It is an ancient one.

2000 years ago Tacitus described the political and military successes of his father-in-law, Agricola. In so doing he also noted the failure of others of equal rank to accomplish the same objectives both in the colony of Britannia and elsewhere. To explain the difference he wrote:

"Agricola, however, understood the feelings of a province and had learned from the experience of others that arms can effect little if injustice follows in their train."

In short, what held true for Tacitus remains so: the virtues associated with governments worthy of defending – intelligence, justice, organization, integrity, trustworthiness, flexibility, multi-dimensional comprehensive planning, vigor, humanity, iron laws opposing corruption – these are not just "optional" electives.

To succeed long term: they are imperative.

Avery Moore

Praedor – we may well have too big a military and spend too much on it. But the domestic spending argument flags you as a woolly-headed liberal, domestic spending has a very dubious record.

A better argument might be that anytime we are in a counterinsurgency operation, we have gone too far, in the sense that the cost and time will be more costly than our polity is willing to bear, so just stop it. Even to get into a counterinsurgency setting means our political leaders sailed the country into deeper waters than we intended to go. I intend this to be a caution, rather than a rule.

For Yingling to "name names" would have been poor tactics as a standing officer. Praise in public, criticise in private. And observers should be more sceptical when any government agency, including the Army, expands its mission and so not coincidentially expands its call on the public's taxes, time, and resources.

To sm999- Are you suggesting that we not have a military? Or that we should have less costly wars? Or do you just enjoy a good conversation? I

Counterinsurgency is a nonstarter for this country. Smart people like the concept, but it's unworkable because it demands too much. There would have to be a wholesale rejection of long-standing military doctrine and mind-sets. Forget about it. At any rate, would it be worth it in the end? The investment of time and resources for what? To convert people to the American way? It's colonialism by another name.

The Army takes its orders from the president. It is limited in what it can do on its own. All this debate about the relative merits of counterinsurgency is for naught. If a president orders it to invade a country, it will do it even if the Army has deep reservations. If the generals put up objections, their careers are over. The president finds generals who agree with him. That's how it works. There are no coups in this country, not that I'm advocating that. It's just that the military is subservient to the commander-in-chief, and his view, colored by his political tendencies, is supreme.

My next assignment was with the Special Operations Group in Vietnam. There I experienced close up the animosity between combat arms officers whose focus was conventional warfare and those of us who thought that there would be a lot of insurgencies to deal with in future; that we needed to focus on winning over the local populace; that less military presence is frequently more effective and that enemy kills are not only a poor indication of progress, but are most often counterproductive when accompanied by civilian casualties.

I thought we had learned some lessons about combating insurgencies in Vietnam, but it didn't appear so until recently when General Petraeus reinvented the wheel.

To my comrades in arms who still espouse conventional warfare, I have one question: Where do you anticipate we will become involved in a war similar to WW II – Central Europe, China, Iran?