There are many ways to lose a war...

...this is just one of them.

Step one - explain the fundamentals of your plan:

...we've got to get the job done [in Afghanistan], and that requires us to have enough troops so that we're not just air-raiding villages and killing civilians, which is causing enormous pressure over there. It means that we have enough civilian support, agricultural specialists, people who are engineers, people who are building schools and so forth...

Step two - get elected President of the United States*.

Step three - get lots of expert advice and formalize your plan:

SUMMARY OF RECOMMENDATIONS FOR AFGHANISTAN AND PAKISTAN

The following steps must be done in concert to produce the desired end state: the removal of al-Qaeda's sanctuary, effective democratic government control in Pakistan, and a self-reliant Afghanistan that will enable a withdrawal of combat forces while sustaining our commitment to political and economic development.

• Executing and resourcing an integrated civilian-military counterinsurgency strategy in Afghanistan...

Afghan Strategy Requires 'Holistic' Approach, General Tells Senate

WASHINGTON, June 2, 2009 - Despite impressive progress in many areas, the situation in Afghanistan remains serious, the nominee to become the next commander of both the International Security Assistance Force and U.S. Forces Afghanistan said during his Senate confirmation testimony today.

"Afghans face a combination of challenges - a resilient Taliban insurgency, increasing levels of violence, [a] lack of governance capability, persistent corruption, lack of development in key areas, illicit narcotics and malign influences from other countries," said Army Lt. Gen. Stanley McChrystal. "There is no simple answer. We must conduct a holistic counterinsurgency campaign and we must do it well."

A key component to a holistic campaign is people, McChrystal said. More than 21,000 additional U.S. military personnel will deploy to Afghanistan by October. McChrystal admitted he didn't know if that would be enough and might not for some time.
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Counterinsurgency is difficult and demands resources, courage and commitment over time, as each step of the "shape, clear, hold, build, process presents challenges," McChrystal said.

Make sure he doesn't come back with answers too quickly, because that's crucial to...

Step five - pretend that was never your plan, and that the military was trying to ram it down your throat, but you were too smart for 'em*.

Military thwarted president seeking choice in Afghanistan

...The military's plan "compromises our ability to do anything else. We have things we want to do domestically. We have things we want to do internationally." Obama turned to Gates. "You have essentially given me one option," he said."It's unacceptable."
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Two weeks later, on the day before Thanksgiving, the president and Emanuel met in the Oval Office with Donilon and his boss, retired Gen. James L. Jones, the national security adviser. No Pentagon officials were there.
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Obama described how he wanted to explain his strategy to the American people in a speech scheduled for Dec. 1 at West Point.

"This needs to be a plan about how we're going to hand it off and get out of Afghanistan," he said. "Everything that we're doing has to be focused on how we're going to get to the point where we can reduce our footprint."

He said he didn't want to use the word "counterinsurgency."
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There was some subdued laughter.

The military did not understand, he said. "It'd be a lot easier for me to go out and give a speech saying, 'You know what? The American people are sick of this war, and we're going to put in 10,000 trainers because that's how we're going to get out of there.' "

It was apparent that a part of Obama wanted to give precisely that speech...

Later that same day, Obama held his regular weekly meeting with Gates in the Oval Office... Under the redefined mission, Obama told Gates, the best I can do is 30,000. "This is what I'm willing to take on, politically," the president said.

Footnote/postscript:

*Key to accomplishing steps two and four - have full and unquestioned support of the American media. That can help in step two - but it is imperative once you get to step five. This could help:

The White House is working hard to secure deals that yield fluffy, feel good commentary about the Obama White House. One American White House reporter used colorful terms to describe the arrangement. The reporter said, "They want 'blow jobs' first [in the press sense]. Then you have to be on good behavior for a bit or be willing to deal, and then you get access."

If you aren't clear what "feel good commentary about the Obama White House" means - it means calling President Obama the best president in history. If you think that's an exaggeration, or that no self-respecting journalist would ever go along with that, - think again:

The Obama administration was determined to change that. "For the past eight years, whatever the military asked for, they got," Obama explained later. "My job was to slow things down."

...it was important to remind the brass who was in charge. Inside the National Security Council, advisers considered what happened next historic, a presidential dressing-down unlike any in the United States in more than half a century. In the first week of October, Gates and Mullen were summoned to the Oval Office, where the president told them that he was "exceedingly unhappy" with the Pentagon's conduct... Lyndon Johnson had never talked to Gen. William Westmoreland that way, or George H.W. Bush to Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf. Presidents Kennedy, Carter, and Clinton had all been played by the Pentagon at various points but hadn't fought back as directly. Now Obama was sending an unmistakable message: don't toy with me. Just because he was young, new, a Democrat, and had never been in uniform didn't mean he was going to get backed into a corner.

Remind the public of steps two and five by repetition, repetition and repetition, but never ever, ever, mention steps one, three, or four again.

Oh, by the way...

American and Afghan Troops Begin Combat for Kandahar

In the last several days, soldiers shifted from guarding aid workers and sipping tea with village elders to actively hunting down Taliban fighters in marijuana fields and pomegranate orchards laced with booby traps.

Sixteen Americans have died in the push so far, including two killed by a roadside bomb on Sunday.

The combat phase began five or six days ago in the Arghandab, Zhari and Panjwai Districts, Brig. Gen. Josef Blotz, a NATO spokesman in Kabul, said, defining the current phase for the first time.

"Lions, all of them," says Lex. "May they not be led by sheep."

Previously: Past in review

Next: More ways to lose a war