Time to Get Out of Afghanistan?

Link.

Found out tonight from his fiance that my good friend who is a Marine in Helmund had his vehicle hit by an IED that put him in the hospital but with only some minor damage to his leg from the shock of the blast that went off underneath his vehicle. There were two Marines in his company from Utah that died this week as well, and one of whom he was close to. His fiance is the most upbeat and cheerful person I know and it was tough for her to talk about, but he's going to be okay and he might get a purple heart.

As far as us getting out of Afghanistan, I do think we owe it to them to see how this minisurge plays out. Pakistan seems to be getting serious now, so it seems a lot depends on the Afghan leadership. And frankly it is just too soon to tell how this Helmund thing will work out.

 

BREAKING NEWS!

They caught him! The American traitor has been arrested by Pakistani authorities!

He was #3, behind Osama bin Laden and Zawahiri.

They just discovered that cave last week, and caught that major Taliban commander before that. I think we'll be catching Osama soon! and proof if he did already die.

Adam Gadahn was the American traitor, who grew up in Orange County California, Jewish heritage but raised and homeschooled by very Christian parents, who went on to join Al-Qaeda and rise to become #3, he was their PR guy and main spokesman. He was arrested by Pakistani authorities in Karachi. Now all they have to do is capture Osama and Zawahiri, and we can end the war! Gadahn was the first American to be convicted of Treason in DECADES, I think.

AQ's power is in its symbols and PR. We got the #3 guy. If we took out Zawahiri and bin Laden, sure AQ might still exist in some form, but it will be completely demoralized and defeated in spirit. Whether they planned it or not, those three have been the symbolic head. Other leaders might replace them, but I doubt they would gain the same notoriety as these three. And now there's just two. We're very, very close.

It will also allow America to leave Afghanistan with honor and a sense of Victory and Justice accomplished.

 

This is surely good news, for three reasons. While I hesitate at the thought that catching the big guys will completely cripple Al Qaeda, there are a few good things to take away from this arrest. One, and probably the most important, it seems that Pakistan has finally gotten serious about dealing with AQ people in its lawless areas which is a good thing for all of us. Second, this will boost morale for people fighting the Taliban and AQ and will bring home a good success story to keep public opinion from turning against the war effort. Third, this shows that it is hard but not impossible to catch these guys and makes me glad that Obama resisted his base's urge to cut and run. I always believed that once the U.S. set it sights solely on Afghanistan, things will start getting better.

I'm still not convinced at all that this means we will get Osama. He is allegedly surrounded by body guards who are ordered to shoot him if his capture seems likely.

 

A lot of people here seem to be under the notion that if we pull out of Afghanistan, Al Qaeda and the Taliban will simply go away. We invaded in 2001 for a reason. History often times repeats itself but if we were any wiser, we wouldn't let history repeat itself this time. If we leave Afghanistan prematurely, as we did before in 1989, the Taliban will come back to power and Al Qaeda will use the country as training camps for attacks on American and European soil as it did before.

The Taliban we are fighting now are not the same guys that simply protected Osama Bin Laden in 2001. They are now much more intertwined with Al Qaeda than ever before. If the Taliban retake the country, I guarantee you that AQ will regroup and carry out terrorist attacks against the West (not to mention the fact that they will destabilize the entire region, i.e Pakistan and Iran).

I don't want this to turn political but I think the Obama Administration needs to do a much better job on educating the American people on how important the success of Afghanistan is to not only American security but to European and Central Asian security. We can't afford to pull out and fail this time. The Afghan people have been at war for the last 30 years and we're only now making progress on convincing them that we are there to help and we have no intention of leaving them at the hands of the Taliban and the warlords. I'm glad that Obama has ordered 30,000 extra troops there and that DoD has declared Afghanistan the main effort on the War on Terror. That's what we need to get the job done and we'd been lacking that for the last 9 years.

 

The problem with that is that achieving "victory" in Afghanistan tends to be a mirage. Even if the Taliban and the many other armed groups opposing the Kabul government - al-Haqqanis' and Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, the former US ally, as the most prominent - would be seriously weakened, most of the territory they control wrestled from them, their ability to strike elsewhere more or less broken, and some of the leaders bribed to change sides, it would probably still not be a lasting "victory", but a fragile arrangement that could break down sooner than later. The same, of course, goes with a Taliban "victory"; there's no reason to think that they could achieve total victory over all their Afghan opponents, even if Pakistan would support them in the same way it supported them in the 90s. A Taliban "victory" would probably instead just mean a new phase in the Afghan civil war.

