Today Taegan Goddard’s political wire gives the quote of the day from Senator Lindsey Graham:

We made mistakes in Iraq. Let’s not Rumsfeld Afghanistan. Let’s not do this thing on the cheap.

War is not something to be pursued moderately. I’m probably opening a can of worms here, but I’m going to suggest two things. First, that war should be pursued by a nation only when it is truly the only workable option, and one should be certain it is workable, else it isn’t actually an option. Second, if one chooses to pursue war, one should pursue it to success.

I would issue yet another caveat to my second point: You must be certain that success as you define it is actually possible. The greatest problem of the Iraq war, in my view, was that it was charged with a set of goals that simply were not and are not going to happen. (To those who claim victory at this point, let me point out that if Iraq becomes a base of terrorism in the future, or the government is unstable, what we set out to do was not done.)

The problem is that our response to opposition to a war is often to pursue it more gingerly, in a more limited fashion. When one goes to war, but doesn’t commit the resources to succeed, then one has simply killed lots of people for no purpose.

Is Afghanistan salvageable? I don’t really know at this point. I think one of the greatest strategic errors of the war on terror was moving into Iraq without truly completing the military goals in Afghanistan. But if we simply stay and fight with less resources than are needed, all we are doing is prolonging the agony.

War is not something to be pursued moderately. It should be pursued to success, or not at all.

For some odd reason, foreigners killing local folks, however they may express their justification, just don’t become popular with the same local folks. Sometimes you have to do it, but don’t expect it to make you popular. So if you are carrying out a war in order to become popular, for some reason you’re likely to fail.

Stupid, conflicting aims – lousy results. We similarly harmed our own interests when we pushed for early elections for the Palestinians, and then were shocked by the results. (Ex-President Bush take note: People do freely choose terrorists as their rulers.)

But then there are bad reasons for getting out of a war, for example:

• The people will start to love us if we go home after the invasion.
• Force is really unnecessary if we just talk enough.
• We’re really tired of fighting the war.
• This is harder than we thought when we started.

Thus I view with some alarm this report that only 1/3 of Americans support sending more troops to Afghanistan. In this case the point is not popularity, though we may be able to aid the current government. The point is hunting terrorists, in a place where actual terrorists live. As long as that is a viable option, we need to be willing to use the necessary resources. When it is strategically right, we need to be able to move on.

Now I must give a hat tip to Dr. Michael Westmoreland-White, who alerted me to this report. In his case I must note that he is consistently opposed the war, in fact, all wars. That is a consistent and moral position, even though I disagree.

The folks that get on my nerves are the ones who are happy to invade, kill a few thousand people, and then get out because it’s inconvenient. They don’t oppose war; they oppose inconvenience. Theirs is not a moral choice; it’s a position into which they drift for their own comfort.

Americans have a bad habit of supporting the glory of a quick invasion when we can see the enemy running and dying. It’s the hard job of cleaning up afterward for which we lack the stomach. That’s the worst of all possible combinations; it’s childish and immature. A nation with our kind of firepower can’t afford to be so childish and immature.

There were also moments when he showed an ability to communicate. There were a number of good speeches, though he doesn’t have truly great presentation, he can be quite adequate to the task. But apparently he didn’t see the need to communicate a vision to the country.

Don’t get me wrong on what I am about to say. I am an implacable foe of the war in Iraq. I believe that we will not be happy with what will be left months and years after we withdraw, and I believe we would be unhappy with the result if we stayed another five years lost a few thousand more troops, and then withdrew. That’s because our goals in going to war there were nonsense from a strategic point of view.

But having chosen to go to war, President Bush acted as though there was no need for continued support of the war. There are indications that many in his administration thought the war would be much easier. I have a hard time crediting that level of stupidity. I find it easier to believe that certain people thought the war would sell better presented as an easy thing, and then it would be easier to get additional support by pointing to troops in harm’s way.

In a democracy, one of the strategic resources for a war is public support. In deciding to go to war, political leaders need to calculate that they have enough support from the American people to carry their war to a conclusion. The arrogant decide that if they start a war the public must support it as a patriotic duty. This is nonsense. Patriots should vocally oppose bad wars. It’s our duty to our country and our troops.

