The other surprise of his visit to Russia is his decision to buy 30 Sukhoi jet aircraft. There is nothing wrong with it but it raises eyebrows when the identity of the Malaysian agent is known. The ultimate "dalang" (puppet master) of defence agents in Malaysia is Datin Seri Rosmah Yaakob, the wife of the defence minister, Dato' Seri Najib Tun Razak. The Soviet Union, and later, Russia, do not have exclusive agents for its defence equipment as Western countries, and they hand out agencies to anyone who asks for it, paying what it is due to the one who brings the orders. Datin Seri Rosmah brought them all under her charge. With a husband to shepherd it through, it was easy. Dr Mahathir at one time found this so distasteful that he transferred him to education, where she also spread her spell to be commission agent for computer software for its touted-but-failed "smart schools". (The software is still not ready, years after the promised date).

To come back to the Davos Forum, it is a living exampale of what marketing can do to a product. For years it met in humdrum existence, and it was not until after the Soviet Union broke up in 1989, and the organisers brought in Mikhail Gorbachev as the star that it acquired the status it now has. And with free advertising from those who pay nearly RM25,000 to attend, if only to prove spending that much money is worth it, how could it fail? The NST diaryist describes it as "the earth's pre-eminent political and economic powerfest". Really? So, when Arthur Andersen or its Malaysian equivalent comes to check the books of a losing company, as the NST is, the extravagance could be justified? It is not the NST alone?. Eighty-eight others went along for the ride. They have done it for years. What good has it done for us? But it has made the Davos Forum organisers very rich indeed. At our expense.

Afghanistan has tripped more powerful nations than the United States. Since Alexander the Great conquered parts of it in the 4th century BC, none, including Great Britain and the Soviet Union, could hold on to the country for long. Its history is a continuing tale of ultimate defeat of the foreign conqueror.

Mr Bin Laden forced the United States to attack Afghanistan to remove its government more lethally, though the methods used are the same, as the Soviet Union, raining bombs and anti-personnel sleeper bombs, as in Cambodia, for the killings to go on years after peace comes. He led the US and Great Britain into a quagmire in Afghanistan, in which the new government is aligned not to Washington but to Moscow; only the interim head is pro-Washington. Nothing changed internally but that, as Robert Fisk graphically notes, one set of murderers and warlords represented by the Taliban is replaced by another from the Northern Alliance. The euphoric statements out of Afghanistan these days equalled the euphoric reportage in the Soviet Press in Moscow's presence in Afghanistan two decades earlier.

The US wields the big stick, assumes as the British Raj and the Soviet Union before her, she would succeed as they did not. The high technology of war gives her a tremendous advantage over London and Moscow in their heyday, and makes her tasks simpler. But this presumes an Afghanistan willing to be ordered, and bandied, about. This reliance on high tech warfare comes with it, as in the US, a reluctance to take casualties. What brought the US down in Vietnam was the unacceptable casualties. With high technology, the war must be over before the casualties mount. As the Gulf War showed, this decides nothing. President Saddam Hussein is still in power ten years after he was pulverised from the air. The intiial "success" in Afghanistan now leads President Bush to consider expanding the war into Iraq.

What frightens is that rush to Islam comes with it a view of the world as an extension of Malaysia. Malaysian embassies are seen as villages of Malay Malaysia, the ambassador the penghulu and Madrid Merlimau. When the Central Asian Muslim states became independent with the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1989, Malaysia stepped in smartly and trained its diplomats. Malaysia had a good reputation and well regarded. Then we allowed out business men and Muslim missionaries there, and spoiled what we had. We presumed they needed the Quran more than economic help. They did not, and lost. The Malay arrogance, combined with this obscurantist view of Islam, cause us to lose friends where we need it most. This is reflected, at a personal level, in how Puasa is viewed at home.

It does not matter who, but someone would. During the Cold War, it was the Soviet Union. In 2001, it is terrorism, especially, or so we are led to believe, Islamic terrorism.

It does not matter who, but someone would. During the Cold War, it was the Soviet Union. In 2001, it is terrorism, especially, or so we are led to believe, Islamic terrorism.

Where was this respect for the criminal code when it was in power after the Soviet Union was booted out of Afghanistan? Did not ISA (NA) elements throw acid upon women who had makeup and were unveiled, when it was in power? Or is it its considered opinion that women are lower than dogs in Afghanistan? Was the criminal code applied when they ruled the roost? Why did the people rise with the Taleban then to force them into the corner of AFghanistan where the minority tribe they represent? If they rose because the AFghan criminal code was applied strictly, then why is this international coalition against (of?) terror are so terrified of the ISA in power. Why do they believe then that the ISA in Afghanistan would be more horrific than Dr Mahathir's ISA, and should not, under any circumstance be in charge in Kabul? Since it is, in its view, a modern state, with respect for people and property, why I wonder does it not state when free and unfettered general elections would be held?

Since then Afghanistan was bombed into ruins by a succession of pro-Soviet governments, until the Soviet Union herself was finally forced out eight years ago. The parties in the Northern Alliance captured power, but their record was such that it made the Talibans take power with relative ease.

For after the hype and propaganda comes reality, and this reality, like the Gulf War a decade earlier, does not achieve the desired goal of containing terror. Since this campaign is planned and executed with a cynicism of power but without the real politik confidence, AFghanistan would be left to rot, the Muslim anger doubles in intensity, the Middle East becomes as confused and dangerous, and more bombs would drop on the Afghanistan countryside to join what the Soviet Union had dropped to kill and maim men, women and children decades into the future. Is this the Christian charity that President Bush and Mr Blair wants the world to know it for?

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