THE WHITE HOUSE — The man who once wrote a book highly critical of policymakers who escalated an unwinnable war in Vietnam is urging escalation in an unwinnable war in Afghanistan, sources confirmed today.

Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster, whose PhD thesis castigated the Joint Chiefs of Staff for their "dereliction of duty" during the Vietnam War, has laid out a plan to send thousands of additional troops to fight in Afghanistan.

McMaster, who rose through the ranks as an unconventional military thinker, dismissed comparisons to the Vietnam War, in which the US military tried to prop up the failing Diem regime amidst an insurgency sponsored by North Vietnam, and the war in Afghanistan, in which the US government is supporting the faltering government in Kabul against a Pakistan-sponsored insurgency.