The Seattle Times: America at war on Memorial Day

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Simply put, our enemy is not mere random groups of terrorist criminals. It is using terror and irregular warfare as a means to conduct a protracted, global insurgency. It is waging war of a kind and scope rarely seen before. As incredible as it may seem to us, this is the nature of the enemy we face.

For all these differences, significant though they are, some aspects of war endure. War remains brutal, face-to-face, a matter of survival. Innocents suffer. The enemy hides and deceives, so war is still the realm of fog and uncertainty — regardless of technological advances. War requires skill, cunning, imagination, sacrifice and leadership. Once war starts, its outcome is unpredictable. Straightforward cause-and-effect logic only partially applies to activity in war, for emotion, chance and the human heart reign as much as reasoning. War remains a clash of wills, a duel where guts and staying power count.

America and her allies have fought a hot, sustained, global campaign against enemies who sought to impose an ideology on the world before. Then, however, the threat was clear and unambiguous, for the enemy was a set of nation-states and they fought conventionally. Clarity and conventionality went a long way to sustain the national will necessary to persevere when times were bleak; maintain support for those in uniform and their families; welcome home with open arms those who fought; and rightly continue to show appreciation for their sacrifices year after year, Memorial Day after Memorial Day.

The enemy we are fighting today has chosen means that exploit ambiguity and lack clarity. Eroding our national will is its very intent — all the while acting to achieve its political and ideological aims. There are soldiers, Marines, airmen and sailors who are fighting this very day and this very night to prevent the enemy from achieving its political and ideological aims. They and their families need our continued support, our perseverance and our open arms. The shape of our future is literally in their hands.

But in today's environment more than ever before, the future is also in your hands. In a conflict where the erosion of your will is a major goal of our enemy, you are a soldier as well.

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