Or we could demand that Congress have a reasonable debate as to the strategy and endstate of war efforts in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and having found no significant reason to stay in that region (given a corrupt central government, weak provincial governments, lack of an effective judicial system, entrenched Taliban that is only increasing regional holds, and neighboring states who don't assist), we could support the military by shutting down the sausage grinding machine that is AfPak.

Just a thought. Certainly an alternative to the status quo of increasing billions of dollars of sunk costs and continued loss of military and civilian lives.

"Encourage your sons, daughters, friends and relatives to join and defend the country."

The US military is in the service of an evil Empire. Why should young people join the imperial military to be sent to their deaths by the self serving morons and cowards in command. They die and get mutilated to make fat slob war mongers and generals rich.

The officers of today are not worthy of our children.

FTMC

"To keep our honor clean."

I wish I could. But I'm gay. It's so nice to not be wanted, and then chewed out for not being patriotic enough to join up.

2 words: neo-isolationism

Purchase a bumper sticker that says "I support the troops" and put it on your car. Then when it is convienent, and you have the time, perhaps at an airport while you await your flight, say thank you to a Soldier in uniform returning or going back overseas. Really, that should be enough.

Leave Iraq and Afghanistan, start over with a specific goal in mind: like getting OBL?

It seems that increasingly the real war is in NW Pakistan, and all we've got going there are drones. I want to support the "war effort", but am a bit jaded about where that effort is currently applied. Turning Afghanistan into a functioning state seems a Sisyphean task, and Iraq I think will achieve homeostasis on its own without much further intervention. How about we stop spending trillions on these boondoggles and focus ourselves on where the jihadists actually are?

As long as US continues to ignore Taliban’s Pakistani connections, problems faced by US in its Afghan mission will continue to not only persist but compound.

As Times of London reported yesterday (6/13/10) on Matt Waldman’s report titled ‘The sun in the sky’ from London School of Economics, “support for the Afghan Taliban is ‘official ISI policy’ and is backed at the highest levels of Pakistan’s civilian administration. Pakistan appears to be playing a double game of astonishing magnitude. There is thus a strong case that the ISI orchestrates, sustains and shapes the overall insurgent campaign in Afghanistan.”

The ISI is said to compensate families of suicide bombers to the tune of 200,000 Pakistani rupees, claims the report. Thus US aid to Pakistan goes directly to finance the death of US/NATO soldiers in Afghanistan.

Pakistani government issued its usual denials just as it had denied existence of Mullah Mohammed Omar’s ‘Quetta Shura Taliban (QST)’ in the provincial capital Quetta of Baluchistan. But General Stanley McChrystal confirmed the existence of QST in his report to President Obama in August, 2009.

Can American CIA not know what Matt Waldman knows? How come Obama administration is continuing Bush’s mollycoddling of Pakistan with such incriminating evidence against Pakistan’s double game? How can US mission in Afghanistan succeed if Obama administration continues to ignore such damning evidence against Pakistan?

I liked the suggestion to send care packages to troops. But I don't know any and the web site you link to doesn't help identify any units that could be the recipients. What is the best way to find a unit that could use care packages?

One reason some many vets are disgruntled is because officers insist on pushing this "national defense" yarn, and when they return home into the real world they find its all BS. Is your life worth "democracy in Iraq" as a cover for stealing oil?

Encourage kids to join the Border Patrol or Coast Guard if they want to defend the USA. Join the military if you want to travel, destroy things, kill brown folks, and watch billions of dollars wasted.

Don't Do Drugs - Or you could legalize it, like California is going to do soon enough. Also, there are about a million things we need to do before that.

On the memoirs, Gen. Kill presents a much better picture of service than One Bullet Away. I'd actually recommend the first 100 pages, but then skip over to Gen Kill.

Also, Soft Spots, by Clint Van Winkle, and The War I Always Wanted, by Friedman, are much better books in my opinion.

These options are kind of limited and one sided? What about vote for politicians that will reform America's military budget, quit spending money on useless military waste, fire contractors, etc, etc.

