IHMO, the fighting will continue for a long time. We need to encourage and help establish democracy and implement social/diplomatic solutions while we're fighting.
WE are...
however, the fighting still rages on. Although they have declared the end to major ops, there is still stuff going on in both Afghanistan and Iraq.
The Idea is to show that there is a continuity plan for when we are pulling out of Iraq and Afghanistan.
This is what will be used to shut the liberals up when they say the WH has no plans for post war Iraq.