For years, the official intelligence community estimate was that a little more than
100 al Qaeda fighters remained in Kunar Province, a foreboding territory of imposing mountains and a local population in the mountains at least that largely agrees with al Qaeda’s ascetic Salafist philosophy.But recent estimates from the military and the U.S. intelligence community have determined that al Qaeda’s presence has expanded to nearby Nuristan and that the group coordinates its operations and activities with allies like the Pakistan-based Taliban and Haqqani Network.On Tuesday, in response to President Obama’s announcement that he would be leaving 9,800 U.S. troops in Afghanistan past his original end of 2014 deadline for withdrawal, Rep. Mike Rogers, the Republican chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, also warned about northeast Afghanistan.100 al Qaeda fighters remained in Kunar Province, a foreboding territory of imposing mountains and a local population in the mountains at least that largely agrees with al Qaeda’s ascetic Salafist philosophy.But recent estimates from the military and the U.S. intelligence community have determined that al Qaeda’s presence has expanded to nearby Nuristan and that the group coordinates its operations and activities with allies like the Pakistan-based Taliban and Haqqani Network.On Tuesday, in response to President Obama’s announcement that he would be leaving 9,800 U.S. troops in Afghanistan past his original end of 2014 deadline for withdrawal, Rep. Mike Rogers, the Republican chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, also warned about northeast Afghanistan.
Stephanie Sanok Kostro, the acting director for homeland security and counterterrorism at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told The Daily Beast, “By reducing troop levels to under 10,000 [in Afghanistan], it will certainly create more space for al Qaeda in the north. The north has not seen a lot of attention given ISAF’s focus on the south and southeast of the country. So this has left the north vulnerable to al Qaeda influences and this is only going to get worse.”
Well, Most Equal Comrade, are you gonna charm these guys out of their desire to murder us in our beds?
Consider this really cogent and literarily savvy from one who is still there, but done all that: ndeed, it is not national security but domestic politics that is driving U.S. withdrawal. The American people no longer want to be at war, and the Obama administration is obliged to accommodate them. How is U.S. policy now any different from European imperialism, which frequently abandoned its holdings once profits were too low or costs too high? It may ease the national conscience to think of bringing “freedom and democracy” to the Afghans, but a comparison to Pakistan is more truthful. Just as Pakistan sees national strategic value in maintaining a destabilized Afghanistan, the U.S. sees national strategic value in making it democratic and pro-Western. Afghanistan is geopolitical “ivory” that is now too costly to pursue further. To gain a measure of the truth of this comparison, we can ask ourselves whether the average Afghan is now any better off than he or she was prior to 2001. While the April presidential election speaks to progress and increased freedom and empowerment of Afghan citizens, that still leaves rampant corruption, virulent drug trade, widespread poverty, and regular insurgent violence. Not so different from how imperialists left their vassal states, is it?
ReplyDeleteRead more at http://warontherocks.com/2014/05/american-amnesia-in-the-afghan-war/
Because European imperialism was largely based on the quest for treasure, whereas the traditional robustness of US foreign policy has been based on preserving the freedom of US citizens and citizens of its allies.
ReplyDeleteMoney line: "The American people no longer want to be at war and the Obama administration is obliged to accommodate them. Now let's hear you gripe about our low information citizenry and how very late in the day that it is that we do not have the stomach for your brave military incursions. Show us the results since WWII will you please?
ReplyDelete