According to the Quran and the Islamic texts that support it, jihad means to strive. However, there are several words and expressions that, when associated with jihad, express a variety of feelings. The expression fi sabil Allah, "on the path of God", can be interpreted to mean fighting for the love of God. Associated with the word ribat, jihad is linked to war or pious acts/activism (Bonner 2006). Jihad represents a struggle that provided Muslims with a solid foundation of military effectiveness historically demonstrated in the early days of Islam. During the Cold War, America saw an advantage in promoting Afghan insurgents and channeling aid to the rebels. It was later revealed that the United States began aiding tribal and Islamic revolts six months before the USSR invaded Afghanistan. The Afghan invasion not only led to the collapse of the Soviet Union, but also led to the creation of young men from the Middle East who sought acts of violence to satisfy their own personal jihad. America trained these men as their own, provided them with advanced weapons intelligence and, finally, money and drugs. The war escalated in Afghanistan and eventually gave rise to a growing global jihad. The United States supplied the mujahideen with anti-aircraft missiles. And the CIA has supported Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence Agency (ISI)'s ongoing recruitment program of mercenaries and religious volunteers around the world. New York, San Francisco, and Detroit all had recruiting centers (Parenti 2001). With American assistance, the ISI received help from a striking and very wealthy young man named Osama bin Laden. He joined the ISI, as a favor to the head of Saudi intelligence and his good friend, Prince Turki. Bin Laden quickly assumed the important role, including...... middle of document......, Panel Reports. Said, E. (1981). Cover Islam. New York: Pantheon Books. Sheikh, K.Z., Price, V., Oshagan, H. (1996). Treatment of Islam by the press: what kind of image do the media paint? Gazette of International Communications 56(2), pp. 139-154St. Clair, J., Cockburn, A. (1998). How Jimmy Carter and I Founded the Mujahideen. The New Observer. 76Stern, J. (2000). The Culture of Jihad in Pakistan. Foreign Affairs. 79(6), pp. 115-126 Suleiman, M. W. (1988). Arabs in the Mind of America. Brattleboro. Vermont: Amana Books. Transcript, Public Broadcasting System, “Frontline: Looking for Answers,” Program No. 2002, original broadcast date October 11, 2001. Winter, T. (2011), America as a Jihad State: Perceptions of the Middle -East of modern America Theopolitics. The Muslim world, pp. 101: 394-411. Zaidi, M. (2009). A TAXONOMY OF JIHAD. Arab Studies Quarterly, 31(3), pp.. 21-34.