We Need an End Game For Afghanistan

Easy. Nuke the place and put no US Soldier at risk.

This will be Obama's Vietnam, his quagmire....Afghanistan is a terrible place to fight a war...especially an asynchronous war against an enemy with a sympathetic population and that is able to blend well with the general population. Obama does appear to have his head on straight in terms of taking the fight to the terrorist, rather than fighting a defensive battle here in the US. But I don't think he has the backbone needed to win the fight. Even if he did, the far-left Soros wing of the Democrat party will force him to abandon our ally after the first few hundred deaths during Obama's watch.

I think the hope of our military and administration is to build a large govt. Afghan force, which would allow us to draw down and leave. However, this is a dubious proposition due to corruption and disloyalty. In the past, when we provided arms, etc., much of it ended up in the black market.

I agree that the venture is pretty hopeless, and we must concentrate to find an end game.

This is so grim. We have to get out.

AFGHANISTAN
Look Before You Leap

President Obama has inherited a crisis in Afghanistan. "Large parts of the country, perhaps 70% of Afghan territory, are no-go areas for security forces and government officials. ... Narcotics production has coalesced into enormous tracts of poppy in Taliban-controlled areas, heroin production has spiked, government legitimacy is collapsing, food and water are critically short, the insurgency is spreading and intensifying," observed the blog Small Wars Journal. On Wednesday, suicide bombers and Taliban gunmen struck government buildings at three sites in Kabul, "killing at least 20 people and wounding 57." Security forces remained on high alert Thursday, "not only in preparation for the arrival of the envoy, Richard Holbrooke, President Obama's special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, but also because a Taliban spokesman claimed eight bombers remained at large in the city and were still 'looking for a chance.'" On Feb. 5, Defense Secretary Robert Gates announced a delay in the expected deployment of 17,000 additional troops "until after the Obama administration concludes its ongoing review of the strategy for Afghanistan." It is imperative that this interim be used to define and focus on America's key interests in the nearly eight-year U.S.-led intervention in that country.

WHAT IS THE MISSION?: In the years since a U.S.-led NATO force entered in October 2001 in order to disrupt and destroy the Taliban-hosted Al Qaeda terrorist network that had launched attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, the Taliban insurgency has slowly but steadily regained steam. Violence is up 543 percent since 2005, according to counterinsurgency expert David Kilcullen. This is in large part the result of the Bush administration's decision to refocus attention and resources away from Afghanistan and toward Iraq in 2003. In testimony on Jan. 27, Gates said, "There is little doubt that our greatest military challenge right now is Afghanistan," but also that the U.S. must set "realistic and limited" expectations there. Several months after the ouster of the Taliban -- and several months after then-Sen. Joseph Biden proposed a plan along the same lines -- President Bush promised a Marshall Plan for Afghanistan. "Half a decade later, that vow remains unmet." While the Bush administration originally trumpeted its goal of a modern Afghan democracy, the current crisis suggests that the more realistic goal is simply one of a functioning state that neither provides a safe haven for terrorists, nor terrorizes its own people. Speaking of the recent attacks in Kabul, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said it "hardens our resolve to get the next steps in Afghanistan right." He added that it was it "imperative that we get the review process done correctly."

LOSING THE POPULATION: A recent poll showed that "only eighteen percent of Afghans think the U.S. decision to send more troops to the country is a good idea; forty-four percent want fewer troops." Many Afghans believe "that U.S. military action has not and will not improve the security of Afghan civilians. The Taliban remain unpopular -- more unpopular than the United States -- but the gap is closing, and larger numbers of Afghans now see the Taliban as 'more moderate' than in the past." Civilian casualties caused by NATO air strikes, another consequence of the lack of troops on the ground, "were described as unacceptable by almost eighty per cent of those surveyed." Many Afghans also see their own corrupt government as even more predatory than the Taliban. According to Sarah Chayes, a former journalist who for the last seven years has helped run an economic collective in Kandahar, every citizen interaction with the Afghan government "involves some form of shakedown." Official corruption is so bad, Chayes said, that many women in her collective have told her that they would prefer living under the Taliban. Delivering a threat assessment on Feb. 12, Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair concurred with this view, stating that corruption in Kabul and throughout the country had bolstered support for the Taliban and warlords.

AN AFGHANISTAN-PAKISTAN SOLUTION: It is appropriate that Holbrooke's portfolio includes both Afghanistan and Pakistan, as the situation in the former cannot be understood without regard to the equally serious challenges in the latter. DNI Blair stated in his assessment that "no improvement in Afghanistan is possible without Pakistan taking control of its border areas and improving governance. The lawless zones of instability in Pakistan's tribal belts are used as sanctuaries to undermine stability in Afghanistan. It is also important to recognize that actions in Afghanistan also have an impact on Pakistan, a country with nuclear weapons and a population more than five times greater than Afghanistan. U.S. missile strikes on suspected Al Qaeda hideouts in Pakistan, which often incur civilian casualties, have a highly negative effect on Pakistani public opinion toward their government's cooperation with the U.S. Pakistani officials have told Holbrooke "that the Obama administration should reconsider" these strikes, calling them “counterproductive." Al Qaeda's No. 2 leader, Ayman al-Zawahiri, has said he wants to destabilize the "apostate" Pakistani government. As in Afghanistan, whatever value these missile strikes may have in destroying Al Qaeda's leadership may, in the long run, be outweighed by the rage they incurred against the U.S. and its allies.

--americanprogressaction.org

It is significant that Obama just admitted that we are losing in Afghanistan. He added that the USA hopes to meet with moderate Taliban to work out an accord. Good luck!