Bruce Anderson: Mr Clinton should have finished off bin Laden

'Clinton declared Laden as dangerous as any state; but for Clinton deeds were always another matter'

In the upper reaches of the Bush administration, anger is under the restraint of counsel. From the earliest, shocked hours, the President and those around him were unanimous on one point: that it was more important to get it right than to do it quickly. Though ultimatums and action must now be imminent, there has been a scrupulous, intensive consideration of both military and diplomatic options.

When the President declared war on America's terrorist enemies, there was no triumphalism. He assured members of his audience that America was going to win; he also assured them that this would be a slow, hard and bloody business. He would not just be sending Americans into battle to fire Cruise missiles over the horizon or to drop bombs from 30,000 feet. He would be sending in the infantry, to slog, fight, capture ground and hold it – and inevitably, to take heavy casualties in the process. He may have been addressing a fired-up audience; he did nothing to stoke the flames. Ninety per cent of Americans are now demanding retaliation, and George Bush agrees with them. But he was also reminding them about the butcher's bill.

Yet on this side of the Atlantic, he is being widely advised to show restraint, as if he were some trigger-happy gunslinger. Even Tony Blair was at it. In public, for the cameras, he is shoulder to shoulder with America and the President. But out of the back doors to No 10, they are spinning a different message, in which the PM is never off the phone to Washington, constantly telling the President not to do anything rash. In part, this is political calculation on Mr Blair's part, to ensure that whatever the outcome, he will benefit. It also reflects the European liberal mindset, which is instinctively distrustful of America and fearful of its reactions.

In this case, however, that mindset is an even more useless guide to events than is generally the case. This crisis has not been caused by American rashness or lack of restraint. On the contrary, it was caused by American weakness, and a pathetically feeble response to provocation.

Osama bin Laden did not declare war on America last Tuesday. He has been at war with the US for more than a decade. Even before Tuesday he had been responsible for the deaths of nearly 300 US citizens. This was his second attack on the World Trade Centre. In 1998, after organising the destruction of the American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, bin Laden declared himself to be dedicated to the killing of Americans, wherever they were. In response, President Clinton declared that bin Laden was as dangerous an enemy as any sovereign state; unlike George Bush, Bill Clinton was always good with words in such circumstances.

Deeds were another matter. America fired a couple of Cruise missiles, which hit innocent targets. That was not only a rash reaction, it was a pointless one. There would have been more effect on bin Laden's war-fighting capability if he had been made to pay Monica Lewinsky's dry-cleaning bills.

"Kill Americans wherever they are." Nearly four years after he issued that threat, bin Laden was not only still alive and at large. He was able to run a terrorist network, with the complicity of a state. He did not need to scurry from refuge to safe house; he could communicate with his followers, prepare missions and train suicide pilots – all with apparent impunity. If a sovereign state had blasted American embassies and attacked an American warship, it would have faced instant and overwhelming retaliation. Bin Laden was able to operate with all the advantages of a sovereign state, and none of the vulnerabilities.

Matters will now be different, but America's previous supine acquiescence in such a state of affairs was an indictment of its resolve to defend its people. That said, bin Laden was fortunate in his timing. Most of his rise to malignant eminence took place while Bill Clinton was in the White House. During those years, bin Laden developed a contempt for America's military strength, concluding that it was vitiated by American moral weakness. While Mr Clinton was president, that was a plausible argument.

Bin Laden will now discover that it was a wrong one. He will shortly become what he should have been from the outset: a hunted fugitive, one slip away from capture or death. But it will not be enough to destroy him, his network and his associates. In order to guarantee its security, America will have to rethink its strategy.

Over the past few years even while the gap was growing between American military resources and those of any possible rivals, those resources were becoming irrelevant, because of the existence of rogue states. Bin Laden could not have operated without the help of such states. Even if he were eliminated, future terrorist leaders could replace him, as long as terrorist states exist to give them assistance and space.

After the Kuwait war, George Bush senior spoke of a new world order, yet did nothing to create one. Until there is such an order, America will be vulnerable to further attacks, perhaps employing weaponry even more terrible than the airliner converted into a bomb. The new President Bush must now deal with this father's unfinished business.