What might have been at Tora Bora

It changed the course of the war in Afghanistan. The most wanted man in the world, the reason those poor souls jumped from the high floors of the twin towers, the man whose capture was an integral part of the point and mission of the war was allowed to . . . disappear. The American presence descended into a muddle of shifting strategies, unclear purpose and annual reviews. The guiding military wisdom in Washington—that too many troops might stir up anti-American sentiment and resistance—was defied by the facts of Tora Bora. The unwillingness to be supple, respond to circumstances and deploy the troops to get bin Laden “paved the way for exactly what we hoped to avoid—a protracted insurgency.”

Why didn’t Washington move and get him? Maybe it was simply a mistake—“the fog of war.” Maybe leaders were distracted by Iraq. Maybe it was a lack of imagination: They didn’t know what it would mean to people, their own people, to get the bastard. And maybe this: Maybe they consciously or unconsciously knew that if they got the guy who did 9/11, killed him or brought him to justice, that would leave a lot of Americans satisfied that justice had been done. That might take some steam out of the Iraq push. Maybe they concluded it would be better not to get him, or not right away…

But what if we’d gotten Tora Bora right? Think of what might have followed. Bin Laden and his lieutenants captured or dead, an insult answered. Maybe a few more months in Afghanistan for America while the bad guys were fully, truly broken. Then—time for some historical romance—a message is delivered by a U.S. general, the last general in Afghanistan, who puts the last boot on the last helicopter. “Months ago you wounded a great nation. Your government of mad imbeciles has been removed. Fortresses have been reduced to rubble, your Taliban killed, al Qaeda expunged. Our mission complete, we will now leave. Let me give you some advice: Don’t make us come back. It will be so much worse when we do.”