Endless War is Bin Laden's Whole Point

Sept. 11 -- Most wars in U.S. history have had some clear moment of final resolution. But the war against terrorism — even with its finite beginning on that horrible September morning two years ago — is not likely to end with the same conclusive certainty.

In fact, eternal conflict — endless war — is the whole point for Osama bin Laden and his loyalists. It was clearly part of the message on his latest audiotape, broadcast Wednensday on Al Jazeera and meant to invigorate and motivate his followers to continue their jihad ad infinitum .

"Engaging in warfare, conducting raids and terrorist attacks, entering into battle itself, provides rewards," says Brian Jenkins, terrorism expert at The Rand Corporation. "Without action, Osama bin Laden is a picture on a T-shirt, " he said.

"For the jihadis, war is a condition, war is perpetual, war is infinite," Jenkins adds."Going to battle, for them, is like going to church."

Wars Collide

Of course, not all Muslims accept that theology, but for al Qaeda and its disciples, it is a cardinal tenet of their faith — one particularly hard for Americans to understand.

"The characterization of war in the Western sense cannot be applied to what is going on," explains Akbar Ahmed, professor of international relations at American University. "What you are seeing are two different civilizations with different cultural codes and different ways of fighting wars, with different objectives, interacting now at this moment in history."

In the West, "we see war as a finite undertaking," Jenkins adds. "It has a beginning and an end. Therefore, we're anxious to measure progress, weigh the cost, know the score. Those are typically Western things — especially American things."

Keeping score in a perpetual war isn't easy. Except for bin Laden, his chief lieutenant Ayman al Zawahiri, and their immediate cadre, America's enemies remain mostly unseen and unidentified. They form an amorphous, anonymous army, with no uniformed battalions or brigades and no dependable estimates of its size. There is no way to be sure whether a prisoner captured or a plot foiled marks a major turn in the tide, or simply a minor skirmish.