Straight From The Troops

Jeff has posted a masterpiece about how the troops still believe the in mission. Even Paul Harvey praised Jeff's article:

Jeff Emanuel, whoever you are, wherever you are, I wanted to thank you sir.

Nobody since Ernie Pyle has reported this war from the trenches as you are doing. Obviously, you know our guys deserve better.

Here are my favorite parts of Jeff's post:

The knowledge that the American military can win this fight appears to be shared by the vast majority of the soldiers here (and it was expressed by every one that I talked to). This doesn’t mean that they enjoy being here – not at all. “This place sucks,” said one soldier. “Sand sucks. I’m exhausted, and I miss home.” Though these latter sentiments are as common and as pervasive as the formerly expressed confidence, they should be taken for what they mean, not twisted to suit an anti-war agenda. Living somewhere away from home for twelve to fifteen months at a time, living in conditions that aren’t exactly five star resort-esque, eating bad food, going a long time between getting showers and clean clothes, and having an opportunity to be killed virtually every day is an unpleasant situation, and can quickly grind people down.

[. . .]

“The sense I get when talking to the other soldiers,” said a public affairs soldier, “is that the worst thing possible would be to give a date when we’re leaving, period. We all want to win, and to accomplish our mission, especially since we’ve put so much into doing it so far. To just up and leave would be terrible.” I asked what effect such statements as Harry Reid’s “the war is lost,” and Nancy Pelosi’s “the war on terror is not in Iraq” have on the troops’ morale and opinions of their mission, and also pointed out the relevance of John Kerry’s 1971 statement to Congress that nobody wants to be “the last man to die for a lost cause,” and asked how that – and the fact that Congress had just passed resolutions mandating troop pullouts in five months – and asked about that affect, as well. The response was, “It’s terrible. I mean, I understand political posturing and all that but it really is terrible. If the war is lost and we need to go home, then why do we need to stay here five more months, when I could die or my friends could die before we go home? The war is either over or it isn’t; this just doesn’t make sense.” The Specialist continued, “What we want is to keep helping the people here. The people at home who say these things, they don’t understand that these are people who have to live here after we leave, whatever the situation is.

[. . .]

Surrender is not an option to the American fighting force – and they know that very well. Abandoning Iraq while the mission is still unfinished is not an option being entertained by any of the soldiers with whom I have spoken to this point; rather, it appears to be solely the purview of those at home who think that they know better than the soldiers themselves what is good for them. What the troops appear to really want is to be given the support and the resources which will allow them to complete their mission – and, more than anything else, the time to do so successfully.

There is much more in Jeff's "Believing in the mission." Go read the whole thing.