“The 30,000 additional troops that I am announcing tonight will deploy in the first part of 2010 – the fastest pace possible – so that they can target the insurgency and secure key population centers. They will increase our ability to train competent Afghan Security Forces, and to partner with them so that more Afghans can get into the fight. And they will help create the conditions for the United States to transfer responsibility to the Afghans.”Remember, if the surge or the giant shadow army of contractors bothers you and causes your blood pressure to rise, there's always "Surprised Kitty." I fear that I may be watching a lot of Surprised Kitty tonight...
“Because this is an international effort, I have asked that our commitment be joined by contributions from our allies. Some have already provided additional troops, and we are confident that there will be further contributions in the days and weeks ahead. Our friends have fought and bled and died alongside us in Afghanistan. Now, we must come together to end this war successfully. For what’s at stake is not simply a test of NATO’s credibility – what’s at stake is the security of our Allies, and the common security of the world.”
“Taken together, these additional American and international troops will allow us to accelerate handing over responsibility to Afghan forces, and allow us to begin the transfer of our forces out of Afghanistan in July of 2011. Just as we have done in Iraq, we will execute this transition responsibly, taking into account conditions on the ground. We will continue to advise and assist Afghanistan’s Security Forces to ensure that they can succeed over the long haul. But it will be clear to the Afghan government – and, more importantly, to the Afghan people – that they will ultimately be responsible for their own country.”
.
8 comments:
"...and allow us to begin the transfer of our forces out of Afghanistan in July of 2011."
Wonderful... just 'effin wonderful.
The Taliban can go on vacation until July 2011... that's only ~18 months from now.. they've been there for who knows how many years... 18 months is nothing.
Barack Hussein Obama is showing his true colors... certain parts of Afghanistan should be turned into a parking lot.. yeah, there might be some civilian casualties, but that's the cost of eradicating the Taliban.
This is the beginning of the end for the great experiment called the Obama Administration.
In a desert shit hole in which not much has changed for decades, where "warlord" is is a term still used without a bit of irony, where corruption rules, where opium is the main export...our President thinks he can turn things around in a couple of years? What is he smoking?
This is nothing but pure political calculus...and it leaves my head spinning. Let's see, what happens in 2012? Is their an election that year?
Christ, if GWB had done this, we Progressives would have been reaming him a new one! It's time to do the same with Obama! This is simply a terrible, terrible mistake! Congress dissembles about helping out of work Americans, but we can spend how many more billions on this failed strategy?
WTF!
cm: Afghans have waited out foreigners for centuries. Do you think that they thought that we would stay forever?
Clyde: Obama, and Kerry before him, as well as every just about every other Democrat with presidential aspirations (Kucinich the exception) criticized Iraq by saying that the money and blood invested in Iraq should have gone to Afghanistan, since that was where bin Laden and Queda were, and an actual threat to America was.
Like it or not, Obama could not just walk away from the place. All we can do is hope this works.
It seems President Obama is damn if he do and damn if he don't.President Bush is the one who backed away from Afghanistan and decided to start a war in Iraq for oil money.Now President Obama has to clean up his mess.
You rightwing haters can't have it both ways.
Why don't you rightwingers just put your real cards on the table and stop pussy footing around with why you hate our President.
If it is another 5th grade mental president you want then go to work and get sister sarah elected.
CM, did the Taliban attack us? Absolutely they sheltered Osama Bin Laden, except it appeared they were willing, under certain conditions, to give him up back in September 2001. Except that George Bush had to "show his true colors" and refuse to do more than a token negotiation before invading and then losing Bin Laden at Tora Bora.
I think that Afghanistan is actually very complicated. The people have been at war or under a repressive government since the late seventies, but really they have not been at peace since the British wandered through or maybe ever. I would like to think that they might think that we really want to help them, that we are different than the Soviets or the Taliban. But another part of the problem is that the Taliban is already staying over the border in Pakistan, and can continue to do so indefinitely. Even if we were inclined to turn pieces of land into a "parking lot" (such a cold blooded metaphor for mass murder), we can't do that in Pakistan, our ostensible ally.
Conservative Mountaineer is showing the worst kind of "American Exceptionalism". He wants to help the Afghani's by killing huge numbers of them, to get at a few Taliban. When the Soviets slaughtered Afghani’s, at least they were honest about just wanting obedience. Under CM’s plan, we would be killing Afghani’s to save them for democracy. A pretty good way to get the Afghani’s to hate democracy and the United States, and embrace the Taliban because at least they are fellow Muslims.
Meanwhile, I would say the President’s plan (what I have heard of it) has maybe a fifty fifty chance of succeeding. As I said, the Taliban can hide in Pakistan for some time, and it seems unlikely the Pakistani’s will be able to dislodge them. Although we have tried to help the Afghani’s, we have also had incidents of collateral damage, and reticent to take responsibility. And even if we are trying to help them, we are planning to leave in a year and a half. And even if we defeat the Taliban militarily, by our own rules, they could be elected the next year to local or national government (like Hamas by the Palestinians). Of course, one way of looking at things is that the Taliban becoming democratic might be a sort of victory for us. The trick would be keeping Afghanistan democratic.
A simple message and act for Democrats, Independents, and Republicans who want to express their opposition to more war:
pick up a voter registration form and change your registration to
Green Party...the peace party.
Note well: we will BEGIN the transfer of our forces out of the country in 18 months. So the beginning is on the critical path, not the end - if, that's any comfort to McCain et al. who were quick to speak soft words of encouragement, but hollow objections to "time tables."
My favorite line in the speech is when he made clear that the nation he's most interested in build is our own. That was nice.
The timeline criticism is ridiculous.
It's a plan that the generals have signed off on.
Post a Comment