As Taliban gain and U.S. weighs troop hike, a widow's plea to 'finish the job'

Alexandra McClintock holds her son Declan with her husband U.S. Army Sergeant First Class Matthew McCintock in this October 2015 handout photo provided May 24, 2017. Courtesy Alesandra McClintock/Handout via REUTERS

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - On a cold morning in January, Alexandra McClintock shoved her bare hands into the pockets of her black jacket and gazed at the endless rows of graves in Arlington National Cemetery, just across the Potomac River from Washington D.C.

Taking her hands out of her pockets and falling to her knees, she hugged a white marble tombstone as her sobs drowned out the bugle calls from a nearby funeral. Only the sound of her giggling one-and-a-half-year-old son, Declan, forced her to wipe away her tears and loosen her grip on the tombstone.