U.S. still determined despite harsh reality in Afghanistan

[unhappycamper]

FOB Joyce, in eastern Afghanistan. Pakistan is just a few miles away.


U.S. still determined despite harsh reality in Afghanistan
By Nancy Montgomery, Stars and Stripes
Mideast edition, Monday, May 18, 2009

KABUL — Spc. Patricia Stringfellow had been in Kandahar exactly one day when a pair of middle-aged Danes, her NATO allies, burst her bubble.

Cold drinks in hand, sitting on a bench on the base boardwalk, the tanned Danes told the newly arrived 24-year-old U.S. soldier with the 19th Engineer Battalion she was “crazy” if she thought more U.S. troops would rout the Taliban or that Afghanistan could be transformed.

They said they’d be doing her a favor if they amputated her leg so she could return home to Fort Knox, Ky.

“They got quite cheeky with me,” said Stringfellow, a friendly, sincere woman with a husband and 2-year-old son at home. Still, she said, she believed that the U.S. effort would be successful. “I have faith,” she said, putting her hand over her heart.

Stringfellow’s battalion is part of the United States’ 21,000 troop increase requested by Gen. David McKiernan, who was sacked earlier this month just as the troops began arriving.


Rest of article at: http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=62752

[bemildred]

1. Oh good, "faith-based" military strategy.

Just what we need.