In the cluttered markets of the Pakistani border city of Peshawar, in the Northern Alliance-controlled towns of Afghanistan, in Rome where the former Afghan king lives, and in Washington, the talk now is of the future.
Serious diplomatic efforts are underway to try to cobble together a new post-Taliban government for Afghanistan that would be capable of ending the decades of war and repression in the devastated country.
Ousting the ruling Taliban, who came out of nowhere to seize power in Kabul in 1996 to impose the world's strictest Islamic regime, is only part one of the international communities' war on terrorism.
When the bombing and the battles are over, the work of reconstructing Afghanistan will have to begin.
This week the United States Secretary of State, Mr Colin Powell, and the Pakistan leader, President Perez Musharraf, agreed at a meeting in Islamabad that a new government would have to be broad-based and representative.
The former Afghan king, Mohammed Zahir Shah, various political and religious leaders, moderate Taliban chiefs, elements from the Northern Alliance, tribal elders, and Afghans living outside their country, should all have a role in this regard, President Musharraf told a joint news conference with Mr Powell.
Mr Powell also conceded the Taliban could not be entirely dismissed. "We have to listen to them or at least take them into account," he said.
The Taliban, he stressed, could not be driven away from Afghanistan but getting rid of the present regime was a must.
The 86-year-old chess-playing King Shah, who rarely ventures out of his villa in Rome, is an unlikely candidate to unify Afghanistan and cleanse it of terrorist camps. But the ageing monarch has suddenly found himself in the world spotlight.
Diplomats and Afghan opposition leaders are flocking to Rome to meet him, while inside Afghanistan hope is spreading that the king might actually come home.
King Shah ascended to the throne in Afghanistan in 1933 and ruled in relative peace for 40 years. He was deposed in 1973 in a coup by his cousin, Mohammad Daoud, and since then has lived in exile in Rome.
His ousting is seen by many as the start of decades of problems that saw Afghanistan tumble to one of the poorest states on earth through wars and ethnic conflict.
Last month, the king agreed with the Northern Alliance on the holding of a grand council meeting to call a Loya Jirga, or a gathering of Afghan tribal elders and ethnic elders, to discuss the future.
The Northern Alliance has stated it had no intention of taking Kabul before the broad-based tribal council is held to agree on the shape of a new government.
A three-member team sent by Shah and led by his close aide, Mr Hedayat Amin Arsala, met President Musharraf in Islamabad on Monday to discuss the future political shape of Afghanistan.
"We discussed the issue of Afghanistan, how the situation can be solved and how peace and stability can return to Afghanistan," Mr Arsala said afterwards.
Mr Arsala said the Taliban could not be ignored in the future, but it was difficult to say what role they could have in a government.
"Of course the Taliban are a part of the Afghan society. Obviously those elements that want to support the peace process in Afghanistan would all be welcome to co-operate with this effort and I hope they do," he said.
Trying to bind together all the religious and ethnic groups will be a very difficult task. Afghans are independent people who are divided by tribes, religion and customs.
The Northern Alliance is mostly non-Pashtuns made up of Tajiks, Hazaras, Uzbeks and Turks. The Taliban are predominantly Pashtuns.
Any future regime in Kabul will also have to be acceptable to Afghanistan's neighbours, including Pakistan, Iran and the central Asia republics.
Pakistan has said that if the people of Afghanistan want the king and it is acceptable to the world, they would not object.
According to Mr Ahmad Gailani, a moderate religious leader canvassing support for the ex-king's return, Northern Alliance ranks would be open to "those who find it their religious, spiritual and national obligation to stand with the rest of the people of Afghanistan".
He said that after the conflict was over, many Taliban would be taken back by their tribes as prodigal sons.
Some would be murdered in cold blood and a few would linger on with nuisance value but no power, he predicted.
The Afghan opposition is now openly trying to woo back these turncoats, saying they are welcome in the broad-based power structure to come.
Nobody expects the frail King Shah to assume executive power in Afghanistan. But it may well be that he could go back, with the authority of age and with the advantage of not having sided with any one group for a long time to help put together a new regime.
