The fog of war: how can we tell if we're winning the War on Terror?

• Author: Lyons, Stephen J.
• Position: Shadow War: The Untold Story of How Bush Is Winning the War on Terror - Fortress America: On the Frontlines of Homeland Security--An Inside Look at the Coming Surveillance State - Book Review

Shadow War: The Untold Story of How Bush Is Winning the War on Terror, by Richard Miniter, Washington, D.C.: Regnery Publishing, 256 pages, $27.95

Fortress America: On the Frontlines of Homeland Security--An Inside Look at the Coming Surveillance State, by Matthew Brzezinski, New York: Bantam, 272 pages, $25

WHEN THE DEPARTMENT of Homeland Security released a list of potential terrorist targets in December, Rep. Ernest Istook (R-Okla.) called it "an exercise in full employment for bureaucrats, rather than a realistic way to make the country safer." Who knew the nation's water parks and miniature golf courses were in danger?

Ah, goes the answer, but there have been no terrorist attacks on U.S. soil since 9/11. Something must be working....

If you're tempted to throw up your hands in confusion, you're not alone. It often seems impossible to calculate whether the United States is winning its War on Terror. What constitutes definitive success? If something bad has not happened, does that mean that something good has?

Two recent books offer some intriguing, if very different, answers. On the micro level, Matthew Brzezinski's Fortress America examines the security and civil liberties implications of expanding the government's surveillance abilities. On the macro level, Richard Miniter's Shadow War tries to explain how the U.S. has prevented additional attacks. The books are not necessarily contradictory, but they do strike distinct tones. Fortress America reveals alarming gaps in our domestic security; Shadow War celebrates the government's apparent successes.

Miniter, an investigative journalist, is the author of Losing bin Laden: How Bill Clinton's Failures Unleashed Global Terror. In Shadow War, he asks and attempts to answer three questions: "Where is Osama bin Laden? Why hasn't there been another terrorist strike inside the U.S. since September 11, 2001? Is President Bush winning the war?" Miniter focuses his reporting on the 911 days from September 11, 2001, to March 11, 2004, the date of the Madrid train bombings.

Miniter's answer to his first question isn't very convincing. He asserts that bin Laden may be in Iran, citing a pair of Iranian intelligence operatives who report that the terrorist entered Iran from Afghanistan on July 26, 2002. In tow, they say, were bin Laden's four wives; his eldest son, Saad bin Laden; and his sidekick Ayman al-Zawahiri. Supposedly, bin Laden's beard was trimmed in the style of a Shi'ite cleric and "he seemed to have put on weight." Miniter continues: "Bin Laden's new appearance may explain why neither he nor his deputy has appeared on videotape. They do not want to broadcast their disguises." Bin Laden himself cast some doubt on this theory with his pre-election videotape, released after Shadow War went to press.

But Miniter...