“War is the province of chance,” wrote the famous military philosopher, Karl von Clausewitz. “In no other sphere of human activity must such a margin be left for this intruder. It increases the uncertainty of every circumstance and deranges the course of events.”

With his speech last night, President Barack Obama entered the realm of war and chance with a very public commitment to a three-part strategy in Afghanistan.

It was a good, sensible, direct speech that explained the strategy clearly and laid out the moral imperatives behind it. As always with Obama it was extremely well-written and eloquently delivered. It raised policy matters to the level of principle and distilled universal truths from particular circumstances.

From a homeland security standpoint, it was very encouraging to hear the president acknowledge the importance of security in the homeland.

“…We cannot count on military might alone,” he said in laying out his three-part strategy in Afghanistan. “We have to invest in our homeland security, because we cannot capture or kill every violent extremist abroad. We have to improve and better coordinate our intelligence, so that we stay one step ahead of shadowy networks.”

This was an important vote of confidence in the need for US homeland security, which will likely bear an even heavier burden if, as can be expected, Al Qaeda and its allies become more desperate and attempt to bring the fight to the American homeland the way they are bringing it to mainstream Pakistan, through terror.

Presumably, this need to invest in homeland security will translate into real resources as the federal budget is refined.

As part of that commitment to homeland security, Obama recognized that, “We will have to take away the tools of mass destruction. That is why I have made it a central pillar of my foreign policy to secure loose nuclear materials from terrorists, to stop the spread of nuclear weapons and to pursue the goal of a world without them.”

Nuclear detection and interception is a critical part of the homeland security mission.

And Obama drew a direct line from the situation in Afghanistan to the security of Americans at home: “It is from [Afghanistan] that we were attacked on 9/11, and it is from here that new attacks are being plotted as I speak. This is no idle danger, no hypothetical threat. In the last few months alone, we have apprehended extremists within our borders who were sent here from the border region of Afghanistan and Pakistan to commit new acts of terror. This danger will only grow if the region slides backwards and Al Qaeda can operate with impunity.”

In explaining the connection between Afghanistan and the US homeland to the American people, the president made clear his own understanding of that connection and his appreciation for the role that homeland security plays.

Where was Napolitano?

Tangential to the speech is the question: Why was Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano not present?

If she was present at West Point she wasn’t shown on television—at least that I saw. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Defense Secretary Robert Gates were prominently shown, sitting side by side.

It is true that the speech dealt with military and political matters. But as the president made clear, homeland security is a part of this overall effort and Napolitano should have been there as a reflection of the domestic element of this strategy and the importance of the Department of Homeland Security in implementing it.

According to an advance schedule, Napolitano is scheduled to testify today about post-9/11 transportation security challenges before the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation. Presumably, she will elaborate on the measures being taken to prepare the homeland for the threats to come.

The gamble

In looking at the strategy itself, the greatest gamble is the commitment to a certain end-date: 18 months, or July 2011.

This commitment to a date certain immediately came in for criticism from Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), who otherwise vocally supported the strategy and the troop surge. It will no doubt come in for more criticism in the days to come.

The date is not going to be retracted or changed. But everyone should recognize what it does—it puts enormous pressure on the administration and the military to achieve victory conditions by that deadline.

Ostensibly the Taliban and Al Qaeda could simply sit on their haunches and wait out the time period and then topple the government of President Hamid Karzai. That’s essentially what they did with the communist government left in charge after the Soviet withdrawal in 1989. The task for allied forces, both military and civilian, is not only to strengthen the Afghan government but to so destroy Al Qaeda and the Taliban within the next 18 months that it doesn’t have the option of waiting. As always in guerrilla war, the victory condition for the occupying power is to so crush the insurgency that it has no possibility of success or hope of victory, its fighters are all killed or the survivors fall into such despair they abandon the fight.

For the guerrilla, though, victory consists of simply existing at the end of the conflict, the occupier having exhausted himself.

Clearly, in the weeks of deliberation Obama weighed these possibilities. Already in the midst of a domestic political healthcare fight that has seen several deadlines come and go, he has an appreciation of the dangers of setting a deadline.

To his credit Obama addressed these criticisms head on. He rejected an open-ended conflict “because it sets goals that are beyond what we can achieve at a reasonable cost and what we need to achieve to secure our interests. Furthermore, the absence of a time frame for transition would deny us any sense of urgency in working with the Afghan government.”

He and the Afghan government will certainly have their sense of urgency.

Clausewitz was not the only military leader to acknowledge the role of chance in warfare. Julius Caesar famously said that “Fortune, which has a great deal of power in other matters but especially in war, can bring about great changes in a situation through very slight forces.”

When examined in light of the challenge, the 30,000 additional American forces that Obama is sending to Afghanistan can be considered “very slight forces.”

But at least we can feel relatively confident that the risks have been weighed and the situation and the strategy thought through. The decision has been taken and announced to the world.

And as Caesar also famously said: “The die is cast.”