International support for America's war on terror was thrown into doubt when President Bush signalled a widening of the war and the start of a second stage, more difficult to prosecute than the first. Bush singled out enemies of the US in his State of the Union address when he labeled Iran, Iraq, North Korea and "their terrorist allies" as members of an "axis of evil".

Under the heading of "war on terror", Mr Bush bundled together three areas of action: on the home front; against overseas terrorist networks; and against so-called rogue states.

FT.com examines what these three areas mean for the ongoing anti-terrorist campaign.

Rogue states

Rogue states was a term used by previous administrations to label countries such as Iraq, Iran and Libya that supported terrorist activities. In mid-2000 the term was downgraded to the more palatable 'states of concern' but with his State of the Union address, and his specific naming of Iran, Iraq and North Korea, Bush has put the concept of rogue states firmly back on the US agenda.

The terrorists attacks on September 11, on the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon in Washington killing nearly 3000 people, came when US foreign policy was marked by bursts of isolationism, driven by a new president not yet at ease with his role. In the aftermath Bush seemed restrained, despite a strong resolve to rid the world of al-Qaeda, but this new agression, and the expansion of the war on terror has made US allies nervous.

Chris Patten, European commissioner for external affairs, accused the Bush administration of taking an "absolutist and simplistic" stance and France warned the US not to give in to the "strong temptation of unilateralism".

Some critics attributed the widening of the campaign to Republican party policy devised before September 11 rather than the natural evolution of the coalition's counterterrorist campaign. In particular the naming of Iraq and the implicit threat of military activity against Saddam Hussein, could be seen as Bush Jr finishing off a job started by his father in the Gulf War.

Condeleezza Rice, US National Security Adviser, described Republican policy in 2000 as the targeting of so-called "rogue states" through "regime removal" strategies. It was seen as a forceful way to re-establish US "credibility" alongside a revamped nuclear missile programme. It also signaled a will to confront states suspected of acquiring weapons of mass destruction, such as Iraq.

Michael Howard, the military historian, warned in Foreign Affairs, the US journal, that the scale of the war in Afghanistan had already deepened animosity towards the US in certain quarters and given succour to militant groups.

"Even more disastrous would be its extension … in a long march through 'rogue states' beginning with Iraq, in order to eradicate terrorism for good so that the world can live at peace. No policy is more likely not just to indefinitely prolong the war but to ensure that it can never be won," he said.

Overseas terrorist networks

There is no real terrorist HQ, rather they operate in 'cells', small numbers of terrorists gathered in several countries, joined by a common belief into terrorist networks. An Executive Order, signed by President Bush on September 23 indentified 189 groups, entities, and individuals that the US says are terrorist supporters. Top of that list is al-Qaeda, fronted by Osama bin Laden who the US holds responsible for the September 11 attacks. Also singled out in the subsequent State of the Union address were groups like Hamas, Hezbollah and Islamic Jihad.

Indeed, the first person to be charged over the September 11 attacks was not a citizen of Afghanistan or the Middle East but a Frenchman, Zacariah Massaoui, 33, who will go to trial in October.

In a speech to commemorate the six-month anniversary of the September 11 attacks Mr Bush also indicated the second phase of the war would include aid for so-called proxy forces to combat these networks that have alleged links to al-Qaeda in countries such as Yemen, Georgia and the Philippines.

"We have entered the second stage of the war on terror," Mr Bush said. "We will not send American troops to every battle, but America will actively prepare other nations for the battles ahead."

US officials also dropped strong hints of escalated action in countries such as Somalia and Indonesia, thought to harbour al-Qaeda or its affiliates.

But it has done so amid much nail-biting by observers and allies worried about the risks of taking a big stick to such a disparate enemy. There is also the risk that US intervention can upset delicate regional balances and inflame conflicts - which has been argued was a factor in heightened tensions between Pakistan and India over Kashmir.

Mr Howard warned that publicly pursuing conventional warfare could also undermine more effective counterterrorist operations.

"The qualities needed in a serious campaign against terrorists - secrecy, intelligence, political sagacity, quiet ruthlessness, covert actions that remain covert, above all infinite patience - all these are forgotten or overridden in a media-stoked frenzy for immediate results, and nagging complaints if they do not get them," he said.

