The war in Afghanistan is just about over. Contrary to most expectations, the U.S.-led coalition avoided the traps that had ensnared previous enemies of governments in Kabul. Its bombing campaign succeeded in exterminating a loathsome regime and the terrorists it harbored. Yet despite that impressive victory, there are few celebrations. Osama bin Laden, the face of modern-day evil, has escaped capture. He may be dead, a victim of the fierce air assault, or he may have survived.
Either way, the terror network he built survives. And the fear and confusion it created will linger. The United States may not be the paper tiger that bin Laden and his comrades counted on, but neither is it the invulnerable giant its citizens assumed that it was. Coming to grips with those new realities was the central task of 2001.
The big story was the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11. The U.S. had assumed that it was immune from the violence that surfaced regularly throughout the rest of the world. On that day, the world became infinitely smaller for Americans as they watched symbols of their country collapse in fire and rubble. In one hideous videotaped instant, the oceans that insulated the world's remaining superpower from conflict "over there" disappeared.