As a fighter pilot, Adm. Patrick Walsh amassed what you might call a Top Gun sort of service record, including stints with the Blue Angels, the Navy's elite aerial showmen, and in combat over the Middle East. Yet there was no swagger in the nuanced analysis Walsh offered of the war on terror during a speech at Dartmouth College last week. If anything, his remarks offered a sobering insight into how much must change before the war can be won.

Walsh arrived late and spoke rapidly, as if intent on recovering lost time; his remarks were accompanied by slides showing such military concerns as sea lanes, choke points, zones of command -- and such unexpected material as the age and religious makeup of populations in the Middle East and Pacific. Why? “If anything,” Walsh told his audience of about 50, “what we've learned in the past seven years is the limits of military power.”

Walsh did not mince words when describing the terrorists American forces face: They are, he said, people who believe that Islam is under attack, that peaceful co-existence with those of different views is not possible, that violence is the only solution and that they are working directly for God in what amounts to unrestricted, unlimited warfare.

It's a conflict, Walsh said, that pits moderation against extremism. “We see this as an area of prolonged conflict,” he said. “What's at stake is who we are.”

The potential for conflict is not limited to the Middle East -- the largest Muslim population in the world, Walsh noted, lives in Indonesia -- but it is focused in the Middle East. There, Walsh said, 35 percent of the population is under 15, and many nations have only emerged from colonial control within the past 60 years. “Where were we in 1830?” Walsh said.

What's more, Walsh said, these are nations where religious and not secular impulses drive behavior, where Western influence and involvement are often seen as threats to their own culture -- creating a vast gap in perception. Winning a conflict in this setting isn't only about destroying the enemy's capacity to fight, Walsh said, but also about building new understandings and relationships. “We must know hearts and minds before we can win them,” Walsh said -- and that, in part, requires changes in traditional American military attitudes toward the sharing of information and responsibility.

Walsh related the experience of working with a Pakistani admiral during a stint in command in the Middle East. The United States and Pakistan do not share strategic priorities, Walsh said, and the Pakistani navy offers little in the way of might. But when the Pakistani was placed in command of a naval task force, Walsh said, the Saudis and other hitherto reluctant participants immediately responded by contributing forces. A Pakistani commander, they indicated, would understand their interests in a way Americans did not. “It was just a fascinating world that we walked into,” Walsh said.

A fascinating and dangerous world. From a military standpoint, Walsh said, the challenge amounts to nothing less than equipping the Navy for “for a future that is very hard to imagine.” A dutiful sailor, he made a pitch for more resources than the Obama administration proposes to deliver; the sea covers 70 percent of the Earth's surface, Walsh said, and the demand for naval power isn't going down. But above all, this pilot left us with the message that ships and missiles alone cannot bring the conflict to an end.

There was nothing pessimistic in Walsh's tone, so we expect he believes that the end will someday come. That said, the end is certainly not yet in sight.