ The Perfect Storm\ So a far more potent message was formulated and propagated: Islam was under attack by Godless communists who were using modern weaponry to kill and maim brother Afghani Muslims and drive them out of their homes. The message resonated through the hearts and minds of Muslim youth from Morocco to the Soviet Central Republics, from Sinkiang Province, China to Indonesia - rallying volunteers by the plane load to the holy war. When the Soviet Union was defeated, a possibility naturally germinated in the minds of the triumphant warriors - the expulsion of other occupying forces from Islamic lands and the spread of a puritan brand of Islam. The possibility may well have been stillborn, but a number of forces came together to provide nurturing - creating a perfect storm:\ First, the USA walked out of Afghanistan after the Soviet retreat; only considerable American resources could have helped transition a brutalized and hardened population back toward peaceful, civilian existence. The lack of Government writ would create a power vacuum that would be filled in years to come by leaders with a militant message; the impoverished and embittered population providing ready volunteers. Meanwhile Pakistanis would have trust issues with flippant USA foreign policy in the aftermath of the Pressler Amendment which imposed sanctions on Pakistan, due its Nuclear Program, the year after Pakistan's linchpin role in expelling the Soviets was no longer required.\ \ Second, the brutal American-led invasion of Iraq by the Bush Administration, stationing of USA troops on the soil of Saudi Arabia together with the on-going American support to Israel's occupation of Palestinian lands would create a groundswell of animosity against American foreign policy the world over but particularly in Muslim lands. The target of the militant's wrath transitioned from the defeated Russians to the erstwhile ally - the USA - just as the target of American ire transitioned from Khomenie (80's) to Saddam (90's) to Bin Laden (2000's).\ Third, was the new environment spawned by the Information Age. Virtual communities congregate over the Internet - integrating individuals from physically disparate locations as communication costs plummet. Media spreads unprecedented awareness in remote corners of developing countries empowering the common man. Mobile phones enable carpenters, tailors and repairmen at the "bottom of the pyramid" to ply their trade and generate much higher volume of business without expensive offices. But on the flip side, the Internet and the mobile phone allow ephemeral terrorist networks to coordinate largely undetected - with Media enhancing the impact of their actions several fold.\ \ Supra-national Invisible Hand\ While all the elements of the perfect storm - a potent rallying cry, a brutalized embittered population, a vacuum with no writ of a Government, an aggressive foreign policy of the sole surviving Superpower, and the multiplier effect of technology and media were in place, it is widely believed that some supra-national entity was still required to guide, train and fund brainwashed militants and suicide bombers who by themselves did not possess the required level of sophistication and resources. Theories about the identity of this supra-national invisible hand or hands differ as no blast case has yet been cracked completely.\ The Governments of the USA, Western world, Pakistan and allies together with mass media assert that Al Qaida, led by previous CIA asset and ally in the Soviet Afghan War, Usamah Bin Laden, is the fountainhead of terrorism in Pakistan and the world over. Al Quaida may be allied with local militants such as Baitullah Masud in...