But this kind of quick sell of a concept followed by an assumption that, the decision having been made, the people would stick with him, seems to have characterized Bush’s presidency. Even with very bad decisions, a more constant communication would have helped.

In the transition, while President Bush has been much more gracious and has helped facilitate an effective transfer of power, his powers of communication have actually dimmed, in my view. His farewell speech was laughable and seemed even more detached from reality than normal.

I’m reminded of the day I watched the Southern League All-Star game in Jacksonville, FL. I was there because my stepson, John Webb, was one of the pitchers, but he doesn’t come into the story. A batter whose name I don’t remember stepped up to the plate, swung with great power at a pitch, lost hold of the bat, and sent it several rows into the stands. Some fans, who should receive psychiatric care, tried to catch the bat, but it crashed to the ground.

The 43rd president thinks history will judge him much more favorably than he is judged now. In the sense that the distance of time makes failures seem less disastrous, perhaps it will. But I believe he will be remembered as a president who had great challenges and great opportunities, stepped up to the plate, and swung the bat at the ball with vigor. For a moment, those of us who wished him well looked for a home run. But much like that batter at the all-star game, he lost hold, and the bat flew into the stands, threatening the well-being of bystanders.

If military people wish to have their own parades to mark their fallen comrades, they are welcome to do so. But please can they do so well away from the churches, whose fundamental attitudes are, or should be, completely at odds with theirs. And please can churches stop pandering to the expectations of those in the world outside, and of those among their own numbers, who hold anti-Christian militaristic views and expect the church to hold ceremonies for them, and disrupt its own regular programmes to do so.

Now my point here is not to go after Peter or his position on this issue. What interests me on this is simply that I have many people in my life who simply would not be able to hear one another’s position. Many local Christians that I know consider pacifism a crazy notion held by people who aren’t really quite Christian, and probably live in California. They would be very surprised to meet Peter, hear his authentic testimony of Christian faith, and yet find that their views on war are so diametrically opposed.

I have an interesting family history here as well. My father spent part of World War II planting trees in Canada because he refused to bear arms. He was willing to work in the medical corps, a reasonable option considering he intended to be a physician, but he was not accepted into that form of service, and because he refused to train with or carry a weapon, he was given alternative service. He lived to see both his sons serve voluntarily in the U. S. military.

My father’s religious background was Seventh-day Adventist, many of whom reject bearing arms, but will serve in the military in medical capacity. One thing I found disconcerting about growing up in SDA communities was the rather large number of people who would reject personally bearing arms and yet voted for the most pro-military and pro-war candidates that were available. I have a much greater respect for pure pacifism than I do for those who refuse to do the killing themselves, but vote for the policies that lead to others doing so.

A few years ago I was teaching a group of teenagers at a United Methodist church, and I found that the one thing they wanted to know about me was whether I had ever personally killed anyone while in the military. As a veteran of the U. S. Air Force, that is unlikely. The Air Force is not generally very “personal” about killing, and I was simply a cog in the machine that made it happen.

I don’t believe that relieves one of responsibility. I consciously chose to be in that position. I chose the particular job I wanted in the Air Force. I knew what I was doing, and I re-enlisted to continue to do what I was doing. I was not a practicing Christian at the time, so it is appropriate to ask whether I would still do it.

The answer is yes. I’ve written about my position before in a post titled Why I Am Not a Pacifist. I think that there are circumstances under which peaceful protest is the correct approach. I think there are circumstances in which one must suffer evil silently. But I also believe there are circumstances in which one needs to respond with force. The state doesn’t carry the sword in vain, and my citizenship in this country in this world means I may be called upon to carry out my part.

A peaceful protest or civil disobedience is an approach that depends on the conscience of the enemy. There are times when one faces an enemy without a conscience. Peaceful protest often works by wakening the consciences of others who will bring force to bear. There need to be people with an ethical approach to bringing such force.

I recall a conversation while I was in the Air Force. Since I was stationed at Offutt Air Force Base, headquarters of the Strategic Air Command, we got an unusual measure of the nuclear freeze protesters, which was the major movement of the time. A group of us were discussing this, and most indicated they were annoyed to be defending the freedom for people to protest against them. Flag burning even got into the discussion, though I don’t recall any flag burning amongst the freeze protesters at the base. They were generally painfully courteous about their protests.

