War is not the Answer
July 15, 2008 by Fran
Barack Obama has announced his presidential plans–
Obama promises 10,000 more troops for Afghanistan
My heart sank.
The Guardian (UK) Writes:
“Barack Obama pledged to increase US troops in Afghanistan by a third if he becomes president, sending 10,000 more to reinforce the 33,000 already there.
Obama has promised, soon after becoming president in January, to begin scaling back the 156,000 US troops in Iraq and Kuwait, and to shift the focus to Afghanistan.
Obama, said today’s speech “will focus on the global strategic interests of the United States, which includes ending our misguided effort in Iraq”. He added that a gradual, phased withdrawal of US troops “will allow the US to properly address the growing threat from a resurgent al-Qaida in Afghanistan”.
Previewing his speech Obama wrote: “As president, I would pursue a new strategy and begin by providing at least two additional combat brigades to support our effort in Afghanistan. We need more troops, more helicopters, better intelligence-gathering and more non-military assistance to accomplish our mission there.”
He said that ending the war in Iraq is “essential to meeting our broader strategic goals, starting in Afghanistan and Pakistan, where the Taliban is resurgent and al-Qaida has a safe haven”.
“I continue to believe that we’re under-resourced in Afghanistan,” he said. “That is the real centre for terrorist activity that we have to deal with and deal with aggressively.”
Obama, in the New York Times article, reiterated his promise to have all US combat troops out by the summer of 2010, with a “residual” force left in place to fight al-Qaida and train Iraqi forces.
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#1- Advice to Barack– Please don’t plan new or enhanced wars before you are even in office.
#2- Using the words “accomplish our mission”– really bad. Reminiscent of one seriously flawed Bush event.
#3- If you are a political science major, you would have known the then Soviet Union spent 10 years cat & mousing it in Afghanistan, before they threw in the towel & retreated.
#4- We’ve already logged 6 years in Afghanistan & the situation now is only becoming worse.
Adding more troops to surge the problem– it’s already been done, Sir- some of us refer to it as a “quagmire”.
#5- Even your opponent McSame talked about the Whack-a-mole situation in the Middle East.
Here is the pattern- an area flares up, the US adds more troops to qwell the situation, they subside only to flare up in another place, or again back at the same place. Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, until bankruptcy occurs.
Aaauuugh!
My Ideal Presidential candidate would not be talking about more wars or shifting troops.
The latest stuff Obama is coming up with is starting to horrify me.
First FISA, now this?
This is NOT the kind of change I am looking for.
Do we want a war here- or a war there- the answer is Nowhere!
Sigh
Sphere: Related Content
We are mired in the biggest muck - quite terrifying when you think back at all the examples we’ve had about this kind of war. It’s funny, back when I was a freshman in high school, 1962, President Kennedy sent advisors to Vietnam - and there I was, a little bit of a shy, gawky teen, who only wanted to paint and write stories - I told all my friends we should not be doing that, going into Vietnam. Everyone thought I was some kind of Trotskyite. I was opposed to that war before it became a war; and I am not a pacifist - there are times when force does become necessary - fighting Germany in WWII, that was necessary. Wars of choice - such as Nam, or Iraq, or Afghanistan - those are wrong under every concievable thread of reasoning. War should not be a choice, like “should I buy this car, or a new house, or get a dog?”
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