A nation at war that is unwilling to sacrifice is doomed to half measures and failure

By Dan Verton

My father, a member of the Greatest Generation and one of 13 survivors of the U.S.S. Sims (DD-409), once told me how astounded he was about the lengths to which modern American political and military leaders would go to spare one man. Of course, having spent four days adrift on the Coral Sea in an open whaleboat and watching thousands of Marines give their lives for tiny strips of sand throughout the Pacific, he and others from his generation have a keen understanding of what war really is.

With the notable exception of our brave military men and women who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan, today's America is adrift on a sea of denial when it comes to the War on Terror. And nowhere is this reality more prevalent than in President Barack Obama's new Afghan strategy, which he attempted to sell to the American people on Dec. 1 during a speech at the West Point military academy. 

General Eisenhower before the Normandy invasion he was not.

Aside from his lack of passion for the great cause of this war, Obama made clear that his administration will make decisions about the War on Terror based not on military realities but on political expediency. And from that emerged a schizophrenic speech that all but ensures America will be dealing with a major terrorist threat from Afghanistan for many years to come.

“It is from [Afghanistan] that we were attacked on 9/11, and it is from here that new attacks are being plotted as I speak," said Obama. "This is no idle danger, no hypothetical threat. In the last few months alone, we have apprehended extremists within our borders who were sent here from the border region of Afghanistan and Pakistan to commit new acts of terror. This danger will only grow if the region slides backwards and Al Qaeda can operate with impunity,” he said.

Had he delivered this portion of his speech with a modicum of passion that would have shown Americans that he was leading us on a great crusade to ensure our safety, America might have risen to the occasion and stood behind him. But political expediency would not allow that. As a result, we were told that a strategy based on effectively destroying the Taliban "sets goals that are beyond what we can achieve at a reasonable cost and what we need to achieve to secure our interests." 

That was a cold, hard slap in the face for many Americans, especially those who lost a loved one on 9/11 or whose family member was sent to Afghanistan shortly thereafter because America had been dealt its worst blow since Pearl Harbor. We are, as we did in Vietnam, once again measuring the worthiness of our war effort based on the number of lives lost and what this bloody business of war will mean for our President's political future and the political future of his party in congress.

As with his Republican predecessor, we were told that Afghanistan is critical to our homeland security and that terrorists are actively planning to attack and kill Americans, but we were not asked to sacrifice anything and join in the effort to destroy these barbarians and secure the future for our families. This is because we are no longer fighting a "war on terror." We are taking half measures that are politically acceptable at home, where Americans are no longer willing or able to recognize what is in the nation's best interest.

Americans seem strangely unwilling to stand up and fight for their own safety and security. Perhaps this is because we have been duped by the great disinformation campaign of our time -- that war in the modern age can be won on the cheap and that today's military campaigns can be bloodless, antiseptic endeavors.

Nobody understands or dislikes war more than those of us who have worn the uniform of our country. But what we dislike more is when our senior political and military leaders act like schizophrenic spin doctors in the face of real, mortal dangers.

If the Taliban and al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan are truly as dangerous as many experts believe them to still be 8 years after this war began, then our leaders owe us the reality check that the situation calls for. Obama promised to "finish the job" in Afghanistan. I hope he stands firm on that promise. But my fear is that political expediency at home and an electorate that has forgotten what war is really about will dictate when and under what circumstances we will see the next "Mission Accomplished" banner unfurled.

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Dan Verton is a former intelligence officer in the U.S. Marine Corps and an award-winning journalist. His book, Grace Under Fire, details the sinking of his father's ship, the U.S.S. Sims, during the Battle of the Coral Sea in 1942.