Yes, "sleep in a hole," was essentially the response of Gen. James Conway, commandant of the United States Marine Corps, when I asked him Tuesday afternoon whether the he has enough "infrastructure'' to feed and house the 20,000 Marines who will be in southern Afghanistan by early summer.

"We do not,'' Conway said.

He went on to say that Marines can live comfortably in what to other people looks like a moonscape. Just recently, Conway visited a Marine in Helmand Province who was sleeping in a hole in the ground – "below the shrapnel line,'' Conway assured me.

"And he was perfectly happy,'' the commandant added with a straight face.