The battle continues:

Six Nato troops have been killed in Afghanistan in the worst single-day loss for international forces since the launch of a big offensive to drive Taliban insurgents from the town of Marjah.

The deaths on Thursday, followed by the loss of another soldier on Friday, underscore the risks US, UK and Afghan troops face as they seek to clear what commanders describe as pockets of resistance by fighters digging in to resist one of the biggest operations launched by Nato in Afghanistan since 2001.

The seven casualties brought the death toll of international troops from the six-day operation to 12, an official for the Nato-led force in Afghanistan said.

We’re all busy, but do not forget about these men and women. Think about them, every day – and say prayers for their victory and safe return.

From Michael Yon via Instapundit:

…Chaplain Gary Lewis said a prayer, then 1st Platoon left the Gate heading to “Brick 1″

The soldiers checked weapons yet again and adjusted gear, and we walked out the gate, keeping intervals so that a single bomb couldn’t get many of us at once. Sometimes enemies “daisy chain” bombs together like a trotline, killing or wounding many soldiers simultaneously.

The morning was cool, bright and dry, and so the fine dust left perfect boot prints. This was to be the final mission for 1st Platoon in the area before the 82nd Airborne would take over responsibilities at around midnight…

Read it and don’t forget that Yon is reader-supported, so give what you can.

Michael Yon has the latest from the campaign in Afghanistan.

Say a prayer for our troops.

The news:

U.S. troops are bracing for the biggest joint offensive since the start of the Afghan war.

Officers say the troops will be joining their Afghan and NATO allies, targeting a southern town that’s believed to be a big Taliban stronghold and a hub for the militants’ lucrative opium trade.

Security issues prevent officers from giving a date the offensive begins. But U.S. commanders have said they plan to capture the town of Marjah in Helmand province. That’s about 380 miles southwest of Kabul.

It will be the first major offensive since President Barack Obama ordered 30,000 more U.S. troops to Afghanistan, and many of the Marines set to participate arrived as part of the surge.

We know that a terrorist rabble cannot withstand our troops – as long as they are properly supported from home, they will win. But it will be a long, hard fight and we can expect serious casualties.

Remember, fellow Americans, that as we debate and argue here at home, the best we have are doing the real work of our nation. Pray for the troops, and pray for victory.

Steyn picks it out in bold colors:

“Our goal in war,” wrote Basil Liddell Hart, the great strategist of armored warfare, “can only be attained by the subjugation of the opposing will.” In other words, the object of war is not to destroy the enemy’s tanks but the enemy’s will. That goes treble if, like the Taliban and al-Qaeda, he hasn’t got any tanks in the first place. So what do you think Obama’s speech did for the enemy’s will? He basically told ’em: We can only stick another 19 months, so all you gotta do is hang in there for 20. And in an astonishingly vulgar line even by the standards of this White House’s crass speechwriters he justified his announcement of an exit date by saying it was “because the nation that I’m most interested in building is our own.” Or, as Frank Sinatra once observed, “It’s very nice to go trav’ling/But it’s so much nicer . . . to come home”:

“It’s very nice to just wander the camel route to Iraq . . . but it’s so much nicer, yes it’s oh so nice to wander back.”

It is to be hoped that a combination of circumstances will force Obama’s hand and not allow him to precipitously withdraw on his time line if victory isn’t yet secured. If we have a string of successes showing that we’re winning – thus building up public support for continued effort – coupled with a public wariness of a cut-and-run, Obama might not have the political power to scuttle Afghanistan right before the 2012 campaign opens. Ultimately, it will be up to the solders to pull Obama’s chestnuts out of the fire. I have confidence in them.

Much less confidence in Obama – and a great deal of worry that his left wing base, especially if not fed the socialist meat of socialized medicine – might start to insist upon an early withdrawal with the threat of backing a third party if not given the desired defeat of the United States in war. Ultimately, it comes down to this: can the military win the war before the liberals force us to lose it?

