Talking of future wars, an American scholar Ralph Peter wrote in 1996 "The future of warfare lies in the streets, sewers, high-rise buildings, industrial parks, the sprawl of houses, shacks and shelters that form the broken cities of our world". What would have Ralph Peter said if he had been asked to comment on the war on terror presently going on in the north-western part of Pakistan? He would have probably said, "The future of warfare lies in mountain tracts, rugged gorges, hilltop settlements, road junctions, thickly-populated metropolitans, famous luxury hotels, government buildings, barber shops, mosques, madrassas, railway carriages and public transport vehicles". Notwithstanding the academic notion, the prism of the present manifests that the future has actually dawned The war is actually being waged on every piece of soil allowing the combatants even an inch of space to move on. This is how things seem on ground. What type of war is it? One cannot really describe it in established terms of warfare. This ongoing low-intensity combat does not fall in the ambit of Samuel Huntington's clash of civilizations but it is a clash within a civilization. Ours. It is a war in which both slayer and slain are Muslims. Every day we hear about another poor barber or CD shop owner having been bumped off leaving behind a bereaved family to ask the familiar, disturbing questions that have no answer. Everyday we are told of a few more schools that have been set ablaze. I do not know whether it is a conspiracy against our state, society or religion, or all of what we hold dear. From Indonesia to Kazakhstan and Morocco to Turkey, these militants are only targeting the Muslim governments and their populace. Truth be told, none would rescue us from this war within if we did not do it ourselves. We will have to do it ourselves, together as nation of Islam. We need to pay heed to the divine commandment; "surely Allah changes not the condition of a people until they change their condition themselves". -EHSAN MEHMOOD KHAN, Lahore, November 13.