And indeed those protesters couldn’t have been doing the same thing on the other side of the conflict of the time. They were using the freedom for which we might be called to pay in order to protest against us.

But for me that was precisely the reason for me to be there–to defend the freedom of people to annoy me in any number of ways. That freedom was what made it worthwhile to serve in the military and to be prepared to be there in time of war.

It’s worthwhile noting that as a voter, I would have opposed every one of the wars in which I was involved (Grenada, Panama, and the first gulf war). I don’t think they were well conceived. At the same time, I believe that having a democracy in existence with the military force to stand against communism was absolutely necessary, and that helping to keep that democracy safe was a good thing.

Those who are regular readers of this blog will know that I have opposed the current Iraq war since before it started. But I want to be clear that my opposition is not to the use of force. Sometimes actual use of force is required. Frequently, the ability to effectively use force is necessary.

There are those who will respond only to force. For those force is ready. For this reason I look back on my own 10 years of service with satisfaction, and I thank all those others, especially those in those jobs that require one to get more personal about killing, not to mention being killed.

It’s because of you that I can engage in this debate.

By January 2013, at the end of my first term as president, America has welcomed home most of the servicemen and women who have sacrificed terribly so that America might be secure in her freedom. The Iraq War has been won and Iraq is a functioning democracy. The threat from a resurgent Taliban in Afghanistan has been greatly reduced but not eliminated and there has not been a major terrorist attack in the United States since September 11, 2001.

I received this paragraph in a much larger e-mail from the McCain campaign, and similar language shows up in his most recent ad. Let me confess here that the key issue for me this year is the war in Iraq, and more broadly a strategy for the war on terror. Many people think the Republicans have the edge on this, but I don’t. I think neither party has a real, long term, promising strategy, and in lieu of that I think getting the troops out of Iraq and making them available for other activities is critical.

But here’s what bothers me about this ad. How do you accomplish a goal like this? It’s a pretty picture. We’d all like to leave winners, or at least I think we would. But how? What is John McCain going to do differently that will suddenly make it possible to win the war and get the troops (or most of them) out in just four years?

The problem with this war, as with many peacekeeping actions before it, is that the objectives are not stated in military terms. You send your armed forces to defeat enemy forces. Our armed forces have done very well with that. Any particular target you give them, they handle effectively. I’m very proud of our military capabilities and the young men and women who carry them out. I’m very disturbed at the way in which we use them.

But in Iraq they have been given a non-military objective that simply cannot be accomplished. You cannot make Iraq into a stable democracy. Only the Iraqis can do that, and many of them don’t want to. In the meantime, our armed forces are poorly equipped to be an army of occupation, and our citizens (thank God!) are poorly equipped to ask them to be a successful occupying army.

Unless John McCain is going to pull out some new, previously unheard of strategy, there is no reason to believe he can accomplish this goal. It sounds nice in an ad, but he might have said he was going to take a stroll to the moon and back.

I should mention that each remaining candidate has problems with their goals and their means. Neither Clinton nor Obama are admitting the full impact of their health care plans, nor are they going to be able to accomplish them within the specified budget. That’s just my opinion, of course, but I think the history of government programs is on my side.

Each candidate should be asked again and again just how they will accomplish the things they claim they’ll accomplish. We must not vote simply for the best dream. McCain may have just “out hoped” Barack Obama!

In Newsweek, Michael Hirsh is suggesting that the Democrats are wimping out on defense again, not on the battlefield, but on the campaign trail. His article The Democrats’ Wimp Factor paints a picture of the Democrats handing the national defense issue to the Republicans.

To a certain extent I think he’s right. I think the Democratic candidates want to speak mostly about issues they feel they’re already strong on, and that means the economy, health care, education, and other domestic issues. Perhaps they’re right. I’m afraid that personally if I was making the choice purely on domestic issues I’d end up voting Republican. The anti-trade and careless spending policies of the Democrats are matched only by the careless war spending of the Republicans. Both parties seem to think they can propose programs without worrying about cost and sustainability.

