Opinion: The pain of war

Our military leaders say the war in Iraq is progressing according to plan, but the progress has come at a heartbreaking price. Our forces have gained much ground and captured thousands of Iraqi troops, but attacks over the weekend left a score of American soldiers dead. Dozens more were wounded, and several were taken prisoner. A British warplane was mistakenly shot down by an American missile. An American soldier with "an attitude problem" was blamed for a deadly attack on U.S. officers at a Kuwaiti command center. And coalition troops and innocent civilians were killed and injured in other accidents.

These are the realities of war. The U.S. commander, Gen. Tommy Franks, and other military leaders surely anticipated the human costs of this conflict, and their commitment to their battle plans remains strong. Franks has been a reassuringly confident and candid presence in his public briefings. The unprecedented immediacy of media coverage from the battlefield also is giving the American people a powerful view of the courage and competence of U.S. forces.

Yet many Americans may not have been prepared for this war's grim realities. Those who are too young to have accurate memories of World War II (400,000 Americans killed), the Korean War (54,000 Americans killed) or the Vietnam conflict (58,000 Americans killed) may have come to assume that our modern military conflicts would all be relatively simple and bloodless. But Iraq is no Panama, Grenada or Kosovo. This war is not even comparable to the 1991 Gulf War, when dozens of other countries contributed to the military effort and our aims were limited to removing Iraqi forces from Kuwait. This time, our task -- removing Saddam Hussein's regime from power -- is more ambitious. And for all the talk of a broad coalition, American and British soldiers and treasuries will bear virtually the entire burden.

Having committed to this war, our nation can settle for nothing less than unequivocal victory. That means removing Hussein and his henchmen, finding and destroying Iraq's illegal weapons and building a freer and more stable society. We risk falling short of those goals if our people and our political leaders lose patience because they were unprepared for a more difficult conflict than some of the arrogant armchair generals predicted. Callow investment bankers on Wall Street apparently were shocked to learn that things can go badly on the battlefield. Last week's stock market euphoria gave way Monday to more sober concerns over the costs and uncertainties of war. Polls show that the broader public also has backed away from overly optimistic expectations that the war would be won quickly and with few casualties.

President Bush has cautioned that this war could be "longer and more difficult than some have predicted." But some of those who predicted that Iraq would be little more than a speed bump on the way to confronting Iran and North Korea are influential policymakers within his own administration. Fortunately, our military leaders have always sounded realistic about the dangers in Iraq, and they do not seem shaken by the setbacks our troops have encountered in the course of pushing forward.

As the war progresses, it is important for our leaders to be honest with the public and with themselves. Opposition to the war in Vietnam did not explode until a credibility gap emerged between the optimistic reports of our generals and politicians and the grim facts on the ground. So far, our political and military leaders appear to be passing that credibility test, but more difficult tests could come as the battle intensifies. At home, the Bush administration also needs to be honest about the financial costs of war. The White House is only now going to Congress with a supplemental request of at least $75-billion, which will be only a down payment on our long-term commitment to Iraq.

There is a reason war should always be a last resort. People die. Plans go awry. The broad international opposition to this war is based on the belief that the Bush administration committed itself to battle before all non-military options were exhausted, against a regime that did not pose a direct threat to American security. Once this war is over, the world will judge whether the results justify the cost in human life and treasure. Many Americans may have engaged in wishful thinking about the costs of war in Iraq. Now that war is under way in all of its terrible reality, we all have an obligation to approach it with the same seriousness and sense of purpose that our troops have shown from the start.

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