The Limits of Force - Iraq and Afghanistan Aren't Ours to Win or Lose - by Chuck Hagel

Former Senator Chuck Hagel from Nebraska wrote a commentary in the Washington Post. Read the whole piece at http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/02/AR2009090202856.html?hpid=opinionsbox1

The Limits of Force - Iraq and Afghanistan Aren't Ours to Win or Lose
By Chuck Hagel

The implosion of the Soviet Union and a historic diffusion of economic and geopolitical power created new influences and established new global power centers -- and new threats. The events of Sept. 11, 2001, shocked America into this reality. The Sept. 11 commission pointed out that the attacks were as much about failures of our intelligence and security systems as about the terrorists' success.

The U.S. response, engaging in two wars, was a 20th-century reaction to 21st-century realities. These wars have cost more than 5,100 American lives; more than 35,000 have been wounded; a trillion dollars has been spent, with billions more departing our Treasury each month. We forgot all the lessons of Vietnam and the preceding history.


No country today has the power to impose its will and values on other nations. As the new world order takes shape, America must lead by building coalitions of common interests, as we did after World War II. Then, international organizations such as the United Nations, NATO, the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and GATT (now the World Trade Organization) -- while flawed -- established boundaries for human and government conduct and expectations that helped keep the world from drifting into World War III and generally made life better for most people worldwide during the second half of the 20th century.

Read the rest at http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/02/AR2009090202856.html?hpid=opinionsbox1