Understandable?

I understand the reasons our forces destroyed three abandoned and IED-saturated villages in Afghanistan. It would be too risky to our troops to clear them, for one. That is not the prime reason that I understand the choice we made. Our troops need to accept casualties to accomplish their mission, and if that requires our forces to endure casualties to keep from alienating the people in the area, so be it. That's a tragic fact of life in a counter-insurgency war.

But if the villages truly were beyond salvage and the locals understand this perfectly, then blowing up the villages won't harm our efforts to stand as the protecters of the people.

But I worry about how it looks. I'd like alternatives. Could we have fenced off the villages and surrounding area and let the locals know that anybody inside will be considered enemy? And strike Taliban when we saw them in the village? Or would the image of a "free-fire zone" be too damaging? Remember, Afghans are far more sensitive to civilian casualties than Iraqis were. Afghan civilian casualties were at a record level last year despite the fact that few are caused by our weapons (and fewer still are our responsibility legally since human shields are a common enemy tactic). We can note that fact and note that during the height of the violence in Iraq, in a country of approximately the same size, that monthly casualties higher than last year's record in Afghanistan were common. And Iraqis didn't turn on us as we fought our enemies. Iraqis accepted (I didn't say they liked it) the casualties as the price of doing business, so to speak. Afghans don't understand the situation this way, and we have to adjust to that fact of life in this counter-insurgency war.

For now, make sure rebuilding and securing those villages gets high priority in funding and contracting. Take too long to rebuild and get the people back to their lives, and what might appear understandable becomes an outrage.

I understand why we did it. And it is justifiable, under the circumstances. Unless the Afghans think our use of this much force was not understandable. Then it isn't. That is also a tragic fact of life in a counter-insurgency war.