New troops will turn tide on Taliban: U.S. military

[Eugene]

Source: Reuters

New troops will turn tide on Taliban: U.S. military
Sun Apr 5, 2009 9:58am EDT

By Jon Hemming

KABUL (Reuters) - The top U.S. military officer said
on Sunday extra troops being sent to Afghanistan this year
would start to turn the tide against the Taliban-led
insurgency that has been gaining ground for three years.

The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mike
Mullen, was visiting Kabul with U.S. special envoy Richard
Holbrooke a day after NATO agreed to boost troop numbers
before Afghanistan's presidential election in August.

NATO leaders agreed at a summit on Saturday to deploy
3,000 more troops to help provide security for the August
20 election, the key test of U.S. success in a mission
that President Barack Obama has made a centerpiece of
his foreign policy.

The NATO reinforcements will be on top of 17,000 extra
U.S. troops due in the country by July and 4,000 American
soldiers due to arrive before September to train Afghan
forces. They will join about 70,000 international troops
already in Afghanistan.

"I am convinced that the additional military capability
will certainly start to allow us to turn the tide," Mullen
told a news conference alongside Holbrooke. Most
of the new troops will be sent to the south, the
heartland of Taliban support.

-snip-

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSTRE5341UA20090405

[BobRossi]

1. For how long?

Will the Taliban mind-set just one day go away? Not likely.

[Democracyinkind]

2. NATO has quite a different opinion, as long as

...they're not talking to the press.
There is a wide consensus of mission failed, time to go home.
Just count the times the term "Soviet Experience" starts popping up.

And really, check Wikileaks for NATOS 2008/2009 assessment of the state of Afghan affairs.
It's hardly optimistic.

[bemildred]

3. "I see light at the end of the tunnel!".

"We've turned the corner!"

[ConcernedCanuk]

4. It worked so well for the Soviet Union . . - oh wait . . . .

.
.
.

Whatever happened to that nation called the Soviet Union?

hmmmmmm

:freak:

[soryang]

5. Accounts of combat in Afghanistan read like the Vietnam classic

John Paul Vann and the American Experience in Vietnam. Don't expect success in a military sense. What is being sought here is military contractor profits.