Mission impossible

The killing of Osama bin Laden settles nothing, decides nothing, and repairs nothing. Yet the passing of the al-Qa’eda leader just might serve an important purpose. We confront a moment of revelation: coming across bin Laden comfortably ensconced in a purpose-built compound in the middle of major Pakistani city down the street from the nation’s premier military academy should demolish once and for all any lingering illusions that Americans retain about their so-called global war on terror. The needle, it turns out, was not in the haystack but tucked safely away in our neighbour’s purse — the very same neighbour who professed to be searching high and low to locate that very same needle. Think we’ve been had?

Bin Laden was an indubitably evil figure. Yet the historical drama in which he played a role of considerable importance is not a morality play. Its central theme is not good vs evil.