Recent op-ed piece in the Guardian by Simon Jenkins is worth a read. Here's an except:
"Obama and Cameron have let themselves become trapped in a lethal military embrace, one that has failed to deliver peace in Iraq or security in Afghanistan. It has destabilised Pakistan and spread al-Qaida's influence. It has killed hundreds of thousands of people to no one's obvious benefit, and cost billions of dollars that would have been better deployed on peace and reconstruction. Today, London and Washington are fortress cities through which their statesmen must travel like frightened rabbits, like Obama during his London visit.
"This was the legacy of Bush and Blair and it is the most barren in recent history. Yet it holds those successors in thrall. Neither has shown a capacity to disengage from the drums and trumpets of warin favour of a more subtle and more productive diplomacy. Until they do, any hope that the west's leadership might gain traction in the Muslim world is futile."
For full story go to Addicted to War.
I hope the president gets us out of Afghanistan asap, though I suspect that electoral politics will make it unlikely before 2013. But I think it's true that continued operations in Afghanistan serve little purpose other than draining the treasury and the veins of our soldiers. In purely Machiavellian terms, the public appears to have turned decidedly and permanently against this enterprise, and they're not likely to buy any new line of justification for it. It's time to wrap things up and leave in something like good order.
ReplyDeleteAnd he seemed to be saying exactly that today in London.
ReplyDeleteIn all the talk about budget deficits in during the preceding months, the entire focus of the "problem" was on entitlement programs; I don't recall anyone EVER mentioning the continued occupation and financial support for Iraq and the huge expenditures (wasted) in Afghanistan.
ReplyDeleteThis is likely because Conservative ideology is consistently pro-war and anti-entitlement.