If you have read any of our articles and our postings here over the year you would understand that there is more to war than you seem to posit and that your “more than just the war” is in fact, in many, many respects part of the war.
You may remember a while back a book that became popular here among strategic thinkers by two ChiCom colonels about unrestricted warfare. After reading it Admiral Moorer remarked to me at the time: “It’s not like they didn’t tell us what they intend to do.” They are doing it and they are quietly encouraging the terrorists to employ what we commonly now call asymmetric warfare, the capability for which is only going to increase because of our technology which we have developed but the Islamic theo-fascists intend to continue using against us more and more to spread their fanatical version of Islam based on oil income, which they believe Allah gave them and we have been stupid to allow to continue.
So long as citizens wear blinders in this regard and have such a narrow view of war so that what is really happening is excluded from our public thinking and discourse, we will not be able to effectively respond.
Here is the first of the ideas from the website you reference: “A larger, more capable, and more modern military that can defeat terrorists, deter adversaries, and defend the U.S. and our interests.” That is a specific idea and a correct one. If we are, as so many keep saying: “stretched too thin,” the obvious answer is to thicken things. President Bush has made a cautious move in this direction, and it will be necessary to greatly expand the effort in that direction, but what is that increase to consist of, at least in broad outline and, most importantly, how will it coordinate with other efforts outside of the traditional concept of warfare and in the arena of unrestricted warfare?
We need more vision and leadership from all the candidates in this regard.
But the public is war weary and needs a break. With the exception of Ron Paul and Huckabee, all the republican candidates seem to be very much intent on continuing the war as it has progressed if indeed not escalate to some extent. Just because it is not the first and last word out of their mouths at every turn does not reduce their comitmtment but acknowledges where things are for the majority of voters right now. Bread and butter issues both related and unrelated to the conflict are in the minds of most.
Anyways, the given example of my candidate, and many others here at FR, Fred Thompson is clear as to what he wants to do. Indeed it seems he wants to re assert the case, something that sadly the Bush administration has not done a great job on, despite being very correct in most of their actions to date.
As far as the initial subject, John McCain, while he has a good if not excellent stance on the WOT, others have one as well without the problems on a number of other Conservative issues that cause concern among a vast majority on Free Republic. They also do not have the risk to the GOP of having an outburst during the General Election that could leave the party high and dry. This is of concern among many at the RNC.