Excellent stuff, especially the "heart and minds" which we Brits have specialised in for a while now and that the US have almost seemed to have ignored. I cringe when I read in the press of talk by Pentagon officials of a full scale invasion in the Spring. Presumably this is because they will not have acheived much by then from bombing mud huts and Red Cross warehouses. I am also very dubious of the publicity surrounding special forces operations. These always used to be covert and, despite the CNN factor and the need to keep the public informed that something is being done, should still be covert i.e. no publicity.
I live and work in the middle-east and people need to be aware of how sensitive the coalition is to other factors. Most Arabs I have spoken to were as horrified about the 11th Sep as were the Westerners. But there is a quid pro quo for their ongoing support, and that is some sort of resolution to the Israel/Paestine situation. There are UN mandates against Israeli occupation that have not bothered the US or anyone else since they were first published. We don't need to talk solely about the Afghan situation, or whether Iraq is next. We need to see the bigger picture.
Afghanistan is a Muslim country and, no matter what we think of the Taliban, it needs a Muslim input to find a long term solution. Bin Ladin is seen by some of the younger hot heads in the region (not so much in this country) as a hero because he is fighting the devil USA. That image needs to change. To do that, the USA needs to provide a positive input to resolving the Palestinian situation and then it will go some way towards winning the "hearts and minds".