These bastards have refocused us - this is what we are fighting. This is why we need to stay and win in Iraq, even through periods of intense doubt. The Commissar asks legitimate questions about timetables, effective force structure, measurable progress; the Washington Post quotes generals voicing concern about strategic failure; fine, these questions of course need answers. But if it takes two years or ten years, tactical withdrawals followed by messy re-engagements, $100 billion or $100 trillion, this problem, this cancer of Muslim extremism is not going to go away. It flourishes in medieval, closed societies, and our only strategic hope to weaken it is to invest in the success and democratization of the rest of the world. If we fail, we fail trying, we fail making mistakes and correcting them, because defensive isolationism and/or tactical application of military force are one-way tickets to destruction. Highly imperfect as it is, our present, starry-eyed course as charted by the current administration is the only available path that even attempts to adequately answer this challenge.

Study history with any intensity and a constant theme will arise over and over and over: stronger societies that unhesitatingly apply their strength win. That's why the mid-term survival of the United States is dependent upon pressing our advantage and changing the world while we still have overwhelming economic and military dominance, which takes more than a few years' patience. This paradigm will shift drastically within this century, perhaps within a generation or two, as innovation lowers the boundaries to terribly destructive technology. At that point, it's likely that the world may be doomed anyway, but literally our only hope may be the previously forced evolution of most corners of the earth towards pluralistic, democratic societies that will naturally marginalize extreme elements.

If you were horrified by what that small group of men did with a knife and a video camera, ponder what they yearn to do with highly efficient chemical agents, nuclear material or future nanotechnology. There is no exit strategy in Iraq, merely victory or defeat in the first or second round of a lifelong, messy epic battle - civilization vs. those that wish to destroy it. It's going to be ugly, it's going to involve defeats and it will not be politically expedient. Pick sides and fight, feel free to examine and question tactics, but don't for a second think that ignoring the war or withdrawing from individual battles will make its consequences disappear. Our political leadership needs to refocus the American electorate on the gravity of this struggle and the sacrifice that it demands, for the only thing that can defeat us at this stage of the game is flagging political will.

We're in it to win it. Suck it up, people.