BBC NewsIt sounds eerily like the Cold War - and that is no mistake.
The "Long War" is the name Washington is using to rebrand the new world conflict, this time against terrorism.
Now the US military is revealing details of how it is planning to fight this very different type of war.
It is also preparing the public for a global conflict which it believes will dominate the next 20 years.
The nerve centre of this war against terror is the huge MacDill airbase in Tampa, Florida.
Surrounded by white sand beaches, palm trees and two golf courses it looks more like a holiday camp than a military camp.
But inside US Central Command (Centcom) generals are planning what they call "fourth-generational warfare".
Centcom is already responsible for operations in the Middle East, South Asia and Africa - as well as the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan - and now it is planning a campaign that will eventually span the globe.
Aiming at al-Qaeda
The man behind what the US military calls its "principles of the Long War" is Brig Gen Mark Kimmitt.
Gen Kimmitt, Centcom's deputy director of plans and strategy, told BBC News: "Even if Iraq stabilised tomorrow the Long War would continue."
So as Centcom tries to control events in Iraq, he is also planning a strategy for "nothing less than the defeat of al-Qaeda across the world and its associated movements strung together by extremist ideology".
To achieve victory the US military will have to change dramatically, he says.
Like the terrorists it will have to build international networks, Gen Kimmitt says, making better use of "soft power" - diplomacy, finance, trade and technology.
"I'm an artillery officer, and I can't fire cannons at the internet," he says, referring to what he sees as one of the key weapons of the modern age.
Instead, he argues that the US military must try to break down "old mind-sets and bureaucracies" and build new relationships with other agencies - like the FBI, the police and the state department - through what in military jargon are called "joint inter-agency task forces".
Continue reading: The Long War
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