Churchill, Obama and Afghanistan --- The young Winston Churchill was under no illusions about the enormous challenge of waging war in Afghanistan. "Financially it is ruinous. Morally it is wicked. Militarily it is an open question, and politically it is a blunder." -- Churchill wrote these words in 1897 when, as a young cavalry officer, he found himself fighting the great-great-grandfathers of the modern Taliban movement. Churchill came very close to losing his own life during the six weeks he spent on the border of what is now modern Pakistan, and his summary of the British effort in the 19th century eerily echoes the sentiments many Western soldiers must now feel as they seek to wind down combat operations in Afghanistan by the end of this year. -- So much has changed in the century or so since 2nd Lt. W.S. Churchill fought the region's "wild, rifle-armed clansmen," as he called them. But the lessons of his first proper taste of military combat are just as relevant for those participating in the modern campaign as they were for the Victorian era. -- Churchill, like any other junior officer of his generation, initially approached his participation in the punitive campaigns of the 1890s with great relish, and every confidence that the military superiority of the British would easily prevail over the primitive tribesmen. --- But after six weeks of intense fighting, during which he came under fire "10 complete times" and on several occasions came within a whisker of losing his life, Churchill had changed his tune. War was a gory spectacle, the young Winston concluded, and it was unlikely that the Pashtun tribesmen, whom today form the backbone of the Taliban movement, could ever be beaten by military might alone. -- This certainly seemed to be the conclusion that former U.S. Gen. David Petraeus, the retired commander of the decade-long NATO mission in Afghanistan, reached when he devised his counterinsurgency strategy for defeating the Taliban. In an interview in 2011, Gen. Petraeus told me that, during his research on how to deal with the Taliban, he had read Churchill's account of his first war and had studied the British experience. -- He went on to explain that he believed the conflict in Afghanistan could not be won by military force alone. "You cannot kill or capture your way out of an industrial-strength insurgency," Gen. Petraeus explained. "You have to do some of that, but you need to include a political dimension." --- But, as NATO forces prepare to end all combat operations in Afghanistan by the end of this year, the prospect of finding a political solution to a conflict that has dominated the international landscape since September 2001 remains as remote as ever. To achieve a political solution in Afghanistan you need political resolve—especially on the part of Western politicians and U.S. President Obama, who have the responsibility to make sure their campaign reaches a successful conclusion. The fundamental problem today is that the political will to bring the Taliban to the negotiating table is nonexistent as far as the Obama administration is concerned. -- Rather than seeing the campaign through to the bitter end and ensuring that the sacrifices of thousands of American soldiers will not have been in vain, the Obama administration has decided instead to opt for a policy of "cut and run," with all the implications that is likely to have for American security in the years to come. - More, Con Coughlin, Wall Street Journal, at: http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304428004579352540800429078