Free Republic

Nearly a decade after the United States began to focus its military training and equipment purchases almost exclusively on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, U.S. military strategists are quietly shifting gears, saying that large-scale counterinsurgency efforts cost too much and last too long. The domestic economic crisis and the Obama administration's commitment to withdraw from Iraq and begin drawing down in Afghanistan next year are factors in the change. The biggest spur, however, is a growing recognition that large-scale counterinsurgency battles have high casualty rates for troops and civilians, eat up equipment that must be replaced and rarely end...

When Satch,* who graduated in June 2001, returned to my classroom last spring, he bore little physical resemblance to the gangly, bespectacled youth who once sat in my sophomore English class. He strode through the door in neatly pressed military garb, hat pressed to his right hip, a thick-chested, heavily tattooed man. I noticed that contacts replaced the Coke-bottle glasses he once wore. But when we shook hands, his smile revealed more than a glimmer of the angry, confused kid who had struggled at school. "They're shipping me to Iraq," he told me. "I leave in one week." The tone...

Many on the left, most visibly Presidential contender John Kerry, often claim that the "coalition of the willing" is weak and that participation from the international community has been minimal if anything. Opponents of President Bush use such claims in order to discredit the legitimacy of this noble endeavor for freedom. It may not be such a bad idea to look at the state of our coalition, not in an effort to attack President Bush, but rather to conduct a healthy reassessment and critique of the coalition and our allies. Several weeks ago, Michael Rubin returned from the Coalition Provisional...

<p>SACRAMENTO - Support is building to pass one of Silicon Valley's most important political initiatives when the Legislature convenes next month: lowering the two-thirds majority needed to increase sales taxes. The fate of the BART line to San Jose may hang in the balance.</p>