Zafar Sobhan's article

You hit every point with astounding accuracy - unfortunately the US administration, and the broader US public, simply don't get it. The problem with President Bush is that he simply refuses to differentiate between political Islam, cultural Islam, and revivalist Islam - and each of their subsets. Indeed by branding people 'Islamic fascists,' he is, as you say, driving the local population into the hands of militants and insurgent groups.

Moreover, to label Bangladesh as a new haven for "Islamic terror" is sorely off the mark. The 'War on Terror' is a farce - while the Bush administration mentions nothing of state sponsored terrorism and refuses to put pressure on any conflict outside of the Middle East - where, incidentally, the US refiner derives most of its crude petroleum is utter hypocrisy.

Labelling Bangladesh as a hub is simply a move engendered by political expediency, you're absolutely correct - President Bush would not lift a finger, or a pen. Moreover, this label drowns the actual Bangladeshi issues - as your aptly state: women's and civic rights - into a one-dimensional essentialisation of 'terrorism'. As you succinctly note, the US was a former staunch ally of 'terrorist' groups - from Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda to secularist Saddam Hussein.

The War on Terror is the US foreign policy searching for a new menace - unfortunately its target is too easily interpreted as the Islamic faith - and following, all Muslims in general. President Bush's new term 'Islamic fascist' only adds to this absurd state of affairs. American foreign policy has been in shambles since September 2001 - if not before, and is purely reactionary. I'm of the opinion that no one, neither in the Administration nor the general public, is asking the simple question: Why?

Perhaps it is because that they already know the answer - American foreign policy is simply too essentialist.

Lastly, its likely outcome. Iraq is in civil war. And every day bombs are dropped, persons are displaced, education, health care, and economy remain in tatters. One thing will surely be generated - the next generation of freedom-fighting, US-resisting, 'insurgents' and 'militants.' The War on Terror should be renamed The Terror Factory.