In a private memo from last week Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld questioned how successful the Pentagon has been doing in the so-called war on terrorism. Rumseld begins the memo asking “Are we winning or losing the Global War on Terror?”

He goes on to say the government has had mixed results tracking down Al Qaida and he acknowledges many members of Osama Bin Laden’s organization remain at large. Rumsfeld also writes that the U.S. has made reasonable progress in capturing or killing the 55 most wanted Iraqis. Near the end of the memo Rumsfeld writes “It is pretty clear that the coalition can win in Afghanistan and Iraq in one way or another, but it will be a long, hard slog.”

Sen. Joseph Biden Jr. (Del.), the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said the memo shows that Rumsfeld and the Pentagon is beginning to display “a little self-doubt.” Biden added that the memo was “the first sort of introspection that I’ve even whiffed coming out of the civilian side of the Defense Department.”