[PassedOut]

Conservative columnist David Brooks has been talking with his sources in the US government and his latest piece discusses the internal debate on Afghanistan: Clear, Hold and Duct Tape

Quote

President Obama faces such a devilishly complex set of constraints that the policy he announces will be partially unsatisfying to every American and to every member of his administration. The fights inside have been so brutal that there have been accusations that the Defense and State Departments have withheld documents from the president to bias his thinking.

Nonetheless, my impression, pre-speech, is that Obama has negotiated these constraints in a serious manner, and improved some of his options — for example, by accelerating troop deployments. He has not been enthusiastic about expanding the U.S. role in Afghanistan, but he has not evaded his responsibility as commander in chief, and he’s taking brave political risks.

Because I'm a conservative myself, it's not surprising that I often agree with Brooks. But I want to hear Obama's speech before I jump to any conclusions.

Whatever conclusions he does announce will at least have been carefully thought out. That does not, in itself, guarantee success. But not doing so surely guarantees failure.

[kenberg]

An interesting and informative piece, albeit somewhat frightening.

[mike777]

PassedOut, on Dec 1 2009, 11:29 AM, said:

Conservative columnist David Brooks has been talking with his sources in the US government and his latest piece discusses the internal debate on Afghanistan: Clear, Hold and Duct Tape

Quote

President Obama faces such a devilishly complex set of constraints that the policy he announces will be partially unsatisfying to every American and to every member of his administration. The fights inside have been so brutal that there have been accusations that the Defense and State Departments have withheld documents from the president to bias his thinking.

Nonetheless, my impression, pre-speech, is that Obama has negotiated these constraints in a serious manner, and improved some of his options — for example, by accelerating troop deployments. He has not been enthusiastic about expanding the U.S. role in Afghanistan, but he has not evaded his responsibility as commander in chief, and he’s taking brave political risks.

Because I'm a conservative myself, it's not surprising that I often agree with Brooks. But I want to hear Obama's speech before I jump to any conclusions.

Whatever conclusions he does announce will at least have been carefully thought out. That does not, in itself, guarantee success. But not doing so surely guarantees failure.

No one is enthusiastic about the war in Afghanistan but with that said if the President is not totally committed to winning the war tonight, then just send our troops home. The President really needs to show his entire heart and soul is in this fight.

If Congress feels the war in terms of blood and limbs is not worth the cost, shut off the money.


With family and friends in Afghanistan it would be a grave concern if tonight the President just appears luke warm or plays the blame game. It is our family and friends who are risking their lives and who are brave.

[PassedOut]

mike777, on Dec 1 2009, 04:34 PM, said:

With family and friends in Afghanistan it would be a grave concern if tonight the President just appears luke warm or plays the blame game. It is our family and friends who are risking their lives and who are brave.

It will be indeed interesting to see how he explains the plan without reference to the bad decisions that brought the current situation about.

[Winstonm]

Quote

No one is enthusiastic about the war in Afghanistan but with that said if the President is not totally committed to winning the war tonight, then just send our troops home

What exactly do you mean by "winning the war" in Afghanistan? I bet it wouldn't be all that hard to get a complete surrender document from the Karzai government - we could even go out into the gulf and have a signing on board a ship like in WWII- would that be winning?

Any other definition of winning constitutes nothing more than a misguided attempt at nation building. It won't work, and we can't afford it, anyway.

There is only one win in this idiot game - don't play.

Quote

PassedOut
General McChrystal clearly gets this, and I hope others in charge of US policy do too.

I do not think General McChrystal gets it - he is good at repeating what he learned in War College, and that's about it. If he really GOT it he wouldn't be asking for 80K more troops. He is simply repeating the assumptions made by the think-tankers that if only the politicians wouldn't have interfered we would have won in Vietnam. We can't let them make the same mistakes again...

Problem is these guys treat the hypothesis (Vietnam may have been winnable) as an absolute fact (it was winnable) and build off this false premise.