Pay attention, liberals:

President Barack Obama’s speech on Tuesday night deserves to be cheered. Over the objections of his vice president and despite opposition from his political base, the president is sending an additional 30,000 troops to Afghanistan to fight terrorists.

This is the sort of thing you do when you’re a patriot – even if you oppose the man in office, you still try to pick out the parts you can support, especially as it relates to foreign and military affairs.

To be sure, Rove notes that Obama still isn’t giving as much as the military asked. Of course, the military brass could have sensed this sort of thing coming and asked for more than they needed, knowing that the request would be pared back. Bottom line, though, is that we patriots are pleased that President Obama is going to at least try to win.

It’d be better if Obama were to say the word “victory” as part of our goal, but we know we’ve got a liberal with zero military – or, indeed, real world – experience, and so we’ll take the baby steps, if that is the best we can get. It was also dismaying that President Obama laid out an 18 month time frame on this effort – better to have said nothing about it at all, if he was unwilling to use George Bush’s “when the generals request it” for withdrawal questions on Iraq.

This campaign can be won – and in my view, it must be won. We dare not leave Afghanistan with less than victory – if we don’t win, then we’ll pay the price for it in blood and treasure down the road. Interests, honor and basic, human decency require that we validate the sacrifices to date by ensuring a free, prosperous and united Afghanistan. And I hope you liberals with both join Karl Rove and learn a bit about what patriotism requires from him – and from the rest of us conservatives who simply will not attempt to take cheap, political shots at the President for temporary political gain.

UPDATE: With the continuing concern that Obama simply won’t stick it out.

The story:

Former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld on Wednesday lashed out at President Obama for claiming the Bush administration rebuffed commanders’ repeated requests for more troops in Afghanistan.

In a rare break in his public silence since leaving the Pentagon, Rumsfeld rejected the claim as a “bald misstatement” and “disservice” that cannot go unanswered.

“Such a bald misstatement, at least as it pertains to the period I served as secretary of defense, deserves a response,” Rumsfeld said in a written statement. “I am not aware of a single request of that nature between 2001 and 2006.”

What Obama is still hoping is that he can shovel responsibility off for Afghanistan (and, indeed, everything else) to President Bush. Obama, you see, has nothing to do with the current state of Afghan affairs…that is all Bush; and if its necessary to shade the truth to make it so, then Obama is fine with that. Rumsfeld’s statement shows, however, that the truth of the matter is different.

At any event, Afghanistan is from now on entirely Obama’s – he’ll try to dodge the burden, but he can’t escape. Win or lose, its Obama on the line – and, Mr. President, as this is the case, you’d might as well do everything you can to win.

Congressman Jason Chaffetz (R-UT) makes the GOP anti-war case for Afghanistan. The two salient points:

…We can win any war, Mr. President, but only with your full commitment to the mission. Absent such a commitment, our presence in Afghanistan does nothing more than endanger our troops, compromise our readiness, and waste our money…

…Mr. President, in my humble opinion I believe it is time to bring our troops home. The troops have fought valiantly and won. Yet, the fight is not over. For generations the United States must continue to hunt and kill terrorists around the world who want death and destruction for the American people.

Mr. President, if you believe we must continue to fight in Afghanistan with tens of thousands of our men and women, let’s do so with a full commitment to win by giving the commanders in the field everything they need so they can bring all of our troops home swiftly and safely.

There is no real argument against the assertion that if we’re to fight, we must fight for victory with every ounce of our being. But is there validity in the argument that we can pull out? Rep. Chaffetz offers up the prospect of using “hunter-killer” units to go after any manifestation of al-Qaeda, but asserts that the nation-building aspect of the Afghan campaign is not in our best interest – and notes that with the threats from Iran, domestic terrorist attacks and our increasing debt leading to national bankruptcy, we’ve got other matters which demand our attention. Does this state the unarguable case?

Not in my view.

Certainly, if President Obama is not willing to go all out for victory, then we’d better get out of there as swiftly as physically possible. But the only reason for this is that it is immoral to have a pointless effusion of blood. If we’re not fighting to win, then fighting shouldn’t be done at all. My largest concern about President Obama’s war policy is that he’s half-hearted – that he doesn’t want to have the stigma of military defeat, but that he also doesn’t have the plain guts to see a war through to victory. But supposing that President Obama’s plan does work out as a pledge to victory, is it still better that we leave?

