News from the War Fronts, Present and Future

Out of sight on the front page of the Wall Street Journal on August 31, under a collection of short news items headed, "U.S. Watch," there was a report of former Vice President Cheney’s appearance two days earlier on "Fox News Sunday." During that interview, Cheney had stated that in the waning days of the Bush administration, he advocated a military strike to destroy Iran’s nuclear-weapons program. "I was probably a bigger advocate of military action than any of my colleagues," he boldly announced, causing the WSJ to remark that Cheney’s boast "showed just how seriously George W. Bush’s team was considering a military attack."

The fact of the matter is that we have no idea just how close we came a year ago to getting ourselves involved in still another war, this one also in what has been for the past 20 years anyway our favorite stomping grounds, the Middle East. And though Cheney is gone (somewhat), to what extent do his views on Iran prevail even in the Obama administration? Suggestion: Don’t bet the farm that we’ll continue diplomacy and ignore Israel.

Interestingly, in the same issue of the same paper, an editorial carrying the by-line, "Conflict is inevitable unless the West moves quickly to stop a nuclear Tehran," noted that "preventing Iran from getting the bomb is an Israeli national imperative, not a mere policy choice," and suggested that the U.S. drop its diplomatic initiatives and get more "serious." "[U]nless Mr. Obama gets serious, and soon, about stopping Iran from getting a bomb, he’ll be forced to deal with the consequences of Israel acting in its own defense," said the WSJ.

Now there’s wartime ingenuity for you, and a new reason to go to war — Because if we don’t the Israelis will.

Well, that clears that up.

On another front — the war in Afghanistan — there’s news about what our objective over there really is. This will come as a relief for those of us who are totally puzzled about just how our national security interests are impacted by the occupation by Taliban forces in the mountain recesses of western Afghanistan and eastern Pakistan.

You know, folks, things aren’t going wonderfully over there. On August 22, a bombing in Afghanistan killed four U.S. service members and made August the second-deadliest month since the 2001 U.S. invasion. Nonetheless, General Stanley McChrystal, our head military guy in the country, said that though conditions on the ground were "serious," the war could still be won "if the U.S. and its allies better coordinate their efforts and focus more heavily on protecting the Afghan populace from Taliban violence and intimidation." At the time of that statement, the General failed to mention that his very own formal assessment of the situation in Afghanistan is now on its way to Washington stating, in part, that he "may" ask the Obama administration for as many as eight brigades of reinforcements, that is, roughly 40,000 new troops.

But let’s go back to the rationale for all this, our national security interests in fighting a war in Afghanistan. General David Petraeus, who oversees U.S. combat operations in Iraq and Afghanistan (and is McCrystal’s boss), told the American Legion’s national convention in Louisville on August 22, that "growing numbers of American soldiers sent to Afghanistan will encounter tough fighting," but that "improving civilian’s lives is as important to winning the war as defeating militants." I'm sure Afghan civilians will find that reassuring.

Got that? Our objective in Afghanistan is to "improve civilian lives" as well as (duh) to win the war.

(It should be noted that the latter "objective" is surely the objective of any war once you're in it; the question, however, is why are we in it?)

Well, anyway, that clears that up, too. (We're on a roll here.)

Postscript: Senator Russell Feingold, the Wisconsin Dem who has long been a critic of war efforts in both Iraq and Afghanistan, last week called for a "flexible timetable" to withdraw US. forces in Afghanistan. No word as yet from Senator Levin.