There's a lot more to the Afghan strategy than how many troops we send
The push is on for President Barack Obama to send more troops to Afghanistan, perhaps as many as 40,000 more. Boxing in Obama was almost certainly the aim of whoever gave the Washington Post's Bob Woodward a copy of the 66-page internal memo by Gen. Stanley McChrystal, commander of U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan. Full Story »
Posted by Derek Hawkins - via Memeorandum
To me, the fundamental failure of judgment in play with this entire affair, is the assumption that the US should be far in front, leading the attack, imposing more than 100,000 American troops (and private contractors) on the country, when all evidence indicates that the Americans are increasingly being seen as "occupiers" and thus as the enemy. Why squander further hundreds of billions on this quagmire? Iran, Russia and China have ideas about how best to lower the level of violence and instability in Afghanistan. Why is the US so far out in front? The answer in part is that war is profitable, and those profiting from this war because it is American in tone and content, want the US profile as high as possible.