The Bush Doctrine:
We will starve terrorists of funding, turn them one against another, drive them from place to place until there is no refuge or no rest.
And we will pursue nations that provide aid or safe haven to terrorism. Every nation in every region now has a decision to make: Either you are with us or you are with the terrorists.
From this day forward, any nation that continues to harbor or support terrorism will be regarded by the United States as a hostile regime. Our nation has been put on notice, we're not immune from attack. We will take defensive measures against terrorism to protect Americans. Today, dozens of federal departments and agencies, as well as state and local governments, have responsibilities affecting homeland security.
--George W. Bush
President Bush's address, September 20, 2001
This is the current policy of the United States of America, as expressed by the chief of state. This policy was used tp justify the removal of the Taliban government of Afghanistan. The war between the Taliban and the US/UK/Northern Alliance was only a necessary first step before the real war, the "War on Terror" which pitched the US against the al Qaeda organization.
As of right now, we are still fighting that war, hunting down the leaders of al Qaeda in rural Afghanistan and Pakistan.
The state of war between al Qaeda and the United States is nothing new. It has existed since the US embassies in Nairobi, Kenya and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania were bombed on
August 7, 1998. In response, US President Bill Clinton bombed al Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan and (supposed) bomb-manufacturing facilities in Sudan.
The Bush Doctrine took the war one step farther than Clinton did. Essentially, George W. Bush said that he was willing to remove an (illegitimate and evil) government from power in order to pursue a non-governmental criminal organization that had committed mass-murder of American citizens.
(This has very little to do with the possibility of a second war with Iraq. George W. Bush has yet to formally explain the policy behind that idea. The idea is that an evil madman should be prevented from getting his hands on weapons of mass destruction. But doesn't Dick Cheney have access to nuclear weapons? Do we need to go to war with him?)
Bush Doctrine E2 Writeup, Copyright 2002 Frank Grimes.
This writeup is dedicated to the public domain. Do with it what you will. (For details, see http://creativecommons.org/licenses/publicdomain/ )
--Frank Grimes, 2007