If I understand the gist of the quoted reactions to the new ROE’s, most are supportive because, as Johannes said,”the key point of the change in the use of force is to move away from killing to suffocation.” And others cited by the Captain seem to be operating under a similar delusion.

Let’s cut the B.S. and get right to the heart of it: there will be NO suffocation of any bad guys in A-stan because there are not now and will never be (as far as I can fathom from Administration narratives) enough U.S. forces to do anything like the COIN operations needed to ’suffocate’ an insurgency. A-stan is now in the hands of a cold, calculating politician who will do just enough to say he tried but never enough to win.

When is someone in the media, Republican ranks, or military going to clearly nail this infernal excuse for a strategy that lacks the basic requisite of troops to get the job done? Does Dick Cheney have to spend his life on the Sunday talk shows to point out the glaring malfeasance we are seeing from this Administration? How can Petraeus and McChrystal live with themselves when they sell a strategy that, while sound in principle, they know cannot be accomplished with a measly 68,000 troops?

It is stunning to see Small Wars Journal and others playing along with this charade. What is the point of arguing over ROE’s? It is like arguing over the best arrangement of deck chairs on the Titanic as it shudders from the impact of the iceberg. Yes, of course, the U.S. should try to limit civilian casualties and we can’t kill our way out of an insurgency and we need to protect the civilian population etc… But since we know right NOW that the Administration is not going to send anywhere near enough troops to protect the population in any of the ways necessary to make sense of the new ROE’s, what the use?! “Gated communities” ?? “Checkpoints” ?? As TCJ has pointed out over and over, this sort of thing is never going to happen from a FOB.

Ladies and gentlemen, the U.S. military is willingly going along with orders from the C-in-C to bend over, smile and allow the Taliban to kick their butts. It is so frustrating that it cause for weeping. But we will save that for the families of the poor soldiers who will die for this lame-brain strategy.