Shortly after taking office President Joe Biden announced that the United States forces will be out of Afghanistan by September 11th the anniversary of the attacks by Muslim extremists that launched us into a “War Against Terrorism.”

Biden said twenty years is long enough and the Afghan army, trained and equipped by us, should be able to control the Islamic extremist Taliban that had run the country after the Russians were expelled after more than nine years of vicious fighting. It is noteworthy that the Taliban was aided in its war with Russia by the United States and Pakistan.

Communist North Korea invaded Democratic South Korean in June 1950 until an armistice was signed in 1953.

Notwithstanding that South Korea is a prosperous nation with a strong military and its northern neighbor is a destitute dictatorship, the United States has kept a standing military presence of about 28,500 troops along the demilitarized zone for the last 67 years. In addition, we have 55,000 forward deployed troops in Japan ever since World War Two ended in 1945.

President Biden’s declaration of a date certain for withdrawal from Afghanistan is analogous to President Franklin Roosevelt declaring the war in Europe over by Christmas of 1944 when we pushed German forces back over the Rhine. What happened that December became known as the Battle of the Bulge which was the costliest campaign of the entire war in Europe or the Pacific.

Former Marine and author Bing West who lives in Newport wrote a book on our war in Afghanistan titled “The Wrong War.” Ten years ago he wrote this: “An ideology as much as a religion, Islamic beliefs are intended to form the basis of governance. The strengths of the Taliban are their Islamic fevor and the sanctuary. Pakistan is determined to remain a supporter of some Taliban cliques in case the United States quits the war.”

Conventional forces cannot defeat an insurgency that has the support, willing or forced, of a significant part of the population, a source of funding and a sanctuary where it can rest, rearm, retrain, and recruit replacements. Our own war of independence and experience in Vietnam should prove this.

West notes that the preface of the Army and Marine Corps Counterinsurgency manual states, “soldiers and Marines are expected to be nation-builders as well as warriors.” One wonders if this statement has its priorities reversed.

This doctrine was driven by Gen. David Petreus who took a turn commanding our troops in Afghanistan for 20 months and was subsequently kicked upstairs to run the CIA until he resigned as a result of an extramarital affair with his biographer.

West notes, “governance, economics, the addressing of grievances-has transformed the military into a giant Peace Corps.” However, he writes, “We cannot explain why [the men and women of the Army and Marine Corps] chose the rough life. They march to a different drummer. They chose to fight and are highly skilled at it.”

Mr. West summarizes our Afghan adventure in these words: “The United States invaded Afghanistan in order to destroy the al Qaeda network. However, al Qaeda and the Taliban escaped over the border into Pakistan. Instead of pursuing them, America stayed in Afghanistan, vowing to build a strong democratic nation”. Nation building is a role that belongs to the State Department but not many of its leaders and employees are willing to accept the hard life and dangerous assignment in destitute, hostile countries like Afghanistan.

As of July 5th the Department of Defense lists 1,833 service members as killed in action in Afghanistan and 385 are what is known as “non-hostile deaths,” i.e. accidents, illness, suicides. There are over 20,000 wounded some of them horribly maimed and blinded. No one knows for sure how many are suffering from PTSD or other mental illnesses. This is the cost in blood and suffering borne by a minority of the American public. Have their deaths and injuries been in vain?

Command Sergeant Major (Ret.) John Mancini is the Gold Star Father of Sergeant First Class Curtis Mancini who made the ultimate sacrifice in Afghanistan on January 29, 2004. Richard August is a former staff sergeant whose son, Captain Matthew August, was killed in action in Iraq two days earlier.