One of the most contentious issues among military planners is how, exactly, we should be fighting the counter-insurgency in Afghanistan. CENTCOM boss General Petraeus figured Iraq out quickly, but cracking the Hindu Kush’s human terrain remains — as it has for centuries — the bane of empires and great powers. “Is the military mission to engage, push back and dismantle the Taliban networks,” asks Bing West, “with population protection being a tactic to gain tips and local militia, or is the military mission to build a nation by US soldiers protecting the widespread population, with engagements against the Taliban as a byproduct?”

West figures it’s the latter, for two reasons. First, non-kinetic operations are more palatable to the American public, the lifeblood of any war effort. That’s why you see Navy recruiting commercials emphasizing foreign tsunami and disaster relief just as frequently as their standard warheads-on-foreheads fare. Second, denying insurgents use of the local population is prime-directive number one in any low-intensity fight. There’s two ways to accomplish that mission: brutalize the population until they’re broken like a well-trained horse (a favorite insurgent tactic) or — because the first option is proscribed by our Western values — feed, shelter, and protect them until you can bring your superior firepower to bear on the now-isolated enemy.