Mr. Masud has raised some important issues about American efforts to promote democracy abroad. He writes: "One may wonder whether the US policy of supporting undemocratic regimes has changed in the post-Cold War era, particularly relating to Bush's declaration of promoting democracy in Third World countries." Well, it might have changed for the worse.

During the Cold War, the corner-stone of American foreign policy was to stop the Soviet Union and its ideology of communism from gaining ground around the world. The Soviet Union, with its ideology of spreading communism through a world revolution, was perceived as the greatest threat to the Western democratic capitalism. In Western Europe, it led to the formation of Nato and the policy of containment. In the developing world, it was based on propping up anti-communist regimes.

The US policymakers were aware that the developing countries were too poor and too inexperienced in democracy to act as anti-communist bastions in the Third World. This is why the United States poured economic and military assistance into undemocratic regimes like South Korea (which became a democracy only recently), South Vietnam, Taiwan, and Thailand -- all dictatorships of various types. And when Marxist leader Salvadore Allende was democratically elected as president by the people of Chile, the CIA conspired with the Chilean military to oust him in a violent coup d'etat. The rest belongs to history.

The situation changed dramatically after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Freed from the Soviet threat, the United States could finally look at the world without an ideological periscope. It seems the world might be seeing a new era when the Americans don't have to prop up dictators in the name of realpolitik. The invasion of Kuwait by Saddam Hussein was the first test, and the Americans under President George Bush sr. responded with resolve, and Saddam's forces were squarely defeated. Then came the equally brutal attack on Bosnia by Milosevic's forces. Again the Americans under President Clinton responded, and Serbian forces were forced to withdraw from Bosnia and, later, Kosovo.

By the time President George W. Bush was elected in 2000, the world seemed to be settling down without any great conflict. This led Dr. Francis Fukuyama, a former senior US State Department official, to write a book The End of History. In the book, Dr. Fukuyama argued that great conflicts of human history were now over, and the American ideas about democracy and capitalism faced no challenge. Now the world was left with the boring job of day to day management. But the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, changed all this. The new menace of al-Qaeda, with its fanatic vision of Islam, rose on the horizon.

The threat from al-Qaeda is different from the threat posed by the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union was a super-power bristling with nuclear weapons and missiles. The Soviet threat was countered by a retaliatory threat posed by the United States. As such, there was no direct military confrontation between the two rival super-powers.

Al-Qaeda is a different matter. It doen't have any military force of its own. It is composed of a rag-tag group of extremists working out from their sanctuary in Taliban-controlled Afghanistan. What makes them dangerous are their cells operating in the west, and the ideological support they get from their sympathisers. This makes the war against terrorism more protracted and less certain.

Bush decided to counter al-Qaeda on two fronts. One, by invading Afghanistan and Iraq and, later, promising to bring democracy in the Middle East. Democracy, he declared, would end the culture of violence in the region, and the people would themselves turn against terrorism and anti-American rhetoric. But it proved to be exactly the opposite.

Bush failed to realise that democracy could not be imposed on any people by military means. It must grow from within, and over a long period of time. His contention that the American occupation of post-war Germany brought democracy is without any basis. Germany was a democracy before the war, and Hitler himself was elected by the German people. In fact, Hitler is an example of how a democratically elected leader can turn against other democracies.

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez was also elected by the Venezuelan people, and yet he has emerged as the most anti-American leader in South America. The United States is now facing total disarray in foreign relations. It is embroiled in a bloody war in Iraq and both democracy and peace look like distant dreams, while anti-American sentiments have spread around the world.

Unlike during the Cold War, the United States has no friendly dictators in this war. Even Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf has proved to be a fair-weather friend. Gen. Musharraf is playing on both sides, siding officially with the Americans in the war against terror while allowing al-Qaeda a free hand in tribal regions, and al-Qaeda seems to be regrouping in the region beyond the reach of the Americans.

The United States will need a revised policy when Mr. Bush leaves the White House. It will have to reorient its policies from military options to political and security options. This calls for improving economic and political ties while downplaying the military objectives. Despite 9/11, the United States is not facing a military threat. Unlike US-backed rebels during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, today's al-Qaeda doesn't have the backing of any military power and is not a threat in the military sense.

The United States must also give up its idea of spreading democracy through guns, and use what Prof. Joseph Nye of Harvard University calls the "soft power" at its disposal. Soft power involves economic incentives and educational and cultural influence to prod nations into becoming more democratic. This will be a slow process, but it promises far greater success than the current policy of persuasion through gun.

Mahmood Elahi is a freelance contributor to The Daily Star.aeda