Obama is the one being manipulated in this Greek Tragedy.

[Winstonm]

Quote

The problem with Mr. Hassan's former colleagues is that they very much see it as their religious duty to help bring about heavenly retribution. Such people are difficult to work with

I am glad that the Islamists - the jihadists - are a tiny minority. I am with you that I cannot see how dealing with these people is possible, but then you also cannot deal with zealots like David Koresh, either, or Jim Jones. Fanatics are fanatical.

I especially like the last couple of paragraphs in the article, depicting the interview with the still-hardcore Islamist - it showed how far the others had come and emphasized that there is no forcible change possible - change of that magnitude comes only from within the individual.

[Winstonm]

edited for spelling: President Barack Obama, December 1, 2009:

Quote

"We must deny al-Qaida a safe haven," Obama said in articulating U.S. military goals for a war that has dragged on for eight years. "We must reverse the Taliban's momentum. ... And we must strengthen the capacity of Afghanistan's security forces and government."

What a crock of *****.

Let's take these "reasons" one at a time:

Deny al-Qaida a safe haven...

First off, all al-Qaida needs to plan another terror attack is two I-phones and a 1-bedroom apartment in Hamburg - they sure as hell don't need an entire country. Remember, they took flying lessons in the good 'old U.S. of A., so do we count America as a safe haven, too? By its own estimates, the U.S. Army believes fewer than 100 al-Qaida remain in all of Afghanistan and only 300 are in Pakistan.

400 bad guys don't need a 28 million population country - they don't need Afghanistan as a safe haven - they need a Holiday Inn banquet roon.

Reverse the Taliban's momentum?

What the hell does that mean? The Taliban live there for crying out loud. What are we going to do - expel the whole country but for the 5 million dead guys who voted for Karzai in the corrupt elections?


Strengthen the capacity of Afghanistan's security forces and government.

You are kidding, right? This *****-hole of a country is the #2 most corrupt government in the world, right behind Somalia. Their president just presided over one of the most corrupt elections in history and his brother is on the payroll of the CIA as a bagman for the opium trade.

Security? Good governance? Good grief!

It looks more and more as if Obama is a one-term President. He just had his Lyndon Johnson moment and failed it.

[jonottawa]

You DO know how to spell his name, eh?

Otherwise, you're right, as far as your analysis goes.

Obama's upping the ante in Afghanistan because:

1. He ran on it as a war of necessity. He probably didn't believe it then, but that's what he ran on.
2. Republicans, attack politics, 'not supporting our troops', etc. Swing voters and purple state voters eat that crap up. Especially with the lapdog media that still repeats Republican talking points as though they make sense or are worthy of consideration.
3. Pull out + 9/11ish terrorist attack = GW Bush level approval ratings


In other words, an almost purely political decision. He was in a no-win situation. He took the safe way out.

I'm fine with him as a 1-termer. I tend to prefer divided government anyway. But not unless the Republicans run someone sane next time (the only one that comes to mind is Crist.)

[kenberg]

My first reactions were:
A: It took three months to come up with this? and
B: Is there any military person who thinks the Afghans can take over in July 2011?

But given that Obama, among other things, wishes to be reelected it may be worth thinking about what his thinking is here. The Post this morning says "President lays out plan" He did? Maybe sorta.

Fast forward your imagination to July 2011 and speculate on two possible scenarios:

X: Things are better, much better. It's not yet practical to bring any troops home. Obama says "Look, it's working. We have to keep the full force there another six months, or maybe another year, but it's working". This would be broadly accepted.

Y: The situation is no better, maybe worse. Obama says "we did everything that could have been expected, we are out of here". This could well also have broad support, especia;;y if Pakistan, with our help, is containing the threat inside its own borders.

I realize that some, maybe quite a few, think X is not going to happen. I plead lack of ability to judge. I will say that Obama apparently believes that X has a chance, otherwise he is dumb/crazy, and I don't believe that.


