Back when Qari Zainuddin still believed that he could win this war, he stood in front of his office in the Pakistani town of Dera Ismail Khan, surrounded by masked men, each of them with an AK-47 at the ready. A few white doves cooed as the sun blazed down on the flat brick buildings.
Zainuddin, 26, a powerfully built Taliban commander, was wearing a shimmering, gold-colored cap over his dark hair and a Palestinian scarf wrapped loosely around his shoulders. He was speaking into the microphones of the journalists he had invited.
