WASHINGTON - As the Taliban's complicity in Osama bin Laden's terrorist activities becomes more and more clear, Pentagon officials are facing a challenge the likes of which they have never seen - an adversary too backwards to bomb.

"Up until now, standard U.S. policy has been to bomb our adversaries back to the Stone Age," stated new Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Richard Myers. "Unfortunately, Afghanistan is already there, so we've got to rethink our options."

One proposal, championed by Army Chief of Staff, General Eric Shinseki is to bomb the Taliban back into the Ice Age. "The Ice Age is worse than the Stone Age by far," Shinseki said. "It's obviously much, much colder. And the Taliban appears to be sorely lacking in heavy coat technology."

Despite the unprecedented scope of sending a nation further back in time than has ever been attempted, defense experts agree that the United States has the capability to undertake such an enterprise. "Our C-130 Hercules squadrons could easily drop hundreds of thousands of tons of ice cubes on the countryside, rendering it unfit for all but the woolliest of mammoths," said Air Force Chief of Staff General Michael Ryan.

When informed of the plan, Amnesty International immediately expressed fears about the toll a new Ice Age would take on the civilian population of Afghanistan. But Air Force officials insist that "The women there keep themselves pretty well bundled up." "It's all about layering," added General Ryan.

CIA officials, however, want to take a completely novel approach. They want to bring the Northern Alliance forward in time into the Bronze Age by providing the rebels with bronze swords, shields, helmets and statuary. "This would give the alliance an insurmountable edge over the Taliban, who, as we all know, are still fighting with tomahawks and flint-edged spears," explained CIA Director George Tenet.

Still others feel that unconventional warfare demands an unconventional response.

"We need to start thinking 'outside the box,' stated Marine Corps Commandant James L. Jones. "I hear we've got this dinosaur embryo skin. And this cloning business sounds like it's going pretty well. Put it all together, and now we're cooking with gas. I say we bomb them back to the age of the dinosaurs! I know I wouldn't want to fight a T-Rex with a sharp stick!"

According to sources close to the White House, President Bush has warmed to the latter idea and given Secretary of Defense Richard Rumsfeld this mandate: "Let's get 'Land of the Lost' on their butts!"