More Troops

Gen. McChrystal says he needs 40,000 more troops in Afghanistan to win and end the war. To me that's a no-brainer. Give him the troops. What the hell is Uncle Barack waiting for? We have been there for eight years stuck in the mud and now we are being told we can end the thing and the president is taking his sweet time about a decision.

I can't understand why either. After all, we have been there for eight years. In reality we won the war after only three weeks. The Taliban was defeated, Al-Queda was on the run, bin Laden was hiding in a cave. A job well done by the US military. Then we got off track and the resulting quagmire is what we were left with. A lot of good men have died in that time.

Volunteers all. Just like the ones there today. This is an all volunteer military. I volunteered a long time ago. Millions have volunteered since. We all knew the day we signed up and took the oath that it was a possibility that we would be asked to go and fight. That is why I have no problem with giving Gen. McChrystal the troops he is asking for.

I feel for all the folks that have lost a loved one in Afghanistan or Iraq. I know more will be lost before this is finished. I can't help that. Neither can anyone else. People like Cindy Sheehan have a right to grieve over the loss of a son. She doesn't have the right to camp out in front of George Bush's house in Texas trying to get him to end the war. Her son joined on his own. He died in service of his country. He is a hero and a patriot and should be remembered as such. My mother was a bit of a pacifist and she wasn't all that thrilled either time that I enlisted, but she wouldn't have gone off the deep end if I hadn't come back from somewhere because she knew that is was my decision.

If we quit now, if we try to pull back a little and maintain the status quo and fail then every life lost to this point will have been for nothing. Every soldier wounded will have done so for nothing. Those that have given years of their collective lives, time away from their families, their children, will have been for nothing. That is unacceptable.

Let us not forget the enemy we are fighting either. These are the cowards that strap bombs to themselves and walk into a marketplace and blow themselves up. Just to get to Paradise and 72 virgins. They kill innocent folks just because they don't believe the same things in regards to religion. Women are routinely beaten for wearing pants and for talking to males that aren't part of the family. These folks are nuts. They will stop at nothing until their twisted goals are met.

We must stop these radical ideologues. We must give the military what they need to put an end to this insanity. If we don't then we only set ourselves up for more tragedy, for another 9/11 type of attack. Can we stand for another 3,000 innocent victims?

I have had the opportunity to travel a bit in the last few years and have flown through New York. There is an obvious gaping hole in the skyline of Manhattan. In Pennsylvania there is a large hole in the ground where flight 93 crashed with 40 American heroes fighting the enemy. We can't forget these folks either.

I don't care if you support the war itself or not. Really, that's irrelevant. What I am asking you to do is support the troops on the ground. They don't make policy, they defend our freedom. Now it's up to us to defend them. E-mail the president, tell him to give Gen. McChrystal the troops he needs.

And to get out of the way.