Sheesh.

Finally, how could you leave off repeal DADT?

I hope that one of the outcomes of these wars is to have produced the next generation of leaders. Those who have sacrificed, seen war, the blunders, the victories and have felt it. May the voice of the those who have sacrificed always outweigh the voice of those who thought too highly to serve/sacrifice.

The really sad message I have to convey to this (apparently) serving major and the former lieutenant is that I, and many other retired regular army officers will not ever encourage people to join today's military. I've gotten letters from the Army; I get a bounty if I sign a younger person up. No thanks. I do not in any way support the current war efforts and the only support I can give the troops is to try to extract them from one of the most egregious blunders in the history of this nation. That, I'm working on, through the political process.

I'm also a little bemused at how junior officers in today's military feel free to lecture the civilian community about how they're not doing their part. My suggestion: let the president do his job. He's the head lecturer. Military officers do their job. The major has this whole thing turned around: the American people are the ones who tell him what to do. I think this is real chutzpah. It's fine for Ricks or any columnist, politician, et al, to say these things, but a serving officer? How about just doing your job, major.

Weesner, are you a Vietnam veteran? You said, ask a veteran about the protestors. This veteran will tell you this: the protestors saved a lot of American lives.

What all of the war lovers don't understand is that these wars inevitably have an expiration date. We had more than enough time, troops, money, etc., in Vietnam. We tried, but we couldn't get the job done. Maybe because, as we've learned in retrospect, historical tides and many other factors were against us. The same thing is happening in Afghanistan. Nine years is enough.

It's time to change the strategy to a intelligence, FID, counter terrorism approach. Ground troops aren't going to get this job done, if indeed it is doable at all, especially if they've got time to write screeds telling the American people how they're failing them. News flash: Major, the American people are fickle and demanding taskmasters. They don't care about your opinions. They want results. You may well walk away from this feeling they've failed you. And so it goes.

Out of curiosity, do you support legalization of certain controlled substances Mr. Ricks?

As a late disclaimer, I will come out and say that I personally do. Not out of any interest in using them (I have never done so and never will) but from a conclusion that the sheer amount of money provided to various anti-American groups from controlled substances means that the U.S increasingly cannot afford criminalization.

In re. to Don Bacon: You have to pay for a military somehow. Sadly, the time this would have been easiest to pass such a bill would have been around 2001-2003, when very conservative economic though reigned and it was assumed that military operations would be cheap and easy. As it is now, there's practically no chance of that. You would need a major reversal of the economy and a Republican president to get it through.

All,
I think the best thing you can do is go to a mall and shop. Then have a nice dinner out at a resaurant followed by spending more money at a local club. Bottom line, go out spend money and shop.

Warm Regards,
Dubya

I do appreciate the many comments on how to support the war effort. In the case of Number 1, imagine if the editors of publications and media outlets stridently calling for our military efforts (Weekly Standard, National Review, Fox News, Commentary, etc.) donated advertising space to military recruiting ads. Even better, the eligible ( i. e. healthy and under 42years of age) staff members of these media groups could lead by example and volunteer for military service. They could also mobilize their subscriber base to "sponsor" military recruiting stations, ensuring that recruiters have a good supply of patriotic, healthy, well-educated recruits--beginning with themselves and their children

I hate to sound like a broken record, especially on this subject. I agree with most of Maj. Burgoyne's ideas.

However, as some other posters have mentioned, the time to sell these ideas to the American public as ways to help the war effort was in late 2001. As late as 2004 they would have gotten some large-scale response beyond members of the public who were acting on them anyway. After several years in which the government's political leadership has labored mightily to separate the war effort(s) from the daily lives of the American people, I'm afraid Maj. Burgoyne's list would generate a collective shrug from any randomly selected groups of Americans presented with it.

For many Americans, "our" war effort has become "their" war effort. That's the way the Bush administration wanted it; the presentation of a list of ideas like the one here would have been regarded in the last White House as a concession that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were not going to be easy, cheap and over any day now -- not the kind of concession thought prudent going into the 2004 Presidential election. Items 2 and 3 were, in addition, direct contradictions of President Bush's legislative program.

