Yesterday, General Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs, released the 2015 National Military Strategy. On the positive side, the paragraph on Iran is toughly worded. Doubtless, it required tenacity to drive it through the Obama political-review process.

On the negative side, the “strategy” is non-existent. In its place is a prolix taxonomy of bromides artlessly written to induce stupor in our enemies.

The “strategy” took 18 pages to lay out two central sentences:

1) Our National Military Objectives (NMOs) are: 1) deter and defeat state adversaries; 2) defeat VEOs (Violent Extremist Organizations) — a.k.a. Islamists to those not on the Joint Chiefs of Staff; and 3) strengthen our network of allies.

2) Our military will be capable of defeating one regional enemy, while denying the objectives of an aggressor in another region.

The gerunds “defeating” versus “denying” will require the parsing skills of hundreds of officers on senior staffs. The champion etymologists will then meet in an acronym duel between the Blue NMO Team and the VEO Red Team. Read this strategy to cure insomnia.