Additional troops in Afghanistan should be about shifting strategy, not expanding war

[ProSense]

Afghan Conflict Will Be Reviewed

Obama Sees Troops As Buying Time, Not Turning Tide

By Karen DeYoung
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, January 13, 2009; A01

President-elect Barack Obama intends to sign off on Pentagon plans to send up to 30,000 more U.S. troops to Afghanistan, but the incoming administration does not anticipate that the Iraq-like "surge" of forces will significantly change the direction of a conflict that has steadily deteriorated over the past seven years.

Instead, Obama's national security team expects that the new deployments, which will nearly double the current U.S. force of 32,000 (alongside an equal number of non-U.S. NATO troops), will help buy enough time for the new administration to reappraise the entire Afghanistan war effort and develop a comprehensive new strategy for what Obama has called the "central front on terror."

With conditions on the ground worsening by nearly every yardstick last year -- including record levels of extremist attacks and U.S. casualties, and the expansion of the conflict across Pakistan and into India -- Obama's campaign pledge to "finish the job" in Afghanistan with more troops, money and diplomacy has encountered the daunting reality of a job that has barely begun.

Since the November election, Obama has been flooded with dire assessments of the war. A National Intelligence Estimate warned that a reconstituted al-Qaeda leadership, dug into the mountains along the Afghan-Pakistani border, continues to plan attacks against the United States and Europe. The Bush White House delivered a major review of Afghanistan last month that echoed that judgment, acknowledged that a modern Afghan democracy -- stable and free of extremists -- may be both unattainable and unaffordable, and said that the United States may have to accept trade-offs among priorities.

more

Biden on Face the Nation:

"What's happened is that because of - 'neglect' may be the wrong word, but failure to provide sufficient resources, economic, political and military, as well as failure to get a coherent policy among our allies, economically and politically, and in terms of the military resources, the situation has deteriorated a great deal. The Taliban is in effective control of significant parts of the country they were not before, number one.

"Number two, 95% roughly of the world's opium and heroin comes out of that country," said Biden, who added that corruption within the country's police and national police forces is rife. "Some of our allies who have committed to train these troops did not do them well.

"So the bottom line here is, we've inherited a real mess. We're about to go in and try to essentially reclaim territory that's been effectively lost. … There are going to be some additional military forces. There are going to be additional efforts to train their police and to train their Afghan army. And all of that means we're going to be engaging the enemy more now."

"So should we expect more American casualties?" Schieffer asked.

"I hate so say it, but yes, I think there will be. There will be an up-tick."

The focus has to be on counter-insurgency, not war.

From an op-ed on Pakistan by Senator Kerry:

It has become conventional wisdom that the war in Afghanistan can be lost in Pakistan, whose tribal belt offers a sanctuary from which Taliban insurgents launch cross-border raids against us and our Afghan allies. What is often overlooked, however, is that the opposite is true as well: Violent instability in Afghanistan can undercut essential counterinsurgency efforts in Pakistan.

We saw brutal evidence of this in the recent attack on the Pakistani Frontier Corps by militants operating from clandestine bases across the border inside Afghanistan. Pakistan's success in exerting control over its tribal areas depends on U.S. and NATO forces getting the resources they need to accomplish their mission on the Afghan side of the border.

<...>

While there is an increasingly broad consensus that Pakistan is the strategic center of gravity for defeating insurgents in Afghanistan, a military strategy alone cannot prevail on either side of the border. An effective counter-insurgency must address longer-term political, economic, and development challenges, especially in Pakistan's Federally Administered Tribal Areas and the Northwest Frontier Province on the Afghan border.

[Runcible Spoon]

1. I think US citizens are getting BOOGEYMAN! fatigue.

Obama had better learn this quickly before he commits any more resources to this quagmire, or else he will expend all his goodwill and political capital continuing Bush's mistakes.

Al Qaeda is scarcely a threat to the US; it pales in comparison to the looming economic crash. We need every dollar HERE.

[LakeSamish706]

2. Your absolutely bang on..... Sure would love to see them pull out of there, now. n/t

[ProSense]

4. Bush created enough bogeymen to last a lifetime. We also don't need

complacency, which is where this all started (when Bush ignored the August 6, 2001 PDB).

[leftstreet]

3. When the Afghanis Stand Up, We will Stand Down! er...uh...no, wait.....

that sounds familiar...

[ProSense]

5. Rational people

know that a few months is ample time to regroup, not a few years or decades.

[Fire1]

6. Too funny and true! lol

[Life Long Dem]

7. We need troops!!! Can Obama can do some recruiting?

Without a draft, I think Obama would be a big inspiration to young men and women to serve our country and enlist. Over Bush, there is no doubt of that and I don't think it It would hurt if Obama offered more of an incentive to enlist. Money is another problem, but if your going to throw money at the problem, then invest some of it in recruiting.

And make it so this enlistment cannot be taken advantage of to support more of the same(wars) by the warmongers and we know who they are. One is named John McCain and he already mentioned he will be opposing the stimulus package. So much for him wanting to shut down the campaign election to act quickly for this crisis.

This is a suggestion that would be nearly an impossibility to happen under the Bush administration but could be a possibility under the Obama administration. We saw how popular Obama is with all the crowds. How many at the inauguration? And we are having problems coming up with 30,000 troops?