I agree that Iran is a growing threat. But Iran is, also, an easily manageable threat at the moment. The trouble is that President Obama seems determined to go about Iran in exactly the wrong way – so there’s no point is saying that we should pull out of Afghanistan and concentrate on Iran: Obama will continue to get Iran wrong and thus I don’t see the policy benefit of surrendering in Afghanistan in order to concentrate on surrendering on Iran’s nuclear program. Better to win in both places, but if we can only possibly win in Afghanistan – and that is the case – then we should go for what victory we can achieve.

I agree that terrorism is a continual threat here at home – but I’m enough of a student of military history to know that the only thing which results from a purely defensive effort is defeat. We can’t sit tight here and believe we’ll be safe – any defense can be overcome by imaginative offense. No matter how tight we make our borders and how many security programs we implement internally, if we’re not striking at the enemy then he will strike at us, and with great success, in the by and by – he only has to get past our defense once, while we have to always catch him. Such is not possible. To me, fighting in Afghanistan is, among other policy desires, a means of not fighting here at home.

I agree that our debt is out of control – but Obama simply will not do anything to control our runaway spending. Any deficit reduction over the next four years will be mere happenstance – something which happens because Obama simply can’t think of something new to spend a lot of money on; or because an increasingly fearful Democrat Congress simply won’t go along as election years approach. To terminate the Afghan campaign in the hopes that the saved money will go towards deficit reduction is to live in a fantasy world. Its just not going to happen – any savings in military spending will just be spent elsewhere. I’d prefer that we did pay for the war as we go along – I’d even agree to tax increases if I could get some massive cuts in non-defense, discretionary spending…say, two dollars in spending cuts for each dollar in new taxes (it’ll still work out best for the economy – better to be taxed than to be borrowed in to oblivion; best if we can cut taxes and spending, but we’re never going to get anything like that past Obama and the Congress).

Finally, any American withdrawal from Afghanistan will be viewed – correctly – by the enemy as a crushing American defeat. The whole purpose of the asymetric warfare of our enemies is to wear down and discourage the stronger force until it just gives up. A US withdrawal would fit perfectly in with the Islamists campaign model – we’ll have proven to them that if they can endure us for years, we’ll eventually throw in the towel. This will, in turn, encourage them to try again – remember, to them it doesn’t matter how many people die or how many years it takes to get us to quit…if they can get us to quit, they win and as long as they’re winning, they’ll keep right at it.

Any withdrawal from Afghanistan will eventually be paid for in blood and treasure – and far more blood and treasure than fighting for victory would cost (but its still better to get out, now, rather than fight half-heartedly…the bad stuff will still follow, but we’ll at least have saved some lives and some treasure and thus the ability to fight down the road when the enemy over-provokes us, once again – Obama offers the prospect of years of killing, then a withdrawal/defeat – I’m willing to take the horrible course rather than the horribly bad course). And don’t think that hunter-killer units will dismay the enemy – they’ll consider that just part of the cost of doing business.

We have entirely lost sight, I think, of what this war is about. It wasn’t that 19 Moslems just got it in their head one day to drive planes in to our buildings. Those men, and the men who currently fight us, are the result of a complex series of historical events churned up by the horrific politico-economic morass of the Moslem world. Only a fundamental change in Islam will end this war – and this change cannot come from within, it must come from without. If we refuse this task, then all we’ve done so far will be fruitless and, eventually, we’ll pay a high price for our unwillingness to fight for victory. We’re all tired of the war – but wars don’t just “end”: they are won or they are lost. If we pull out now, we will have lost no matter how much we try to sugar-coat it. The question all Americans must ask themselves – from President Obama on down is: do you want to win, or to lose?

I want to win.

