The terrorists sure have the NYTimes figured out

They know all they have to do is set off a few explosions, kill some people, get themselves killed by the hundreds, and the New York Times will fall in line and start writing editorials like this:

Something has gone alarmingly wrong in Afghanistan, previously touted as the Bush administration's one quasi-successful venture in nation-building. Afghanistan's rising carnage still has not reached Iraq-like levels. But the trend is running in decidedly the wrong direction. Poorly thought-out American policies are at least partly to blame.

Is Afghanistan perfect? No. Has Taliban activity been increasing lately, as opposed to last year? Yes. And it's true, the Afghan government's authority is not strong out in the provinces where warlords rule. The drug trade is booming.

But is Afghanistan on the verge of hell and anarchy? Have things "gone alarmingly wrong?" Challenges abound, but, instead of immediately lapsing into defeatism, can we not as a nation toughen our resolve? As Victor Davis Hanson wrote:

What we need, then, are not more self-appointed ethicists, but far more humility and recognition that in this war nothing is easy. Choices have been made, and remain to be made, between the not very good and the very, very bad. Most importantly, so far, none of our mistakes has been unprecedented, fatal to our cause, or impossible to correct.

So let us have far less self-serving second-guessing, and far more national confidence that we are winning — and that radical Islamists and their fascist supporters in the Middle East are soon going to lament the day that they ever began this war.