When you've held a conversation with a man, briefed him on his mission, his objective and reminded him of the potential consequences during the actioning of it, only to hear he never returned, and did not die gracefully, though blessedly quickly, prayerfully painlessly... you do not breathe the same ever after.

NPR: Sergeant Sorts Through War's Chaos in Letter Home

The commander of the British troops, Brigadier Barney White-Spunner, said the mission had a clear objective and a finite duration.

BBC: More troops leave for Macedonia

The global objective of the mission was to assist the Ministry of Culture and Fine Arts (MoCFA) to prepare the grounds for the development of the cultural sector and to finalize its draft of the Cultural Policy in Cambodia.

UNESCO: OFFICE IN PHNOM PENH

He developed a strategy that made clear that our number-one priority, the reason why we are in Afghanistan, is because of al Qaeda, and that our number-one objective for our mission in Afghanistan is to disrupt, dismantle, and ultimately defeat al Qaeda, and that all other objectives that are secondary to that help support the primary objective.

WHITEHOUSE: Press Briefing

Again, the noose -- if I would just make the clear point that it is not the military objective of the NATO mission authorized by U.N.

WHITEHOUSE: Press Briefing

The air lock installation is the primary objective of the Atlantis mission, with the two-room chamber allowing space station crews to venture from the station in NASA spacesuits without the assistance of visiting shuttles.

CNN: Air lock installed on space station