If you haven’t been entirely outraged yet, this will do the trick:

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton expressed “great regret” in August that the U.S. is not a signatory to the International Criminal Court (ICC). This has fueled speculation that the Obama administration may reverse another Bush policy and sign up for what could lead to the trial of Americans for war crimes in The Hague.

The ICC’s chief prosecutor, though, has no intention of waiting for Washington to submit to the court’s authority. Luis Moreno Ocampo says he already has jurisdiction—at least with respect to Afghanistan.

Because Kabul in 2003 ratified the Rome Statute—the ICC’s founding treaty—all soldiers on Afghan territory, even those from nontreaty countries, fall under the ICC’s oversight, Mr. Ocampo told me. And the chief prosecutor says he is already conducting a “preliminary examination” into whether NATO troops, including American soldiers, fighting the Taliban may have to be put in the dock.

“We have to check if crimes against humanity, war crimes or genocide have been committed in Afghanistan,” Mr. Ocampo told me. “There are serious allegations against the Taliban and al Qaeda and serious allegations about warlords, even against some who are connected with members of the government.” Taking up his inquiry of Allied soldiers, he added, “there are different reports about problems with bombings and there are also allegations about torture.”

It takes a village idiot to regret that we’re not part of the ICC. The real purpose of the ICC is to bring charges against western nations in general and the United States in particular. The global left wants nothing more than US soldiers in the dock – with their ultimate dream of having President Bush stand trial. They hate – its all they do and they do it all the time. The pitiable part of it is that they really hate themselves. Parasites who live off un-earned wealth and who are defended by their betters, these people wish to lash out as a means of blocking their ears against the call of their own conscience.

I think all of us patriots will know what to do if even one US soldier is hauled before the ICC.

And he really, really needs to show it:

…Obama has made his own job worse. By empowering the likes of Joe Biden and his domestic policy advisers to second-guess the recommendation of Gen. Stanley McChrystal and to warn openly of the domestic consequences of embracing the only viable plan for victory, the president has signaled that he’s looking over his shoulder. The sole target of his concern has not been the enemy and the horrendous potential consequences of a halfhearted effort. Instead he’s been fixated on his left-wing base. He’s obsessed over an exit strategy, forgetting that his predecessor won a war without one…

…Frankly, it might be a good time for the president to battle his left flank and demonstrate some moxie, if he has it. The world and a vast number of centrists in America, not to mention conservatives, think he’s a wimp. This is his time to prove them wrong.

This is true, though I do have a growing worry that his intellectual ability – his ability, that is, to see what happens and adjust thinking to fit reality – is not up to par. We could have a man with a Carteresque ability to dither on national security combined with mental unwillingness to admit error and change course. This could be a disaster for our nation.

As I’ve said before, President Obama has my fervent backing for any efforts taken to secure victory in Afghanistan. Not for me is the leftist “if my guy isn’t in charge, I want America to lose” attitude. I prefer victory for America even when it will work to the benefit of my political opponents (its called patriotism, liberals; you should look in to it, some times). But for America to win, we need a President – any President – who has the courage to make a decision and the intellectual flexibility to see when things aren’t working out and make adjustments.

So far, Obama has shown a painful unwillingness to commit to a decision coupled with indifference to changed circumstances. I hope this changes rapidly – and Obama’s Monday address is as good a place to start, as any.

Various proposals are making the rounds to increase taxes to pay for the campaign in Afghanistan and, once again, to institute some sort of draft – this last bit the product of a curious bit of leftist thought that if we have a conscript army, we’d be more wary about going to war (in response to this, I offer WWI, WWI, Korea and Vietnam – all fought with conscript armies and, in my view, made longer and less successful by that very fact). What are we to make of this?

That the left is up to its usual, dishonest tricks. The left doesn’t care about paying for government and certainly doesn’t want larval leftists taken out of ACORN and put in to uniform where they might learn things such as discipline, independent thought and personal honor. No, this is all just a gambit to get the war lost and over with as soon as possible. Once again, the left sees an American defeat in war as the preferred option.

