Warrior Diplomat : a green Beret's Battles from Washington to Afghanistan / Michael G. Waltz ; foreword by Peter Bergen

Includes bibliographical references and index

State of the war : office of the Secretary of Defense -- Arabs, Afghans, and Americans : the war of ideas -- The Tagab Valley : patrolling to ambush -- The clinic in Achin: development dilemmas -- The road to Musa Qala : the Taliban are back -- The French in Maruf : a pawn in a diplomatic game -- Operation Perth : war by consensus --Back to Washington : the Pentagon and the White House --The Mangal tribe : protecting people we can't access --The elder in Khost : risk aversion and the cost of inaction -- Night raid : the catch-and-release detention system -- Blackbeard rising : the Afghan National Army Commandos -- On the border with Pakistan : the rocket's red glare -- The tribes of Chamkani : the community defense initiative -- Washington again : wishing the problem away

Grappling with centuries-old feuds, defeating a shrewd insurgency, and navigating the sometimes paralyzing bureaucracy of the U.S. military are issues that prompt sleepless nights for both policy makers in Washington and soldiers at war, albeit for different reasons. Few, however, have dealt with these issues in the White House situation room and on the front line. Michael G. Waltz has done just that, working as a policy advisor to Vice President Richard B. Cheney and also serving in the mountains of Afghanistan as a Green Beret, directly implementing strategy in the field that he helped devise in Washington. In Warrior Diplomat: A Green Beret's Battles from Washington to Afghanistan Waltz shares his unique firsthand experiences, revealing the sights, sounds, emotions, and complexities involved in the war in fghanistan. Waltz also highlights the policy issues that have plagued the war effort throughout the past decade, from the drug trade, to civilian casualties, to a lack of resources in comparison to Iraq, to the overall coalition strategy. At the same time, he points out that stabilizing Afghanistan and the region remains crucial to national security and that a long-term commitment along the lines of South Korea or Germany is imperative if America is to remain secure