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This is the translation of two articles that first appeared in the Turkish mainstream daily, Hürriyet. These artıcles present two diametrically opposed vıews on the war in Afghanistan. The articles were, of course, translated by the Bridge.

The word " terror " is defined in the English dictionary as:

'intense fear, the ability to instill intense fear, a thing that instills intense fear'.

Terrorism is the politics of instilling fear and a terrorist is one who instills fear.

Who is a terrorist and who is not?

For example, doesn't US Secretary of State Kissinger who eliminated President Allende of Chile count as a 'terrorist'?

How about those US generals who for countless years rained bombs on the poor people of Vietnam and turned towns and villages into slaughterhouses? How about president Truman who dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, slaughtering hundreds of thousands of people?

Or those torture-mongering generals who tried for years to cow the local population of Algeria into submission with various kinds of torture and are now revealing the truth in their memoirs?

What or who is the entity we know as 'the West' and 'Western Civilization'? Those whose wealth derives from making and selling weapons of mass destruction and in the process dragging the people of the world into a form of slavery?

Those whose affluent life style derives from exploiting the people of poor nations?

Is it the USA that whenever it feels the urge drops a few bombs or a missile or two on cities or villages in Iraq?

Or is it those who today supply the Taliban in Afghanistan with weapons and missiles? Those who trained Panamanian President Noriega and Al-Qaeda leader Bin Laden?

There are thousands of questions without answers. Who's going to answer them? Those who look down on, and refuse not to look down on, blacks, Asians and Africans, saying " I am at the top of the pile, I am a civilized person, I am a WASP, that is white, Protestant and American"?

Or is it President Bush, totally ignorant of world history or geography, a man who carried out countless death sentences while governor of Texas and saw nothing wrong with this, who is to decide the fate of the world? Is it down to him to put people straight if they oppose Western Civilization?

Afghanistan is the world's poorest country. Now, as in the past, it is in the hands of the enemies of progress. And as for those fanatics known as the Taliban! Who supported and armed them? Wasn't it the same USA that today is showering them with missiles?

If an individual named Bin Laden appeared on the scene, who put him there? Who gave him succor?

According to Bush, it all amounts to 'a Crusade'. Did not a similar Italian Prime-Minister Mussolini once say: 'all those outside civilization must be destroyed'? Isn't it those same people who monopolized the world in the name of globalization who are now making tyranny the name of the game? If terrorism is not tyranny then what is it? They are such tyrants that just to get their own back for what was done to them they are summoning the whole world to join their ranks. Against whom? Using somebody called Bin Laden as a pretext, against the poorest people in the world? They are summoning the British, French, Italians, and Germans.

One question. What use is the United Nations? A world war is set to take place but the United Nations is silent.

This tragic comedy has only just begun. What about tomorrow and the following day? After Afghanistan who's next? Iraq? Sudan? Libya?

War is bad, but a war against an enemy bent on killing by those who refuse to die is justified.

More importantly, waging war against those murderers who spread violence and death in the name of religion is a duty no less sacred than worship. America did not start this war. The war started on September 11th with the massacre in New York. The evidence that was sought to identify those responsible appeared on TV screens the day operations directed against Afghanistan began.

Even though Osama Bin Laden did not openly claim responsibility for the massacre, his words, full of the threat of terror, justifying the attack virtually amounted to a confession of guilt. To avoid weakening the coalition against Bin Laden and the Taliban regime, the West is currently trying to give the impression that it is against equating Islam with terrorism.

But this stance is dictated by political considerations and does not reflect the genuine sentiment of Western society because both Bin Laden's butchers and the states that harbor them are Muslim.

The role we are going to play in freeing the Islamic faith from being tainted with the guilt of terrorism will certainly earn us the recognition of the Muslim world for years to come.

The war that we are going to take our place in has to do not with the Islamic faith, but with humanity. As a nation that has suffered greatly from terrorism, it would ill behoove us to play the role of skeptical and uncooperative partner in a war fought on a global scale against terrorism.

That countries in the region have other aspirations cannot deflect us from what we know to be the right the path. Otherwise we will be guilty of the same double standards shown by our allies with reference to our own fight against terrorism. The practice of distinguishing between 'good' and 'bad' terrorism based on petty calculations of self-interest must come to an end. You can destroy those butchers who use the banner of religion to channel the hate and rage of societies that have suffered injustice into murderous acts of terror. But the well-being of mankind is dependant on eliminating the breeding grounds that produce them.

Finding a solution to the Palestinian question, robbing them of this justification, is a matter of life or death.

There can be no doubt that a Turkey that not only participates in the war against terrorism but also agrees to supply soldiers will make it easier to accomplish all of these goals.

May all end well for our nation and for humanity!