More traditional counterterrorist strategies based on police work have found some favour in Europe, where the UK and France have led joint operations to root out dormant cells and disrupt networks prepared to support terrorist attacks.

There were also arrests in Pakistan, Indonesia, Bosnia and the Philippines. In one of the more dramatic victories claimed in the global investigation, authorities said they foiled a plot by a key al-Qaeda affiliate to bomb a string of Western embassies and other targets in Singapore.

But many of the round-ups of suspects that have hit the headlines seemed based on thin evidence or stale intelligence. The dent made by the arrests appears to be small, given Mr Bush's estimate that "tens of thousands of trained terrorists" were still at large.

The near success of Briton Richard Reid in his alleged bid to detonate a shoe bomb on board an American Airlines flight from Paris to Boston was a reminder that security lapses are almost impossible to prevent. No definitive link between Reid and al-Qaeda has been established.

Paul Pillar, former deputy chief of counterterrorism at the Central Intelligence Agency, and author of Terrorism and US foreign policy, wrote: "the inherent difficulties in both collection and analysis of intelligence on terrorism mean that there will never be tactical warning of most attempted terrorist attacks, or even most major attempted attacks against US targets."

A final assessment of the campaign's strengths and weaknesses may be some years away. But the ability of the US to sustain that effort without alienating allies and losing support at home is not beyond doubt.

Home Front

Mr Bush's popularity was at record highs for a US president after the "war on terror" was launched. His administration was credited for knowing its mind and taking decisive action over Afghanistan.

The policy of targeting "rogue states" and weapons of mass destruction was expected to reinforce the view that the administration knew who America's enemies were and knew what it planned to do about them.

In his State of the Union address, Mr Bush said the "nation will continue to be steadfast and patient and persistent" in its pursuit of the war. But few opinion pollsters in the US would offer any such guarantees.

Charles Hill, an aide to Henry Kissinger when he was US secretary of state, has pointed out that Mr Bush was not the first president to declare war on terrorism. Ronald Reagan, in his time, also declared a war on terror, amid a series of attacks on US interests during the 1980s blamed mainly on groups based in the Middle East, including hijackings, kidnappings, and embassy bombings.

Mr Reagan steadily lost support for his war effort, which may be most easily remembered for the Iran-Contra scandal, when the president and his closest advisers were dragged before congressional hearings to explain how they could not recall key details about a chain of covert operations involving terror cells and guerrilla fighters that spanned the globe.

Some of the certainty about the righteousness of the Bush administration's crusade that marked the first phase of the campaign was already undermined when the second phase began. A particular weakness was the somewhat ad-hoc approach to the legal processes for dealing with suspected terrorists detained by the US as far apart as Mazar-i-Sharif to Massachusetts.

The mass detentions in the US in immediate aftermath of September 11 raised protests from civil liberties groups. The subsequent prosecution of detainees who were innocent of terrorist crimes for immigration violations was also blamed for souring relations with some communities.

Criticism has intensified after concerns were made by International Red Cross over the treatment of "battlefield detainees" captured in Afghanistan and imprisoned at Camp X-ray, Guantanamo Bay. The Center for Constitutional Rights, the Human Rights Clinic at Columbia Law School and the Center for Justice and International Law have all called the detentions in Cuba illegal in a petition filed with the Organization of American States' Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.

One key to the strength of his war effort, it was pointed out, may lie in how far the administration is prepared to stretch the "war on terrorism" as a canopy for its actions.

Like Mr Reagan, Mr Bush said he was prepared to run up a budget deficit while making large increases in defence spending. In his State of the Union address he explicitly linked an expected deficit to his national objectives: "to win the war, protect the homeland, and revitalise our economy". Under the budget proposals the Pentagon's annual budget is forecast to grow by more than one third over the next five years - expanding by $120bn to $451bn in 2007 - representing the biggest military build-up in two decades.

In the past the appetite for the "war on terror" waned as the public grew tired of unpalatable consequences. Towards the end of the Reagan era there was a perception of government excess. Time will tell if history repeats itself.

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