As the US led campaign in Iraq enters the mopping up and consolidation stage, it isbecoming clear even to the more obtuse in India and Pakistan that things have changed; that, even when thecoalition entered Iraq, ignoring the cacophonic and quarrelsome 'international community' and the UnitedNations, the strategic architecture of Asia, indeed, of the world, had been transformed.
This is now being clearly realized even by the leaders of Islamist terrorist groups, who recognize thepossibility of a shift of American attention from Iraq to other areas of potential terrorist threat to thenational interests of the world's 'hyperpower'. Nevertheless, it is apparent that groups based in Pakistanbelieve that they will still be able to conceal themselves in the interstices of 'plausible deniability' andthe complexity of the South Asia situation.