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Obama Throws 17,000 Troops at Afghanistan Mess
Truthdig: Drilling Beneath the Headlines —
... President Obama’s desire to escalate the war in Afghanistan, a sore spot for the progressives and anti-war folk who helped elect him, took a major step forward Tuesday, when the White House announced plans to raise troop levels in Afghanistan by 50 percent over the next few months. ...
Obama Does Something Right For A Change, Sends Troop Surge Into Afghanistan
Say Anything —
... I criticize Obama a lot (and rightfully so), so it’s actually kind of nice to praise him for once. I think he’s doing the right thing by sending more troops to Afghanistan. We invaded that country to topple a tyrannous regime just like we did in Iraq. When we invaded, we made a promise that we’d leave the country better than we found it. Again, just like in Iraq. ...
Obama is sending 17,000 more troops to Afghanistan
AMERICAblog News| A great nation deserves the truth —
... this spring and an Army Stryker Brigade and the enabling forces necessary to support them later this summer. This increase has been requested by General McKiernan and supported by Secretary Gates, the Joint Chiefs and the Commander of Central Command. General McKiernan’s request for these troops is months old, and the fact that we are going to responsibly drawdown our forces in Iraq allows us the flexibility to increase our presence in Afghanistan.And, the take from the New York Times: President Obama will send an additional 17,000 American troops to ...
Eyes and ears in Afghanistan. Or, what Al-Jazeera doesn’t report.
Southern Appeal —
With President Obama sending 17,000 new troops to Afghanistan over the coming months, this front of the War on Terror will undoubtedly be covered by all the major media outlets as the new administration puts its toe in the water of big boy foriegn policy. As much as I’d love to see Chris Matthews or David Gregory embedded with the troops, I know that their reporting might leave a little to be desired. ...
Troops Before Policy?
Swampland —
... The President's decision send 17,000 more troops to Afghanistan is troubling on several grounds:
1. We don't have a policy there yet. We don't know what the goal is--or how we're going to deal with the Pakistan part of the equation (which is where the more serious military issues lie), or the corruption of the Karzai government.
2. I assume this decision has something to do with the deteriorating situation on the ground, including the recent attacks within Kabul. It will be interesting to see how these troops are deployed.
3. This comes two ...
Sahil Kapur: Don't Let Afghanistan Become Obama's Vietnam
Politics on HuffingtonPost.com —
... President Obama has announced his plan to deploy 17,000 additional US troops to Afghanistan this year, adding to the roughly 36,000 currently active in the region. He has long ...
Tomgram: Pratap Chatterjee, Unknown Afghanistan
TomDispatch —
The signals coming from the Obama administration as a "strategic review" of Afghan policy is nearing completion this week are, to say the least, confusing. While much new thinking on the Afghan War has been promised, early leaks about the review's proposals for the next "three to five years" largely seem to promise more of the same: a heightened CIA-run drone war in the Pakistani borderlands, more U.S. military and economic aid for Pakistan (and more strong-arming of the Pakistanis to support U.S. policy in the region), more training of and an expansion of the Afghan army, and of course more U.S. forces -- the president has ...
Unknown Afghanistan
Antiwar.com Original —
T he signals coming from the Obama administration as a "strategic review" of Afghan policy is nearing completion this week are, to say the least, confusing. While much new thinking on the Afghan War has been promised, early leaks about the review's proposals for the next "three to five years" largely seem to promise more of the same: a heightened CIA-run drone war in the Pakistani borderlands, more U.S. military and economic aid for Pakistan (and more strong-arming of the Pakistanis to support U.S. policy in the region), more training of and an expansion of the Afghan army, and of course more U.S. forces the president has ...
Two Wrongs Make Another Fiasco
Commondreams.org Views —
Those of us who love F. Scott Fitzgerald must acknowledge that he did get one big thing wrong. There are second acts in American lives. (Just ask Marion Barry, or William Shatner.) The real question is whether everyone deserves a second act. Perhaps the most surreal aspect of our great Afghanistan debate is the Beltway credence given to the ravings of the unrepentant blunderers who dug us into this hole in the first place. Let's be clear: Those who demanded that America divert its troops and treasure from Afghanistan to Iraq in 2002 and 2003 - when there was no Qaeda presence in Iraq - bear responsibility for the chaos in Afghanistan that ensued. Now they ...