All in all, my plan is to cross my fingers and hope like hell. Sometimes Hail Mary passes connect. There does appear to be an exit strategy if the enterprise goes to pieces. Keeping troops there until 2011 in a transparently lost cause would be unforgivable and, really, immensely stupid. Following a plan that has its chances, well that's better.


The above is the best way I can see to look at it all. The situation sucks, no doubt about it.

[Winstonm]

Quote

My first reactions were:
A: It took three months to come up with this?

Actually, it is 8 years and counting, tick, tick, tick....

This was nothing but re-iteration of the same unfounded claims and fear-mongering the Bush-Neoconservatives used to justify their dreams of a U.S.-led Caliphate of Consevatism in the oil rich Middle East.

Let me reconstruct this speech:

Part one: That's right. We're bad.
Part two: Holy *****, HideyMan! Killer rabbits!
Part three: Run away!!!!
Part four: Hold on. Only run away after two years to make it look better.
Part five: That's right. We're bad!

[jdonn]

I don't really agree with his decision either (of course I have access to much less information than he does, and less inclination to consider the problem anyway). But I certainly don't think he did this for political reasons and find that cynical beyond belief. If he wanted to do this to save his own skin it would have been much more effective to do this months ago, and he knows that. Just because he is a politician doesn't automatically mean every decision he makes is for selfish reasons.

Although I agree with some of the general conclusions, many of the specific comments in the last buncha posts in this thread are rubbish. As usual, almost everyone is presuming to know almost everything, when in reality everyone (myself included) knows much closer to nothing.

[jonottawa]

The next principled unpopular decision President Obama makes will be his first, Josh.

He's also doing this because (if you believe him) he remains convinced that one day Republicans will stop bashing everything he does because they want him to fail more than they want America to succeed. Good luck with that, Barry.

[kenberg]

Politics cannot help but arise here but I agree that this should not be seen as something just to boost his political standing. Toward the end he said something like "I am doing what I can within my limits". That wasn't exactly it, I haven't looked it up, but it had that flavor. The limits of course are financial as well as political.

Regardless of the information that he has, he really cannot say what the situation will be July 2011. I take this date as a political way of saying "We ain't staying there forever and unless we see some action by Karzai and friends we will be hitting the road sooner rather than later". Something like that.

Any speech by any president has some element of theater to it. I take it as given that he would not be sending these troops without some belief their mission will be possible. But I think he cast the plans as if he knows more about the future than he could possibly know. It's a common style in politics.

Anyway, I plan to look at this as a serious effort by a serious person and to wish him well. I have said it before and I'll repeat it. On most things, certainly on the war, I wished success for George Bush. That's different from agreeing with him or voting for him. I hope that my Republican friends can wish for success for President Obama. We will all be better off if this goes well.

[jdonn]

jonottawa, on Dec 2 2009, 11:48 AM, said:

The next principled unpopular decision President Obama makes will be his first, Josh.

Ah ok, as long as you know that for a fact.

Just out of curiosity let me ask, I think every decision he has made thus far has been largely unpopular. So are you saying he has no principles whatsoever? I wouldn't be very surprised if you were saying exactly that but I want to clarify.

[Lobowolf]

jonottawa, on Dec 2 2009, 11:48 AM, said:

The next principled unpopular decision President Obama makes will be his first, Josh.

This strikes me as a really odd thing to say, particularly in conjunction with your previous statement that he ran on Afghanistan being a war of necessity, but might not have believed it.

If he's campaigning and acting as though Afghanistan is a war of necessity without believing it, that's unprincipled. And it's certainly not popular.

FWIW, I think his commitment to the war in Afghanistan is clearly both prinicpled and unpopular.

[jonottawa]

jdonn, on Dec 2 2009, 05:11 PM, said:

I think every decision he has made thus far has been largely unpopular.

