“For example, note that the NYT characterizes the Afghan operation with the leftist weasel-word “intervention,”
What would the proper word be?
“What would the proper word be?”
“Operations,” “military action,” “war” even “invasion,” would all be accurate. “Intervention” is a loaded term implying that it was really someone else’s fight and we had no real warrant or direct cause to be there.
It is a weasel word though because one can ignore this connotation and point out that we did in fact intervene in the conflict between the Taliban and the Northern Alliance. This would only be in the same sense that we “intervened” in the existing Sino-Japanese conflict after Pearl Harbor, however.
How about what it is - WOT.
We did not go to war on the Afghan people. You might call it a "Liberation"- how about that?