With Respect, I Submit That You're Unclear on the Concept

A father of a slain Marine is criticizing the rules of engagement that were implemented to reduce civilian casualties.

As [John Bernard] sees it, the U.S. was right to go to war in Afghanistan after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, but eight years later the focus has shifted to counterinsurgency instead of hunting down the enemy. Marines are trained to "kill people and break things," not to be police officers and nation-builders, he says.

The Taliban "are tenacious and you have to fight them with the same level of tenacity," Bernard said. "If you're going to try to go over there as a peacekeeper, you're going to get your butt handed to you, and that's what's going on right now."

We should not let grieving fathers determine the rules of engagement for the same reason that we do not let grieving fathers carry out executions of those who murdered their children.

Going in with heavy forces and brutal tactics will not work in Afghanistan. The Russians went in with 100,000 soldiers and heavy artillery and air support. They dropped millions of little "toe-popper" mines on every trail and donkey track they could find. The Russians had a puppet government in place. The Russian Empire was next door to Afghanistan, they did not have to send materiel half-way around the world to supply their war. At the risk of belaboring a point, it did not turn out so well for them.

It is by no means certain that even if we and our allies send 80,000 more troops into Afghanistan that it will be successful. The government in Afghanistan is corrupt from top to bottom. President Hamid Karzai's re-election win (even if a run-off is held) has been steeped in electoral theft, a level of theft that would make even the folks at Diebold blush.

We have been in Afghanistan for eight years, most of which the previous Administration pissed away because they did what they always did: Do a job less than half-assed and call it victory. We are in a war where the population is not behind us and the local government is a huge cesspool of corruption, from the cop on the street and the local administrators right up to the top man's family.

We have seen this movie before. It is time to cut a deal, the same sort of deal that Richard Nixon cut in 1973 and leave while we still can. The Chickenhawks of the Right will gnash their teeth for the next few decades, but as many of us have pointed out, they haven't felt strongly enough about this to go serve themselves.

End this war.