Shadows Of The Past

I called in sick today--I'm exhausted from my road trip and have been fighting off some sinus/cold/flu thing for a couple weeks.  Not entirely surprising, as I almost always experience a post-gig collapse once the adrenaline subsides.  So in lieu of my putting any original words to keyboard today, here's some things to ponder from a new Strategic Studies Institute monograph by Dr. Max G. Manwaring, a retired US Army Colonel:

Victory in any kind of war ―including insurgency war ―is not simply the sum of the battles won or lost over the course of a conflict. Rather, it is the product of connecting and weighting the various political, economic, informational, and security elements of national power in support of a unifying political goal. Lessons from over a half-century of bitter experience suffered by governments involved in dealing with destabilizing internal conflicts show that a given response to a given threat often ends ―or continues ―short of achieving the desired peace. Too often, this is because too much time, treasure, and blood are dedicated to tactical and operational concerns as opposed to defining and implementing the strategic political end-game.

Would that Bushco had considered this before launching Operation Iraqi Clusterfuck.

ntodd