8 U.S. Soldiers Killed in Fiercest Battle Since Wanat

And all Obama is doing about it is a 25 minute photo op with Gen. McChrystal.

Mike there is a chain of command that even McChrystal has to go through

@John ryan: And McChrystal DID go through the chain of command John Ryan. He prepared his assesment and sent it up that chain where it now sits on Obama’s desk without any decision despite the urgency.

Apparently, health care was too much of a crisis for anyone to wait long enough to read the bill, but our boys dying in Afghanistan is not?

P.S. There is nothing to stop Obama from reaching out to McChrystal, HIS handpicked general. He doesn’t need to go through the chain of command to communicate with him.

You know that and I know that and our readers know that you know that.

So why do you keep dropping the same STUPID comment here?

It must be terrible to serve in actual combat knowing your president is anti-military. I hope Sarah Palin or the Republicans will offer them their support as much as possible.

Greetings:

There seems to me that there is more than a bit of “Looking for a Tet ‘68″ going on in the more recent Afghanistan coverage. I would like to insert a bit of perspective based on my own personal infantry experiences.

Just as there are two basic plays in basketball, drive to the basket or jump shoot, there are two basic plays in the infantry. The first is the classic “Find ‘em, fix ‘em and finish ‘em” scenario. The second is its corollary, “Let them find you, fix ‘em and finish ‘em”. Effective infantrymen have to develop skills to deal with and execute both. Some days, you’re the cat looking for a mouse, and some days, you’re the cheese in the mousetrap.

The “Find ‘em” scenario is often referred to as a reconnaissance in force, if the target is yet to be located, or an assault, if their location has been determined. One of the difficulties with this approach in a guerilla war is that the enemy can chose fight or flight.

The “Let them” scenario involves finding and occupying a location that may or has significant import to the enemy. The underlying logic is to draw the enemy into a battle, so inserting too large a force would probably be counterproductive.

It seems to me, based on the very limited information available at this point, that the two recent, costly battles were of this latter type. While our casualties are certainly both tragic and unwanted, this is how infantry work sometimes needs to be done. It would be a disservice to our fallen to turn these engagements into reasons to abandon their mission.

@Tom N – As a family member of two combat serving military members, I can tell you it’s a nerve wracking time for all of us. You pray every minute of every day. Our soldiers do their jobs with their heads held high, regardless of the CiC and his efforts to undermine them.

@Savage – Yes they do miss Mr. Bush and so do we!!!

I am hoping against hope here that McChrystal does not resign his post because I don’t think he’d be the last General to do so which would leave us in an incredibly bad position. However, our present Generals appear to have learned from the past and will not allow themselves to be made political scapegoats (which is why I think his report was leaked to begin with).

May God bless and keep our heroes close to Him, watch over their families and hold them in His arms. Let us never forget them.

Dare I open myself to a b***h slapping by making a comment about how heroic and great these guys are over there fighting islamofacism. The last time I said anything like that I got such a drubbing by some old biddy cat lover.

@Davey:

First, welcome.

Second, you will never have to worry about being criticized here for praising the heroic work of our men and women in uniform.

Third, there may be cat people here but they’re not likely to give you a hard time.