First and foremost is to not allow the reestablishment, if you will, of an extremist sanctuary that can export the kind of terror that ended up with terrorists taking down the World Trade Center and plowing into the Pentagon and a field in Pennsylvania. That's the point: We started this war because the Sept. 11 attack came from this area. And we do not fight alone, but with some 40 allies who share that view.

There are some ideas that will translate from Iraq to Afghanistan and there are many that will not. The first lesson of counterinsurgency, in fact, is that every situation is truly unique, has its own context, its own specific set of factors - and you have to understand that context in enormous detail to be able to craft a sound and comprehensive approach.

I am neither a pessimist nor an optimist. I am a realist, and the reality in Iraq is that it has been very hard and it continues to be hard.

After being married for over 37 years, I showed extremely poor judgment by engaging in an extramarital affair.

Items of interest will be located, identified, monitored, and remotely controlled through technologies such as radio-frequency identification, sensor networks, tiny embedded servers, and energy harvesters - all connected to the next-generation internet using abundant, low-cost, and high-power computing.

If you look at casualties, you find countries that had much higher loss rates per capita than the US. Denmark comes to mind, the United Kingdom, they have suffered heavy losses at various points, the Germans as well.

I think no commander ever is going to come out and say, 'I'm confident that we can do this.