With respect to your editorial "NATO's Afghan Failure" (Feb. 1): NATO is an anachronism. It was created to protect Europe from the Soviet Union and had its heyday in an age when European countries lay decimated after World War II; an age when America was the unquestioned leader of the trans-Atlantic alliance.

The Soviet Union imploded years ago, and over the last 50 years European countries have created a new and integrated European Union that is, arguably, our generation's most successful political enterprise. European states...