I wish I could take some pleasure in the vindication, but I can't seem conjure any. Too many of my own boys died in, or took their own lives after, that ongoing nightmare of a war. Deep melancholy seems, for an Afghan veteran, the only appropriate response. No amount of "I-told-you-so's" will bring back the 2,440 American soldiers, and more than 30,000 Afghan civilians who've perished (so far), in that aimless, endless conflict.

What, then, can one learn from The Washington Post's recent release of the Afghanistan Papers? Perhaps this: Forever war is a bipartisan enterprise (the lies spanned three administrations) and more importantly, the time has come to stop trusting the generals – although I'm not sure we Americans ever will. The latest revelations most certainly count as the (remarkably similar) Vietnam-era, Pentagon Papers of my generation.

In 1971, there was a large, active antiwar movement in the streets, and Daniel Ellsberg's leaked documents enflamed it. Today, in the absence of a broad military draft, and with President Trump's impeachment-as-entertainment hearings dominating the media, I doubt the Afghanistan Papers will amount to much in the way of results.