sitting on one side of the large coffee table, with Dillon, Ferguson and Miller on the other. There was coffee available on a sideboard and they had all helped themselves at the President's invitation.Ferguson sipped some of his coffee. 'Trying times, Mr President.''Afghanistan troubles me greatly. The casualties mount relentlessly, yet we can't just abandon them,' the President said.'I agree,' Ferguson told him.The President glanced at Blake. 'What were those Vietnam statistics again?''At its worst, four hundred dead a week and four times as many wounded,' Blake told him.'Two thousand casualties a week.' Miller shook his head. 'It wasn't sustainable.''Which was why we got out,' the President said. 'But what the hell do we do now? We have a large international army, excellent military personnel, backed up by air support and missiles. It should be no contest, and yet…'Harry Miller put in, 'There's precedent, Mr President. During the Eighteen-forties, at the height of its Empire, Britain sent an army of sixteen and a half thousand into Afghanistan to take Kabul. Only one man returned with his life, a regimental doctor. I've always believed the Afghans were sending a message by allowing him to live.''My God,' the President said softly. 'I never heard that story.''To Afghans, family comes first, and then the tribe,' Miller told him. 'But they will always fight together to defend Afghanistan itself against an invader.''And that's us,' Dillon put in. 'And they don't like it. And now even young men of Afghan extraction who were born in Britain end up joining the fight.'The President turned to Ferguson. 'That's what was in your report. Tell me more.'Ferguson said, 'Are you familiar with Major Giles Roper, a member of my staff in
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