It is quite telling that if President Obama had to construct a strategy for defeat, it would not differ from what he and his aides describe as America’s way forward.

If there is one success story since 9/11, it has been the efforts to combat terror finance. If military action is sometimes akin to conducting surgery with an axe, efforts to dry up sources of funding are like wielding a scalpel.

The fight against terrorism is no closer to success today than it was a decade ago when, in the wake of the September 11 terror attacks, President George W. Bush declared a Global War on Terrorism.

February and March were bad months for the Western presence in Afghanistan. First the accidental burning of the Quran and then a lone soldier’s massacre of Afghan civilians undercut U.S. efforts to win Afghan hearts and minds.

When President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad emerged from seemingly nowhere to capture the Iranian presidency in 2005, American officials were dumbfounded. Whereas his predecessor, Mohammad Khatami, sought to assuage the West with talk of ‘dialogue of civilizations’, Ahmadinejad was crude and coarse.

Editor's Note: FMSO’s Operational Environment Watch provides translated selections and analysis from a diverse range of foreign articles and other media that analysts and expert contributors believe will give military and security experts an added dimension to their ...