Modern War

George Will on what we face in Iraq — and elsewhere:

Seven years ago, Gen. Charles Krulak, then commandant of the Corps, considered Chechnya, that cauldron of religious and ethnic strife, as the template of coming conflicts. Now, as then, Krulak talks about “the three-block war.”

In today’s conflicts, he says, you can have a Marine wrapping a child in swaddling clothes. And a Marine keeping two warring factions apart at gunpoint. And a Marine in medium- or high-intensity combat. It can be the same Marine, in a 24-hour time frame, in just three city blocks.

No one told us it was going to be easy. Well, at least I never did.