America spent more than a decade supposedly trying to create a democratic government in South Vietnam. Even with troop levels approaching 600,000 and an armada of aircraft carriers sitting offshore, whole wings of bombers and every other firepower advantage imaginable it was all for naught.
One reason for America's humiliating failure was its indifference to the corruption that poisoned the Saigon regime, leaving it unfit to govern and alienating its people. Washington took its eye off the ball and instead focused its attention and energies on building a South Vietnamese army and fighting an unwinnable war. Does that sound familiar?
Afghanistan is a country in need of security but it also has a mortal need for legitimate, honest government and a viable economy. Instead we've got Hamid Karzai and his gang of villains and a state increasingly dependent on a narco-economy.
Given their ridiculously meagre resources, our soldiers are doing a great job over there. It may not be nearly enough but they're certainly doing more than anyone could expect of them. Yet all their devotion and effort and sacrifice may be for naught if we don't clean up Karzai et al and implement some sort of alternate economy for his country. Six years on, just how much progress have we made on those scores? Precious little and, unfortunately, those are tasks that just get harder to accomplish the longer they drag on.
Whacking 50-odd Taliban is no measure of victory in Afghanistan. What we do with Karzai and the opium problem will be. So, when do we begin and where? Too bad we can't just start this thing all over and do it right next time. We can't.
3 comments:
South Korea anyone?
It is amazing how communist twist the truth. First Vietnam. America fought the war with both arms behinds its back. The government's goal was never to create a democracy rather it was to stop advancing communism in southeast Asia. According to the U.S. State Department at the time failure to stop a communist take over in Vietnam would lead to the fall of other countries such as Cambodia. Guess what it happened! And about 2 million people were executed by the new "communist" government.
Now Afghanistan. Opium was grown and use by the Taliban to finance their war of terror against the West (including Canada). If the U.S. pulls out now the terrorist will be back in control, women will get shot in the head for showing any part of their body and all schools and civil activities will cease. And perhaps they will attack the U.S. again. But you like when Americans die. Oh, just a final note, when we lose YOU LOSE! Hope your up on the Koran. By the way did you know that Islamics hate communist too. Especially Canadian communist.
Anon, you're genuinely delusional. I suspect you're not old enough to have any first hand recollection of the Vietnam War given how abjectly abysmal is your portrayal of those events. It wasn't the fall of Vietnam that led to the collapse of Cambodia and, if you can be bothered to read a book, it was the Vietnamese who intervened to crush the Khmer Rouge massacres. Feel free to comment and disagree but try not to do it from self-inflicted stupidity.
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