On the face of it, none of us could have the slightest argument with an increase in taxes to pay for war – but, if we are to make paying for the war out of current accounts the paradigm, then we have to admit that mere taxation, alone, won’t do the trick. In the end, we’ll also have to cut non-defense spending. This would not only mean no health care reform, but deep cuts in non-defense, discretionary spending. My candidates for the axe are Advisory Council on Historic Preservation, Agency for International Development, Agricultural Marketing Service, AMTRAK, Appalachian Regional Commission, US Access Board, Bonneville Power Administration, Bureau of Economic Analysis, Bureau of Industry and Security, Bureau of International Labor Affairs, Bureau of Land Management, Bureau of Reclamation, Bureau of Transportation Statistics, Center for Nutrition Policy and Promotion, Citizens Stamp Advisory Committee, Department of Commerce, Commission of Fine Arts, Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe, Community Planning and Development, National Institute of Food and Agriculture, Corporation for National and Community Service, Council of Economic Advisers, Council on Environmental Quality, Denali Commission, Department of Education, Department of Energy, Department of Housing and Urban Development, Department of Labor, Department of Transportation, Domestic Policy Council, Office of Economic Adjustment, Economic Development Administration, Endangered Species Committee, Energy Department, Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, Export-Import Bank of the United States, Federal Communications Commission, Federal Consulting Group, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, Federal Executive Boards, Federal Inter-agency Committee for the Management of Noxious and Exotic Weeds, Federal Trade Commission, Federal Transit Administration, Foreign Agricultural Service, Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board, Indian Arts and Crafts Board, Innovation and Improvement Office, Inter-agency Alternative Dispute Resolution Working Group, Inter-agency Council on Homelessness, Japan-United States Friendship Commission, Joint Board for the Enrollment of Actuaries, National Bi-partisan Commission on the Future of Medicare, National Economic Council, National Endowment for the Arts, National Endowment for the Humanities, National Indian Gaming Commission, Rural Development, Surface Transportation Board and the Susquehanna River Basin Commission. Bet none of you had heard of most of those agencies.

Once the left gets serious about getting our spending under control by massively cutting these organizations, then we can sign on for tax increases. Heck, if the liberals would agree to the elimination of a random one of three of the above agencies, I’d agree to a 25% increase in my income taxes – I’d come out ahead just in the increased liberty and economic growth which would result from having that many government busy bodies no longer bothering people and wasting taxpayer money. Remember, most of these agencies grew up haphazardly – piled one on top of another by Congresses and Presidents making political hay by using the creation of a new agency or department as a means of pretending to be taking action.

Reform doesn’t necessarily mean adding something new – it can be re forming the government; making it back in to what it was before. A bit of weed whacking on the federal agencies would go a long ways towards getting our government under control as well as freeing up funds for other activities considered more pressing at the moment. But the left doesn’t want that – they just want to force us on the right to provide more funds for the insatiable maw of Big Government, and they will hold our troops in Afghanistan hostage until we agree.

The word came down on Tuesday that President Barack “Hamlet” Obama will finally let us know his views on Afghanistan – some months after he assured us that we knew his views. It seems we can expect a pronouncement on Monday after Thanksgiving.

To be sure, anything is better than the drift we currently have. By refusing to immediately provide the miltary’s request for additional forces, President Obama discouraged our troops and allies and encouraged our enemies. Being unschooled in military history, having never served in any capacity, President Obama failed to understand how much perception rules the battlefield. History is replete with examples of victorious armies being routed at the last moment because the troops, for one reason or another, perceived they were beaten. Hopefully, President Obama has now learned this lesson and will make his announcement with an understanding that it isn’t just the nuts and bolts of what he proposes, but how his proposal will be viewed by friend and foe which will matter.

The largest worry is that Obama will decide not to decide – that he’ll punt, hoping that something will turn up allowing him to get off the hook. It is known that his allies in the political left were only using Afghanistan as a “good war” in order to flog President Bush – now that Bush is gone, the left has reverted to type and figures that any war America fights is a bad war. The pressure is already building for a withdrawal from Afghanistan. On the other hand, losing in Afghanistan would cost Obama dearly in the center – people who might not like the war, but who like defeat even less. Obama, trying to straddle this fence, might try to come down on both sides with some sort of send-some-troops-but-don’t-send-enough non-decision.

