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Another five American servicemen were killed in Afghanistan. This was the same day the White House announced our president might get around to reading the report from General Stanley McChrystal seeking thousands of new troops for that combat theater. It has now been languishing in governmental "pending" files for almost a month. At the same time, with each passing day our forces find themselves waging warfare under untenable conditions, instead of positions of strength.

If one is to search for a definition of "war", it will be noted the term is sometimes defined as "An interaction in which two or more opposing forces have a struggle of wills." This is a fitting explanation for what is now taking place in Afghanistan. There are opposing struggles of will...and the Taliban has far more will to emerge the victor than a large segment of the American population and their cowardly lackeys in Congress.

If we ever have enough courage to truthfully examine the actions of Americans during times of war, the case can easily be made that our failures and losses in combat can all be traced back to congressional actions, or non-actions that resulted in the American forces defeat.

Anyone who fought in Korea knows that war story well. We were inserted into combat following a period after World War II when Congress reduced our military strength and equipment to a level even lower than pre-war manning levels. Still, the war in Korea could have been brought to a successful conclusion if our forces had been given the political will, manpower and equipment needed to eliminate North Korean forces and convince China to withdraw behind its own borders.

Instead, on a worldwide stage, our politicians negotiated for weeks on the proposed shape of the table around which they would confer, then talked us into a so-called "cease-fire". After 23,615 Americans were killed in action and another 7,600 of our brave youth died of wounds or were declared dead, we departed the battlefield battered and without a victory.

Our ill-fated war in Vietnam is perhaps the premiere example of political cowardice and mismanagement. Restrictive political regulations stopped the pursuit of the enemy. More political restrictions on everything from combat actions to attacking known safe havens and the political snake dance our Washington "leadership" undertook with corrupt South Vietnamese officials placed America in a position where we won every battle and lost the war. 40,934 American KIA, another 6,300 declared dead or lost to fatal wounds and that final scene of people screaming and hanging on to the skids as the last USA helicopter lifted off the roof of the American Embassy was the ultimate portrait of defeat...and it was painted by the anti-war crowd and Washington D. C.

Our actions in Afghanistan seem to mean we have very limited objectives. If the goal is to contain everything in its current configuration, then our restrictive proportionality of force will accomplish that objective. It will also assure there are many more American casualties.

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