secretaries of defense and presidents may have roles, but they better keep their egos under control because tolstoy in his book "war and peace" really had it right. what actually happens in war has much more to do with the tenacity of those who are fighting than it does with the pronouncements from on high. and i'll try to show you why. i'd like to just bring you through very quickly what the war looks like, how the strategy's embedded in it and then turn it over for questions. of most of my time in afghanistan, i've been there -- i'm just about to go back for my tenth trip. i i probably have about 18 months altogether, ten trips in the last four years, and i spend them all with the platoons, army, marines, special forces outfits and associated afghan units. and i generally have been up in the mountains. that's the hindu hindu/kush aren afghanistan. unfortunately, we've been pushed out of there, and the cofar where you're -- konar where you're looking at mountains that are 10,000 feet high. the other half of my time i spend down in the south where the other x is. this is where with mule la omar and