President Obama can count on the ardent support of the non-isolationist right – yours, truly, included. No truer statement was ever made by a mere man than MacArthur’s “in war, there is no subsitute for victory”. Regardless of how one feels about the motivations which brought us to Afghanistan; regardless of how one feels about the conduct of the war to date; regardless of how one feels about the long, difficult task ahead – all who have any understanding of war know that we must fight for victory regardless of how long it takes or how much it costs. The costs of losing are always higher than the costs of winning.

We can prevail in Afghanistan. Our troops are the best America has ever put in the field and they will do whatever we ask of them. The Afghans, being normal people, simply want to be left alone to live their own lives – they will come down on our side if we show them that no matter what, we will not abandon them to the Taliban (the great fear is that if they join us now that we might quit on them – and the Afghans know that for certain the Taliban will kill them if they help America and then America leaves). By a combination of raw, military force, skilled diplomacy, cultural sensitivity and, at times, bribery (it does work in those parts of the world – and it isn’t considered bribery in the sense that we view it…sure, money changes hands, but that is just how business gets done, at times, in Afghanistan) we can set up a system in Afghanistan which, while not being up to American standards of liberty, will be far superior to what they have now and have ever had before. And by doing this we will have struck another very deadly blow at the very concept of Islamo-fascism.

I hope Obama does the right thing.

Cross Posted at OpinionEditorial

This gets ever more painful to watch:

President Barack Obama does not plan to accept any of the Afghanistan war options presented by his national security team, pushing instead for revisions to clarify how and when U.S. troops would turn over responsibility to the Afghan government, a senior administration official said Wednesday.

That stance comes in the midst of forceful reservations about a possible troop buildup from the U.S. ambassador in Afghanistan, Karl Eikenberry, according to a second top administration official.

In strongly worded classified cables to Washington, Eikenberry said he had misgivings about sending in new troops while there are still so many questions about the leadership of Afghan President Hamid Karzai.

To translate: “Obama doesn’t want to make a decision to send or deny the troops, but he needed a plausible excuse to spin things out a while longer – Eikenberry provided it”.

Meanwhile, however, people are still dying there – and our troops have got to wonder ever more often if they’ll be given a clear mission and proper support from the politicians back home.

The truth of the matter is that Karzai may be a lot of things, but the ability of his government to assert control over all of Afghanistan rides on our efforts – and it would be the same no matter who was in charge of Afghanistan. Its not for us to settle Afghanistan’s political issues – it is for us to provide the safe haven where Afghans of good will can work it out, just as Iraqis of good will worked out Iraq’s future under the shield of American arms. Most Afghans, like most of the people in the world, just want to be left alone to get on with their lives – right now, the Taliban is making Afghans wonder if it will be Americans or Taliban they’ll have to deal with in the long run. We have to convince the Afghans that we are the power which will stay, not the Taliban. We do that, and we’ll get our Afghan version of the “Anbar awakening”.

What Obama is doing is playing right in to the enemy’s hands – he’s being irresolute. Someone pointed out that the time between 9/11 and fall of Kabul in 2001 was a shorter time than between presentation of the plan and Obama’s continued refusal to makea choice. Our political leaders in Washington must make it clear to President Obama that he must decide – one way or the other, and right away. No more time for thinking it over – it is time to act.

UPDATE: WAR IS PEACE, FREEDOM IS SLAVERY, DITHERING IS STRENGTH.

And he still won’t make it up for weeks:

President Barack Obama is nearing a decision to send more than 30,000 additional U.S. troops to Afghanistan next year, but he may not announce it until after he consults with key allies and completes a trip to Asia later this month, administration and military officials have told McClatchy…

…The plan would fall well short of the 80,000 troops that Army Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the top U.S. military commander in Afghanistan, suggested as a “low-risk option” that would offer the best chance to contain the Taliban-led insurgency and stabilize Afghanistan.