Because of this, I think that a kind of military "victory" in the fight against the Taliban is surely in the realms of possibility, but that expecting it to lead to a lasting peace, a political victory, that makes the country hostile ground for groups like al-Qaeda is probably too optimistic. One would have to get rid of all the local warlords - those whose changes of side have made any Afghan regime in the last twenty years so fragile - at the minimum to achieve that, and it doesn't seem like any side in the war is interested of doing that. On the contrary, the warlords are being courted to change sides as usual. In the end, for the war that started in 1979 to really stop, one has to either somehow re-establish the balance between Kabul and the provinces, which doesn't really lead to a strong state and society ruled by law, and economic and political progress, or just use brute force to unite the country. And that would made wading in a sea of blood.

 

Rogue 77, I agree. Of course there will never be 100% security. No country has that. Not even America. The whole point of the military campaign is to get rid of those insurgent/criminal groups and enable the Afghan Army and Afghan Police to be able to carry out the same types of operation without significant international assistance. If we can do that while helping the Afghan government connect with its people, especially in the rural areas, then we'll be in a position to exit the theater. But with that said, I don't think we'll ever completely leave. I think we ("we" as in the international community) will need to continue to support the Afghan government in certain aspects (like air lift capabilities and direct air support) for a long time. The main form of communication and resupply in the country is helicopters and if the Afghan government lost that completely, I think we'll see insurgent groups slowly start to trickle back in from Pakistan and Iran. Then we'll be back to square one.

The military campaign will be successful, there's no doubt about that. But the Afghanistan problem is so much more than a military issue. We need to help alleviate extreme poverty, lack of education, and rampant corruption in order to be truly successful.

 

We did hurt al-qadea pretty well but the problem is guys the Taliban is back and those two groups are not the only ones we are fighting. I think we are up agaisnt Hundreds of groups If not thousands of groups with different ideaolgys.

EDIT: There are two different Taliban groups that are still in Afghanistain. The Traditianal and the neo-Taliban and both are very active. Like I said earlier there are other groups in Afganistan and Pakistain all over. Keep in mind we also have Kashmir too as well as Usbekistan and Tajkistain.

All Of central Asia is in Flames with many different muslim Extremist organzitions with different Agandas. Iran is also a haven for them too.

Keep in mind those groups are fighting among each other.

 

I think it is rather telling this isn't something we aren't discussing anymore because nobody can really be sure of what to do.

My Marine friend got home this week safe and sound. Two in his company were KIA, and his vehicle had been hit by an IED. It was interesting to talk to his Marine war buddies. Unlike the Marine vet who served in Falluja (sp?) they weren't all that convinced that they were doing the Lord's work, so to speak. They had served in southern Helmund provice out in the middle of nowhere, and admitted how much corruption the Afgan forces they worked with had, and that they knew there was a lot of corruption they didn't even know about.

They didn't seem to think now was the right time to leave, but it seemed like they knew it would be sometime soon.

 

You know how we're trying to build up Afghanistan's infrastructure, building schools, getting the economy going, establishing higher literacy rates, and whatnot? Well this is what the Taliban thinks of that.

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/14/world/asia/14minerals.html?no_interstitial

The United States has discovered nearly $1 trillion in untapped mineral deposits in Afghanistan, far beyond any previously known reserves and enough to fundamentally alter the Afghan economy and perhaps the Afghan war itself, according to senior American government officials.

The previously unknown deposits ? including huge veins of iron, copper, cobalt, gold and critical industrial metals like lithium ? are so big and include so many minerals that are essential to modern industry that Afghanistan could eventually be transformed into one of the most important mining centers in the world, the United States officials believe.

An internal Pentagon memo, for example, states that Afghanistan could become the ?Saudi Arabia of lithium,? a key raw material in the manufacture of batteries for laptops and BlackBerrys.

The vast scale of Afghanistan?s mineral wealth was discovered by a small team of Pentagon officials and American geologists. The Afghan government and President Hamid Karzai were recently briefed, American officials said.

