gather information in and report from the US.

Sadly, neither is the western press neutral, although West writes that it tries to be. But, its institutional hostility to US Iraq policy disposes it to report the negative ignoring the positive. In Fallujah, the press focused on military deaths and injuries exclusively as tragedies and played up instances of misconduct rather than bravery; the Marine shooting of a wounded insurgent in a Mosque was the most televised image of the Fallujah campaign, not the uncounted acts of heroism, efforts to save civilian lives and property nor the depredations of the Iraqi insurgents and their Islamicist supporters.

As if to make the point, the Washington Post on October 27, 2005 ran a long story by a reporter allowed inside insurgent controlled villages north of Baghdad and accompanied by an insurgent leader. Does anyone suppose that the Iraqi insurgency expected anything but the message they wanted to convey to the newspaper's readers to come out of the reporter's trip? Does anyone further suppose that embedding this reporter with a US Marine battalion in Fallujah would have produced the same result?

Because of this, West laments that US troops in Iraq - while fully deserving the title - will probably never receive the "Greatest Generation" accolades like their World War II forebears.

Finally, West's narrative reminds us of the kind of war this is. Like it or not, the mosque and clerics who preach there every Friday are central to the Iraqi insurgency. Their sermons command the attention and drive the spirit of the Iraqi people. When they are anti-American either out of religious conviction or for material gain -- and there is much of the latter -- the insurgency is greatly animated.

At bottom, this war is nasty, deadly business; no quarter asked, none given. Building a political structure in Iraq supported by a viable economy certainly is essential to US success, and will animate much of the rest of the Middle East, however strong the countervailing influence of anti-western Islamicists and the likes of Al Jazeera.

But for now, this war must be fought by -- and will be won or lost by - the sword.

It is a war only for the tough, courageous and dedicated -- Bing West's Greatest Generation.