But as I’ve said before about health care, national defense has to be produced. Not only must we have soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines, we need the equipment of war. All of that costs, and that makes strategy extremely important.

I’ve argued for some time for strategy in both our foreign policy, and by strategy I mean something that looks decades, not just months, into the future. I think there is room for a Democratic strategy against terrorism, because frankly the Republicans have a loser–keep occupying countries where terrorists operate. This is not even a World War II style strategy; it goes back to something like the civil war in its architecture, and we’re using it against an enemy that just doesn’t operate that way.

But if the Democrats respond with just “let’s do less” as in “let’s get out of Iraq” without working on a sustainable plan to make us safer, they will certainly lose on that issue. People tend to go with someone who looks like he has a plan and is doing something as opposed to someone who just says, “No, let’s not do that.”

But as I was reading that article it occurred to me that neither party actually has a domestic strategy either. We have a “stimulus package” but what is the ultimate goal? As far as I can tell the politicians haven’t even thought beyond the end of the current cycle. McCain’s proposed response on energy–cut out the gas tax for a bit–is the same type of response. Let’s scratch the itch. But the skin disease that caused the itch is still going strong.

How about a strategy that involves improving education first, with responsibility, accountability, quality educational standards, and extremely qualified teachers? While we’re at it, let’s look at that curriculum carefully and see what is preparing people to live and work in the new high tech world, and what is just wasting time. That will require strategic thinking, again in terms of decades, because education is in such a mess.

How about a strategy that involves improving law enforcement with better training, better equipment, more manpower, and clearer direction? Perhaps we could prevent more crime if we were willing to invest in having the people there in time to do it. I know many of our law enforcement officers try, but we expect a large amount of results from our investments.

What about a strategy that builds the tax base rather than talking about how to divide the pie that we have more ways, or take more from the people’s part of the pie to put into the government. I’m not anti-all-domestic-programs. But again, government programs tend to alleviate the current symptom without looking at the root of the problem.

Perhaps Democrats are wimpy on defense, but our politicians are wimpy on policy. We, the voters, are to blame, because we’ll vote these guys out if they tell us what they’re programs actually cost. We’d prefer to be deceived. We won’t listen to them long enough to explain an educational reform strategy with a reach of decades. We’d find it boring and call that politician a “policy wonk.”

We need to increase our attention span, pay attention, perhaps take notes, and vote accordingly. We may find that we’re often voting for only a marginal improvement, but if we do that much, we can push things in the right direction.

I’m an opponent of the war in Iraq, but what would I do if I were still in the military? Would I be protesting? Would I be speaking publicly against the war? No. I would vote my conscience, I would speak privately to friends and relatives, but I would carry out my duties again to the best of my ability. Note that this would not include what I would view as illegal orders–torture, for example. But for the vast majority of those in the military those particular questions do not occur. In the military, I owed it to my country to carry out its policies to the best of my ability.

We live in a republic in which power resides ultimately with the people. I think the primary requirement for patriotism for those not in the military (or similarly sworn to carry out politically determined policies) under those circumstances is involvement. There are things one can do that are disloyal, such as desertion from the military, providing information to enemies, or actively working to destroy the country. But the primary responsibility of the citizen is to be heard.

Some seem to believe that patriotism involves supporting your country’s policies, once made, no matter what. There is a sort of reverence when they refer to the actions of the commander-in-chief. But even though I voted against the current resident of the White House, I participated in making him commander-in-chief, and I get to participate in choosing the next president and seeing him leave.

Would it be patriotism for me to support the current war just because my president got it started? I think it would, in fact, be precisely the opposite. The war is a bad move in what appears to be a bad ad hoc strategy, and it will result in no good for the country that I love. Given that I believe that, could I possibly be a patriot and a person of integrity if I didn’t say it? I would suggest the opposite, that I would be the worst sort of lying traitor in those circumstances.

That doesn’t mean that the honest supporter of the war is less of a patriot. In fact, such a person would be a lying traitor if he or she does not act in support of those positions. We each owe our country our best arguments and our vote.

Patriotism, in my view, is not the support of a set of policies, but rather that one gives one’s best in all areas, including one’s mind and judgment to one’s country and does so with integrity.