"It is diffidult for me to see the wars in Afgh. and Iraq as anything short of monumental successes."
While I am extremely happy that Uday and Qusay will never plague us, and that the Taliban were kicked out of Afg., this does not keep me from being worried that things are not going as well as one might like. To mention 3 specific things in Afgh. (and these threads are more about Afg. than Iraq) we have the major production and export of heroin, the threat to kill a muslim who converted to Christianity, and the questionable death of Tillman. The first two point to the major problem that long range change has to occur in the heads of the Afghanis. The Tillman death may relate to the problem pointed out in "Front Line View on Iraq/Afghanistan War Situation, No. 2" in which the lack of attention to actual military skills as opposed to good appearance is highlighted.
First off we have a major problem with drugs right here in good ole USA - So to suggest that we have fixed the heroin situation out of Stan in and of itself isn't any criteria on which to judge if the WOT (within Stan) has been a success. It most certainly has.
Additionally the heroin trade is a huge / sole segment of money for large segments within Stan - Ending that is going to be a decade in the making process (and it will never be completely ended....that is the reality of the real world).
As for some within Stan wanting to kill a Muslim for converting to Christianity....again, that is not even in the realm of how to judge the progress in Stan. It is simply one negative instance in the grand picture of thousands of positives.
Regarding Rgr. Tillman. Again, that a terribly unfortunate friendly fire accident took place shows absolutely nothing in terms of the big picture. Not a thing. Those soldiers that acted terribly unprofessional with that unit have since been removed - Their reckless actions did cost the life of Rgr Tillman but that is nothing new to this war whatsoever.
As I said earlier, without question the WOT is a success. We are systematically and deliberately destroying our enemies. They have suffered one strategic defeat after another. We have not suffered one.
Do the rats at State and the JAGs screw things up for our guys in the field. Without question. But, so goes life.
As I mentioned above, the person to whom you speak with that is based in Stan makes several good observations....but he needs to take himself down off that cross and leave the martyr role alone. His comments on Stan do not reflect the majority of soldiers there.
Best regards,