Senate Democrats leave Kabul still wary of U.S. troop surge

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Source: mcclatchy

KABUL, Afghanistan — On the first visit to Afghanistan by Senate Democrats since President Barack Obama's decision to send more than 30,000 additional U.S. troops to Afghanistan , Carl Levin of Michigan and Al Franken of Minnesota Wednesday reported signs of progress and expressed optimism that a Taliban takeover of the U.S.-backed government can be averted.

Unlike two much larger Republican delegations that visited last week, however, neither Levin nor Franken endorsed Obama's troop surge, and Levin, who chairs the Senate Armed Services Committee , said he'd have done things differently.

"It's a reasonable decision, though not one that I would have made," he said, adding that he favored sending additional troops to train and support Afghan forces, but not for combat. Still, he said that he expected Democrats would back Obama when he comes to request a supplemental appropriation to pay for the rising cost of the Afghan war.

A new United Nations report on civilian casualties Wednesday painted a stark picture of the fighting, and put the onus on the Taliban for a 14 percent rise in civilian deaths. Of the 2,412 civilians killed last year, the U.N. attributed 70 percent to the Taliban , and 25 percent to the U.S.-led coalition and Afghan security forces


Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/mcclatchy/20100113/wl_mcclatchy/3399381

[pjt7]

1. Isn't it Ironic that Sen. Levin is the Congressional leader in giving

the military so many $$$Billions to fight these Nation-Building Wars & his own state (MI)is the worst off, in the entire Nation.

Amazing.