It splits the difference between two other McChrystal options: a “high-risk” one that called for 20,000 additional troops and a “medium-risk” one that would add 40,000 to 45,000 troops.

The officials, all of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to discuss internal administration planning, cautioned that Obama’s decision isn’t final, and won’t be until after administration officials discuss it with the NATO allies at a Nov. 23 meeting of the alliance’s North Atlantic Council and its Military Committee…

This has gone well beyond dithering – this has gone all the way up to vacillation; and there is no worse error a leader can make. To make any decision – even a bad decision – is better than making no decision at all. Obama seems deathly afraid of coming down on one side or another and the sense I get is that his aides are working it out amongst themselves and just trying to get something which will allow the issue to fade away, at least for a while.

The trouble is that real, flesh and blood American soldiers – as well as Afghans and allies – will have to pay a price for whatever decision Obama makes, or fails to make. People will die, no matter what Obama does – but upon Obama’s decision rides the answer to whether or not they’ll die in vain. We have a war which can be won and the troops are ready to win it – all they need is the word “go” from President Obama. What they might get is “maybe”.

Oh, for just an hour of President Bush back at the helm!

A disturbing news story:

President Barack Obama is considering sending large numbers of additional U.S. forces to Afghanistan next year but fewer than his war commander, Gen. Stanley McChrystal, prefers, U.S. officials said.

Such a narrowed military mission would escalate American forces to accomplish the commander’s broadest goals, protecting Afghan cities and key infrastructure. But the option’s scaled-down troop numbers likely would cut back on McChrystal’s ambitious objectives, amounting to what one official described as “McChrystal Light.”

Under the pared-down option, McChrystal would be given fewer forces than the 40,000 additional troops he has asked for atop the current U.S. force of 68,000, officials told The Associated Press.

Senior White House officials stressed, however, that the president has not settled on any new troop numbers and continues to debate other strategic approaches to the 8-year-old Afghanistan war.

I’d like to say “keep debating”, Barry, and you might eventually get it right…but anyone who studies history knows that councils of war work out to be gatherings of cowards. Everyone gets their two cents in and the decision maker is left with what is best described as the sum of all fears. No decision has been made (which, in and of itself, is a terrible dereliction), but this was my worry all along – not enough troops to win, but enough to keep the bloodshed going at a faster pace.

Please, please, please let this story not pan out…

This is getting excruciating:

Yesterday, fourteen Americans died in helicopter crashes in Afghanistan, the deadliest day for Americans there since June, 2005, in what has been the deadliest year for international and US forces there since the 2001 invasion. Meanwhile, in Baghdad, where Obama has ordered our troops into slow retreat, two massive suicide car bombs claimed hundreds of lives, including those of at least two dozen children, while destroying three major government buildings. And then, of course, came news that Obama had now played more golf while in office than our last president did in nearly three years.

All right, I don’t begrudge Obama the golf. It’s his dithering and cowardice I find shameful. During the campaign, he told us Afghanistan was the necessary war. In March, he told us he had completed a major review of the situation and come up with a new strategy. The commander he put in place has told him he needs 30- to 40-thousand more troops to finish the job. Civilians are dying in the war he wants to abandon. Our soldiers are dying in the war he swore he’d win. And Obama, caught between campaign rhetoric and reality, can’t figure out what to do.

Again, I’m not an expert, but I’m beginning to smell disaster, big time disaster.

President Obama: do something. Get in. Get out. Don’t just sit there dithering and having endless meetings. Councils of war are the tools of cowards – you are the President. Make the decision. I’ll back you on it, come what may – and so will millions of other Americans. What we can’t take is continued indecision while our soldiers are dying and innocents are being murdered.

A little less golf. A little less time making speeches. A bit more time doing the bloody job we hired you to do.

From NRO’s Campaign Spot:

With his attendance at fundraisers for Sen. Chris Dodd of Connecticut and Gov. Deval Patrick of Massachusetts today — boy, there’s a pair of popular incumbents — President Obama has now attended seven fundraisers since General Stanley McChrystal submitted his request for additional troops in Afghanistan.

