Sunday, September 20, 2009

Obama on Afghanistan

From the New York Times:

“I am now going to take all this information,” he (Obama) said on ABC’s “This Week,” “and we’re going to test whatever resources we have against our strategy, which is if by sending young men and women into harm’s way, we are defeating Al Qaeda and, and that can be shown to a skeptical audience, namely me — somebody who is always asking hard questions about deploying troops, then we will do what’s required to keep the American people safe.
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Considering the fact that we are no longer fighting Al Qaeda in Afghanistan, but rather a Taliban insurgency, if we take Obama at his word we will not be sending more troops there. And we should be bringing our troops home.

I don't like the Taliban. But they are not a terrorist group. Our mission in Afghanistan has morphed from one of tracking down and capturing or killing Al Qaeda members, to a counter-insurgency role. We cannot win this fight. And in the process of losing it, we will radicalize hundreds of thousands of tribal Afghans and Pakistanis who otherwise wouldn't care one way or another about the US. On top of this, we are killing innocent people, and getting our troops killed.

It's time to end this war.

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