While it could take many years to develop a mining industry, the potential is so great that officials and executives in the industry believe it could attract heavy investment even before mines are profitable, providing the possibility of jobs that could distract from generations of war.

?There is stunning potential here,? Gen. David H. Petraeus, commander of the United States Central Command, said in an interview on Saturday. ?There are a lot of ifs, of course, but I think potentially it is hugely significant.?

The value of the newly discovered mineral deposits dwarfs the size of Afghanistan?s existing war-bedraggled economy, which is based largely on opium production and narcotics trafficking as well as aid from the United States and other industrialized countries. Afghanistan?s gross domestic product is only about $12 billion.

?This will become the backbone of the Afghan economy,? said Jalil Jumriany, an adviser to the Afghan minister of mines.

Woah! This is big news. I wonder how it will impact the war?

 

Wow!

Long-term, we need something to employ people besides opium production, and this seems like a great candidate. It certainly won't affect the war if we withdrawal in a couple years, but I'm still thinking we'll be there indefinitely.

 

I'm okay with sticking around there as long as it means we eventually put the Taliban down permanently. Those guys are just nastiness personified, and the last thing the world needs is them running wild so close to nuclear Pakistan.

 

To "fix" the Taliban -- and I hesitate to use that term -- you really must "fix" what's going on in Pakistan.

It's a hard situation. Are we really any closer to 'victory' here than prior? In fact, it seems as if it's slipping away. I'm hoping at least the average quality of life there is at least a little better than it was 10 years ago.

 

China is recolonizing Africa right now, building infrastructure from the ground up to extract mineral deposits, buying or leasing land to grow crops for export back to China, etc.

The standard model is big foreign mining companies coming in and extracting resources under armed escort and paying off corrupt governments or local warlords for access. The chances are not great that these mineral resources will directly affect the standard of living of the people of Afghanistan much other than expose them to the toxic environmental side effects of heavy mining.

The Nigerian oil industry is an example of just how bad the situation can get. The vast majority of government revenue comes from petroleum exports. All official oil extraction is run through joint ventures between multinational oil companies and the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation.

The nexus of multinational companies uninterested in the quality of life of local populations, government corruption, environmental disaster and armed insurgency is easily replicable in Afghanistan.

 

Grr. Argh.

 

Shouldn't this thread be called 'Time to get into Afghanistan' by now?

 

I read something about how Afghanistan's mineral deposits might actually harm the country if it ends up concentrating money and political power into a small band of elites. It'd be similar to how oil discoveries in certain African countries provided their governments with so much revenue that they had no incentive to promote good governance.

 

This is going to be a doozy:

McChrystal gives an interview in Rolling Stone called "The Runaway General"

This morning, McChrystal released a statement saying:

I expect more controversy to emerge over this, even if it is behind the scenes. Given that this is the second time that General McChrystal or his people have publicly lashed out at the administration, it may be time to see him replaced. I don't think the strategy should be changed yet, but from a civilian's perspective it is seems inappropriate for generals to be doing this kind of thing.

 

That's what makes this so stunning, in my opinion. Not only the fact that it's a repeat incident, but that he's gone much further this time, and in far less justifiable fashion. It's one thing to, in a major debate over strategy, try to publicly outflank your superiors and embarrass them into supporting your position. While inappropriate, it's at least still a debate over policy, and offers the vague defense that you were at least pushing back in an actual debate. Here though, it's just an article peppered with unprovoked insults, at a time when the Administration is supporting McChrystal's desired strategy. What possible defense does he have? Especially when, according to Rolling Stone editors, he made no attempt to object to the way the story was written, after seeing an advance final copy. The whole thing is sort of incredible. I'd expect major repercussions.

 

As a fan of General McChrystal's, I have to say that he needs to step down. He can't win in Afghanistan simply because Obama will not give him the resourses he needs to complete his plan.Therefore we need someone with a different plan.

And speaking out against a sitting Commander-in-Chief? Unacceptable in any and all cases.

 

Out of curiosity, what exactly do you think he's been denied?

 

10,000 troops and he'd like a different set of rules of engagement. (If memory serves)

 

He requested at least 40,000 troops, but got only 30,000. He was also jerked around for a few months after he made the request. He had to literally holler about the time it was taking to just get an answer (never mind getting the forces deployed). There is also the fact that Obama's announcement of a timetable has also made the job harder.