For all of the talk about needing and wanting to send more troops to Afghanistan, at least in public by those who hold decision-making responsibility, there is very little frank and honest disclosure. Many government officials just outside that circle of responsibility, and many political commentators, talk of thwarting the Taliban in order to prevent the imposition of their dark rule, to save the women and children from repression and torture, and to “stabilize” the region.

The truth is, though, that if protecting a citizenry from tyrannical rule was both our duty and valid justification for America to go to war, we would never have been at peace and never would be. Stalin’s Russia, the Khmer Rouge’s Cambodia, countless countries in Africa, and so many other “valid justifications” would have exhausted America’s resources by now and killed off several generations of young men and women. Yet, we did not fight all of those wars.

The original reasons for the fighting in Afghanistan were blood lust, rightfully so, after being attacked in New York, Washington, DC and Pennsylvania, and the loss of thousands of American lives in an horrific attack. The stated goal was to bring the battle to Al Queda, and to find and kill Osama bin Laden. Afghanistan was that hotbed and that safe haven for bin Laden et als, and so we brought the battle there. However, it is somewhat silly to suggest our reason for remaining in the fight is to save the citizenry. It is also dangerous for America to consider itself as 21st century versions of European Christians, and our president as Pope Urban II, sending troops on a Crusade to save anyone or anything.

Foreign policy, and decisions to bring war, should be based upon our own interests only. Afghanistan is, in all accounts available to the average American, “backwards” by western standards, almost like walking through biblical times. It has no oil, nothing of strategic interest to America other than its proximity to Pakistan. Although Pakistan is not a party to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, it is a nuclear power nonetheless, first testing weapons in 1998. It’s neighbor to the east, India, also possesses nuclear and thermonuclear weapons, in far greater number than Pakistan.

Maintaining a military presence in the region is important to the United States because of the nuclear threat – - if Pakistan were to fall under Taliban or Al Queda control, and those weapons were to come under enemy ownership, US interests, our security and our lives are put at risk. Presence does not necessarily require combat, however.

Battles should be waged only after they have been won, also, as Sun Tzu so wisely wrote in The Art of War. The question today is a simple one to ask: Have we already won the war in Afghanistan such that it now may be fought? The difficult part is defining winning, and therein lies the rub. What is our end game? For what purpose and to what end are we fighting in Afghanistan? Can that purpose be achieved, can that end be met?

Diplomatic efforts continue in Pakistan, with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton there this week for talks. The US relationship with Pakistan has never been a warm one, only a relationship of necessity. The US provides billions in aid, and strings that may be attached to that aid are always met with great push back. But, the nuclear weapons issue is of paramount importance, and diplomacy is the correct tactic to employ as a consequence.

As regards our efforts in Afghanistan, and on the one hand, we have the US General in charge, Stanley A, McChrystal, requesting another 40,000 American troops, and the supporting staff to assist them.  No stranger to combat, either, General McChrystal, the son of a two-star general and a West Point graduate, is a former commander of the elite Rangers Regiment, and, from 2003 to 2008, the head of hunter-killer black ops in Special Operations. He is clearly a warrior, charged with the responsibility of waging that war, and he has done his duty in telling the President what he needs to accomplish his  war mission.

On the other hand, we have a US official who has resigned because he sees no clearly defined purpose or achievable result to the Afghan war. Foreign Services Officer Matthew Hoh, a former Marine Corps captain with his own combat experience in Iraq, had also served in uniform at the Pentagon, and as a civilian in Iraq and at the State Department. He was also the senior U.S. civilian in Zabul province, a Taliban hotbed.

Last night, President Barack Obama greeted the return of eighteen Americans killed in Afghan action, saluting each casket as it was carried past him. Three were DEA agents in Afghanistan to combat opium drug trade, ironically reputed to be a business interest of Afghan President Karzai’s brother, a man who has been on the Central Intelligence Agency’s intel payroll for more than 7 years. Fifteen of the dead were combat troops killed in battle this week.

When the President makes the telephone calls to the families of those Americans, and if asked, how will he answer the questions? For what purpose and to what end? Can the purpose be achieved, can the end be met?

Two divergent viewpoints – - that of General McChrystal, responsible for designing the tactics of fighting the war, and that of a foreign services officer, charged with helping to frame the end game vision, defining the purpose of the war the General has been asked to wage.

We’re not fighting this war to save the Afghan people, or at least we should not be. We’re not fighting this war to protect the flow of oil, either. After eight years, we seem no closer to finding and killing Osama bin Laden. No other vision for the war’s purpose has been identified, and we seem no closer to knowing the end game today than we did when the war began.

There should be no more compelling reason than that to end it, to redefine General McChrystal’s mission to getting his men and women out of harm’s way, and replace it with a mission only to maintain a meaningful military presence in the region. Charge that presence with the task to maintain vigilance and readiness, capable of surgical strikes by air (manned and unmanned) when warranted, but otherwise to remove our troops and treasures from harm’s way.

The struggle in that part of the world, our conflict with those who intend us harm, and the issues surrounding nuclear proliferation and the dangerous hands those weapons might fall in, are far more complicated than one thousand words can address in this column. But if the issue has to be reduced to just a few words, then let it be said this way: If we can’t tell our brothers and sisters where the goal line is, what they have to finish in order to come home, we have no right to send them to war. It’s time to end it now.