Your statement that no deaths are considered inconsequential is a generous one that I would expect from you. I would also expect the same response from most of our soldiers on the ground over there, being decent souls who encounter the suffering first-hand. I refer to the parade of articles celebrating the "light" loss of life written by people who are not there to see the impact of those light losses in the eyes of the people who loved them. If I read the phrase "You can't make an omelette without breaking a few eggs" one more time in reference to death in wartime, and especially to civilian casualties, I will scream, and you will hear it in Ohio. It was (and continues to be, but we hear it less) disrespectful and dehumanizing for the dead and their families. But I tend to look at statistics and wish for portraits. This is a weakness in my outlook that I have no desire or incentive to correct.

I will tell you what I told Don. Nobody wants to see our soldiers or civilians die. But any military that holds as its primary goal avoidance of casualties is utterly doomed to defeat. This isn't nice. It isn't pleasant. But it is a fact. As it is, we have taken a far greater toll in our own soldiers than we had to because we have tried to avoid unnecessary Iraqi casualties. We are up against enemies who think nothing of blowing up themselves, wrapping bombs around children, infiltrating the Red Cross in ambulances to kill them, and generally valuing human life not one whit.

People who would blow your brains out on the street without blinking an eye. People who would blow your kids' brains out at point blank range without blinking an eye.

Needless to say, this makes our work a lot harder if we are not to descend to that level.

You are a wonderful person, and would make a great neighbor. But if you were in charge of our defense, we would lose. If casualties had been the first priority in WWII, you would have people a lot more difficult to deal with than fundamentalists running your life.

Regarding "success": We can celebrate a surgeon for his skill if we wish, but he still inflicts a wound and is paid handsomely for his trouble. We celebrate the patient for the recovery, because he is the one who suffered and endured, he is the one who completed the therapy after the doctor got a check and walked out of his life, and he is the one who didn't give up.

Maybe so, but without the surgeon, the patient would probably be dead.