Petraeus on Counterterrorism/insurgency

General David Petraeus gave a speech in London last night outlining the challenges in of the fight in Afghanistan, and the necessity of meeting those challenges. I think that this quote gets at a very central issue in a concise and clever way:

"But the core of any counterinsurgency strategy must focus on the fact that the decisive terrain is the human terrain, not the high ground or the river crossing."

I love that quote. Traditional combat operations are necessary to get a foothold, but the real battle that needs to be won is stabilizing the region that you are in so that the local population is not reliant on, or in fear of, terrorist organizations.