Boy, it’s a shame Gen. McChrystal isn’t an unpopular incumbent Democrat; if he were, Obama might be more eager to help him out.

Your job, Mr. President, is to lead the nation – not bail out failing Democrats.

Victor Davis Hanson gives an excellent run down on all the good reasons to send the troops and prevail in Afghanistan. There really is no downside to giving McChrystal what he wants. So, why is Obama dithering?

Is he just so ignorant of military affairs that he can’t tell who is giving him good or bad advice?

Is it that he’s just such a leftist that he can’t stand the thought of America having a clear cut, military victory?

Or, is he just a coward afraid to make up his mind?

Unless he acts quite soon, the answer will have to be one of the above…

Interesting, to say the least:

White House military and defense advisers will meet again this and next week to discuss a proposed troop increase for Afghanistan, Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel said Sunday…

…”We would love the luxury of this debate to be reduced down to just one question — additional troops, 40,000,” Emanuel told CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday. “This is a much more complex decision.”

“The question, though… does not come [down to] how many troops you send, but do you have a credible Afghan partner for this process that can provide the security and the type of services that the Afghan people need?” the chief of staff added. (emphasis added)

The issue here being the very credible stories of voter fraud in the recent Afghan Presidential election. What Emanuel is saying – or, at least, what he’s running up the flag pole – is the concept that while Obama would like very much to provide the requested military reinforcements, since there is questions about the government’s legitimacy, we simply can’t do it though we’ll continue to work with Afghan leaders to bring about a peaceful resolution and let no one think this means we’re giving up on al Qaeda as the full power of American law enforcement will be mobilized to bring them to justice, if we can get an indictment… Its a soft scuttle – a pretense that our hands are tied and we’re doing as much as we can, and its too bad that the Taliban are back in Kabul. If this goes through, I’ll expect that the CIA will suddenly decide that bin Laden died in the Tora Bora in 2001, thus getting Obama off the hook for that, too.

This sort of cowardly dodge is being seconded – most notably by Sen. John “I was in Cambodia” Kerry. Make no mistake about it, the Powers That Be in the Democrat leadership are looking for a way out of Afghanistan which doesn’t too badly damage their national security credentials. They might not be able to finesse this and end up forced to send the troops, but the preferred option does seem to be to get out – and get out far enough in advance of the 2012 elections that, hopefully, the American people will not care about it when voting time arrives.

The truth of the matter is that the Afghan government is horribly flawed – but we’re not there for the Afghan government, but for the people of Afghanistan, and the people of the world. Certainly, we must help the Afghan government overcome corruption and build a credible military force, but our moral responsibility is to the safety and liberty of the Afghan people, not to whomever happens to be running the show in Kabul. If we fail in this – if we use the excuse of government corruption to justify abandonment of the Afghan people – then we will have placed a mark of shame on our nation second only to that we acquired when we abandoned South Vietnam.

But will the President do what is necessary?

As President Obama mulls the military’s request for a big troop build-up in Afghanistan, Americans have swung in favor of such a move, according to a new IBD/TIPP Poll.

The survey of 927 adults found that a plurality of 48% favors sending more troops and resources to Afghanistan. That’s a sharp reversal from September, when Americans opposed the idea, 55%-35%.

Gen. Stanley McChrystal, commander of U.S. and NATO forc es in Afghanistan, has reportedly asked for another 40,000 troops to help control rising violence.

But Obama is in no rush to make a decision, holding a series of high-level meetings with military and political advisers on his next move.

And the upsurge in overall support for more troops in the IBD/TIPP Poll may not sway Obama.

That’s because the turnaround comes from a surge in support from Republicans — up 27 points just in October to 72%. A month ago, GOP respondents had leaned against sending more troops, 47%-45%.

But, Mr. President, we’re showing that we’re behind you 100% in your role as Commander in Chief. For us GOPers, politics does end at the water’s edge.

Win the war, Mr. President – we’ll provide all the political support you need, and the troops will do all the rest.