If Confidence Could Win Wars, McChrystal Could Declare Victory

ABC News’ Martha Raddatz reports: Projecting certainty in a war effort may always be a good thing. But in his testimony today before Congress, Gen. Stanley McChrystal exhibited confidence to a stunning degree.  Again and again McChrystal said the mission would work. He did not hedge many comments with “I believe” or “We expect to…” Instead, he went straight to full-on predictions of success: “We can and will accomplish this mission,” he said. Give that this is war,  which by definition means that things rarely go the way you want them to, and war in a country without a great record for victory, perhaps he could have taken a more cautious tone.  Remember Iraq? But Gen. McChrystal wants to motivate his troops, and let the Afghan people know he is committed to this plan. Even if he sounded a bit more like a tactical leader motivating his soldiers to take a hill, rather than a man who speaking to the Hill, he wants the takeaway from this session to be his absolute certainty that this a conflict that is worth the sacrifice.