Barack Obama is going to order another 34,000 American soldiers sent to Afghanistan. It seems he's also passing the hat around NATO trying to scrounge up additional troops.
It seems that Afghanistan is president Obama's baby now but the important questions still haven't been answered.
Even with the 20,000 additional troops Obama quietly added since taking office, this latest top up still falls far short of what's needed to 'defeat' the metastasized insurgency. So what is he intent on achieving? What does he expect his generals to deliver? What's the next step if they don't?
Look at it this way. If your kid did his chores as well as these generals have done theirs, you'd cut off his allowance. They're already working on Year Nine and what have they got to show for it? Are they ahead militarily? No, anything but. Are they ahead politically? No, again it's worse. Is Afghanistan ahead socially or economically? No. These bemedalled pinheads have achieved virtually nothing. They haven't even held the line. The other side, the Bad Guys, has been winning while our side, Karzai and Co. (also the Bad Guys), has been rotted out through corruption and outright crime.
So, if your kid had done his chores as well as these generals have done theirs, would you be handing him a six pack and the keys to the Corvette? Is that what Obama has done? Maybe but I somehow doubt it. He made a decision but was it mainly a military decision or was it mainly a political decision? I'd bet it was a decision heavily dominated by political considerations. The military decision would've been the Corvette and six pack option. I don't think Obama is looking to channel the spirit of Lyndon Johnson.
We need to see what strings are attached to this reinforcement. I'm sure that's the question that's foremost on the mind of the Taliban leadership too which is why I wouldn't count on Obama showing his cards anytime soon. We'll get some story today but it won't be the whole story. It might not even be the real story.
What's the bottom line? The generals can drool on about a 15 or 20-year war but those same jokers never fill in the part about how they're going to win their 20-year bacchanal. Most of these guys will be in diapers by then (if The Rapture doesn't get'em first).
There has to be a bottom line and it's up to Obama to set it. If he doesn't set it, these 21st century generals never will. And that, kids, is what I think this reinforcement is all about. I think this is how Obama gets to set the bottom line. This is the "put up or shut up" moment for the Pentagon. Now it's up to them to deliver or wear the failure that is and will continue to be Afghanistan.
1 comment:
Are you saying that Obama is trying to save his own butt by playing politics with this Afghanistan thing? He is putting 30, 000 butts, sorry double that, in order to save his own butt. So that is what “survival of the fittest” means or whosoever can best adapt to the environment to survive. No matter which way you look at it, it looks pretty barbarous to me.
Post a Comment