And now Republicans are taking up the mantra: "Afghanistan is Obama's war !!"
Well, yes, in one sense that is true. He has been Commander in Chief for 18 months, he called it "the necessary war" (in contrast to that other, unnecessary one), and his surge of troop levels there is still in the build-up stage.
But more and more people from the middle and the right are joining those on the left who opposed continuing it. Michael Steele's remarks got him in trouble, but he said what a lot of his own party members are saying.
From a different part of the political spectrum, Fareed Zakaria is calling it "disproportionate." Referring to CIA chief Leon Panetta's comment that the number of Taliban in Afghanistan may be down to as few as 50 to 100, he said on CNN yesterday:
If Al Qaeda is down to 100 men there at the most, why are we fighting a major war?. . . Last month alone there were more than 100 NATO troops killed in Afghanistan. That's more than one allied death for each living Al Qaeda member in the country in just one month. . .
Why are we investing so much time, energy, and effort when Al Qaeda is so weak? Is there a more cost-effective way to keep Al Qaeda on the ropes than fight a major land and air war in Afghanistan? I hope someone in Washington is thinking about this and not simply saying we're going to stay the course because, well, we must stay the course.
Good questions to be asking. I'm sure there are better answers than simply "because . . ." But it does seem that we're heading for a quagmire, not unlike Viet Nam. It's not oil this time, like in Iraq, although the recent publicity about the mineral mining possibilities puts the greed issue back on the table.
My hunch is that the Obama administration would like nothing better than to get out and concentrate on our huge domestic problems. But I think it's fair to say that it would have been political suicide for Obama to walk away from Afghanistan. Those same Republicans who are hanging it around his neck now would be whooping it up and condemning him for cowardice and weakness if he had even hinted at wanting to end it short of total victory.
I think one simple answer to the "disproportionate" argument is that few Taliban are there now because they simply moved over into Pakistan. If we left, they would just return and set up their training camps and intimidate the people again.
The one glimmer of hope -- short of some sudden miraculous victory -- is that Petraeus is held in such high regard across the political spectrum that he might be the one person who could conclude that we had done all we can, that we're now doing more harm than good, and that we should leave.
Ralph
Actually, oil may be in the mix in Afghanistan. Karzai was a Texas oilman, if I remember correctly, before Bush installed him, and the word was the US wanted his help to build a pipeline to the Caspian Seas because we were afraid the Russians were going to get the oil deposits there.
ReplyDeleteAfghanistan is an unwinnable mess and everybody knows it. Karzai is corrupt, his brother a drug lord. The Afghan Army has like a 50% attrition rate and is riddled with drug abusers. The illiteracy rate is enormous in that country. And we are trying to nation-build, without having a viable government to build around
Something else to keep an eye on ,too, is where we might be headed vis a vis North Korea. We have a troop build-up in Guam, and Special Forces are now based in Laos. If you look at a map, those dots seem to be a bit disturbing.
richard
Aristotle said that when struggling with the "horns of a dilemma," the solution is to go "between the horns." This post lays out our dilemma clearly. So what does "go between the horns" mean? A synonym for "the horns of a dilemma" is "an impossible situation." At least in psychological theory, the correct response to a double bind [another synonym] is to talk endlessly about the impossibility and how it came to be. In these cases [Bush's Axis of Evil], the problem is that there's no World power big enough. Unfortunately, the Bush Doctrine weakened the only candidate - the UN. It seems to me that going "between the horns" means to strengthen and support the UN, instead of trying to act like the US/UK is the alternative. Had we done that diligently in dealing with Iraq, we might still be foiling with Hussein, but at least we would have correctly positioned the UN to move a little closer to being "what the world needs now."
ReplyDeleteJust a thought...
I responded earlier, but blogspot ate my reponse. So here goes a second try.
ReplyDeleteThis post lays out Obama's double bind in Afghanistan quite clearly. He's on the "horns of a dilemma" in Aristotles way of describing things1 "Double Bind," "Horns of a Dilemma," "Impossible Situation" are all synonyms for the stuff of insanity. Aristotle suggested "going between the horns" - meaning to find some course of action that takes neither path - to do something new. Psychologists who study double binds suggest talking endlessly about the impossible-ness until some reframing of the problem offers a way out.
In the case of Afghanistan and Iraq, we can't leave and we can't stay. The bozos who got us there didn't give much thought to that problem. They took one horn and left us on the other to be gored. What they should have done was work diligently on strengthening and empowering the UN - which is the only current candidate for a world power capable of managing this kind of mess. Instead, they purported to replace the UN with the US [UK]. Didn't work. Seems like our best course would be to eat humble crow, and get back to supporting and strengthening the UN rather that denigrating it. While I'm sure it would be frustrating and perhaps humiliating, it would be both something new, and would reframe the problem more helpfully....
oh look! responding again made my first comment get uneaten!
ReplyDeleteAnd of course the big problem is that if Obama did what you say -- ate humble crow and boosted the UN, we would never hear the end of the crazies calling him names: appeaser, weak, hates America, surrendering to our enemies. I wouldn't even be surprised if they tried to impeach him.
ReplyDeleteThat doesn't make them right -- but I don't know that he could survive politically. The American people would rather follow Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, and the clowns in Congress than to listen to the truth.