Is FoxNews the only channel you get on your TV? If you're going to call out other people's opinions as 'rubbish', maybe you shouldn't make comments like this. ... Anyway,

When I discuss my political beliefs, I don't preface every statement with: 'I may be wrong, but I think ...' In my 25+ years of regularly watching talking heads expressing views on TV, I've yet to see 1 who does that consistently (or hardly ever.) Your (paraphrasing) 'don't express a political opinion without making it explicitly clear that it is only an opinion and that you are not 100% certain that your opinion is correct' idea is silly. (I'm gettin' deja vu all over again.)

To your question:

President Obama's #1 principle is that he wants to be liked. He surely has other principles as well, but he keeps those to himself to the extent that they conflict with his #1 principle.

America risks slipping into permanent decline, as previous empires have before it. Yes, that is largely the fault of Dubya Bush and congressional R's, but they're not running the show anymore.

What we need is a leader who:

1. Recognizes the seriousness of the crisis

2. Knows (or in Josh's terminology, thinks he knows) how to fix the most serious problems

3. Is willing to fight for his positions

Obama MIGHT be 1. If he's 2, he's keeping it a very well-guarded secret. He sure as hell isn't 3, and I don't think he ever will be.

[PassedOut]

kenberg, on Dec 2 2009, 08:33 AM, said:

Is there any military person who thinks the Afghans can take over in July 2011?

I truly wish he had addressed this question, which was (and is) mine also. Perhaps there will be some related briefings by military people.

I would also have taken a big red pen and deleted about 10 minutes of the speech shortly before the peroration. But I did think he explained why he considers the war so important, and I thought his reminder of how it started was effective. As for the July 2011 date, he also added the qualification that the facts on the ground could affect that.

By the way, I do agree with his setting a withdrawal date in advance. In my experience, specific (and not-too-far-distant) deadlines are essential to prod people to action. And the Afghans themselves need to take action. The fact that the date is announced in advance maximizes US flexibility once that date approaches, along the lines that Ken laid out.

[PassedOut]

Reuters: Senate Hearings

Quote

Defense Secretary Robert Gates, leading off testimony by top Obama officials at the Senate Armed Services Committee, said the first of the new U.S. forces would be sent in 2-3 weeks, starting a quick buildup with an end-point.

Gates said the aim was to start shifting responsibility for security to the Afghans themselves as soon as possible. "Beginning to transfer security responsibility to the Afghans in summer 2011 is critical - and, in my view achievable," he said.

But in a sign that U.S. commanders were keeping their options open, Gates said they would review progress in December 2010 and would not abandon Afghanistan to its fate if the security situation was untenable.

Quote

U.S. Army Gen. David Petraeus told MSNBC that the 18-month timeline was realistic but ambitious.

"It will be very challenging. There will be nothing easy about it. There has been nothing easy. Afghanistan is hard and it's hard all the time and we have our eyes wide open about that," he said.

Obama must have pushed that question pretty hard the past few weeks, and I think he should have emphasized that fact last night.

[jdonn]

jonottawa, on Dec 2 2009, 12:54 PM, said:

jdonn, on Dec 2 2009, 05:11 PM, said:

I think every decision he has made thus far has been largely unpopular.

Is FoxNews the only channel you get on your TV? If you're going to call out other people's opinions as 'rubbish', maybe you shouldn't make comments like this.

Which major decision of his has been very popular?

Btw of course you don't have to put "I think" in front of every statement. But read a post from kenberg or passedout then look at yours. They manage to make statements of opinion not starting with "I think" without seeming to look as if they believe they know everything as a certainty.

[Lobowolf]

jdonn, on Dec 2 2009, 01:41 PM, said:

jonottawa, on Dec 2 2009, 12:54 PM, said:

jdonn, on Dec 2 2009, 05:11 PM, said:

I think every decision he has made thus far has been largely unpopular.

Is FoxNews the only channel you get on your TV? If you're going to call out other people's opinions as 'rubbish', maybe you shouldn't make comments like this.

Which major decision of his has been very popular?

Apparently, his commitment to the war in Afghanistan. We Americans love still being at war in the Middle East. That's why Bush was so popular.