I'm unhappy about this, and if I were humping a pack through some desolate Afghan mud village I'd be damned unhappy about it. However, here at home as in Afghanistan we need to face the fact of time's passage and its consequences. We can't do now all the things we might have been able to do in late 2001.

I disagree with the reasoning behind point #2: Taxing oil.

Bottom line -- an increased gasoline tax may make us less dependant on foreign oil, but it probably will not "punish" producers of oil. Without careful additional measures, a gas tax could significantly harm the US economy.

A tax on oil punishes consumers as well as producers. Gasoline is extremely inelastic, meaning that a rise in its price will not lead to a significant reduction in demand. Some demand will shift to alternate fuels and consumption of oil will wane a bit. Both domestic and foreign oil companies will continue to sell to the India and China, whose combined oil consumption will soon dwarf that of the US. As the US consumes less oil, it becomes cheaper for other nations, and Saudi Arabia, Venezuela and others will continue to profit.

Furthermore, let's get real. This additional tax burden on US consumers and businesses will only retard economic growth and the additional revenue would be squandered by the government. I'd support a "net zero" tax increase by reducing income tax or some other tax in proportion to the increased gasoline tax. I'd also dedicate gas tax revenue to funding public transportation exclusively. (I would not subsidize a specific alternate fuel, such as ethanol, because that creates a artificial entrenched interest in keeping the subsidy rather than allocating resources toward better, new alternatives that may come along).

Vom Krieg: What kind of war is it?

This string is unspecific about where the war I'm to support is, who we're fighting, where victory lies. Just support 'the war effort'. Others will know where to send the care packages. Nation building in Asia or S. America is close enough.

BD and guest contributors seem to have totally bought into the Bush-era conflation of homeland security with our Arab and Pashtun wars. Neither major source of enemy recruits and/or terrorists is even mentioned, except obliquely, thru 'oil' and 'Pakistan'.

Isn't understanding the enemy, sizing their force, naming their commanders, learning their order of battle, supposed to be part of 'military science'? Is speaking their language important? What would that be?

I'm all for defining the threat, making the world safer, and saving the children. But this discussion can't put a finger on what this war is that we're supposed to support. If we're all about kicking Pashtun butt now (or protecting them?), most are in fact over in nuclear armed / proliferating / terror exporting / terrorist harboring Pakistan.

Where do I sign up to support that war? The Nellis USO, in Nevada? Maybe I should protest at WalMart agin Islamabad's Chinese sponsors? Or are we their closest ally in this second decade of GWOT?

Sur-freaking-un-real. Brave New World might be the better textbook.

Seems like we each live a different reality. I have one son in AFSOCOM, my second has been in civil air patrol since age 13. The youngest(age 17) speaks, reads and writes three languages-one is Russian). Know what ROTC told him?
We don't have much for linguists right now. Oh yes ,I was army enlisted-7th army training command. I don't now and never did support the Iraq attack. I did want to kill OBM up close and personal as did many Americans. I did try to sign up for USAID-told I was too old( age 60 then). I have a masters degree, 19 years in my field and have worked as a machinist and railroad machinist- yes I can tear down and rebuild an E-8 engine and manage highly complex disability cases. Too old, don't need linguists and 35 year old Talons with bent wing boxes. This nation is led by a parliament of dunces-business,labor and government. You want more support? Forget it Mac we been jerked around enough.

ROTC is not interested in linguists, as those jobs are for enlisted personnel. Having additional language training helps out in certain officer assignments, but not until you reach the senior CPT and Major level. Even then, it will depend on the assignment.
I am sure, if he met all qualification standards to enlist, the military would be happy to have him for a linguist.

The US military is in the service of an evil Empire. Why should young people join the imperial military to replica IWC be sent to their deaths by the self serving morons and cowards in command. They die and get mutilated to make fat slob war mongers and generals rich.