President Obama has decided to increase U.S. troop strength in Afghanistan to 100,000 in the next six months before beginning a staged pullout starting in mid-2011. It looks like he has a target of a U.S. troop pullout before the next U.S. presidential election.
His goals are ambitious and not without a lot of risk. There has to be progress on many fronts, including progress in stabilizing Afghanistan’s government, guaranteeing basic human rights, reducing corruption in government, controlling the drug trade, and building up their military to the point that the Taliban and/or al-Qaeda will not be able to defeat them in sustained battle. That’s the key.
I’m not sure if Congress will play ball, though. The left wants no troop buildup, the right wants no timetable. I disagree with both sides. There should be a temporary surge, and they should be talking inside the Administration about a withdrawal date. Whether that timetable should be made public is a different story.
They should let the surge go forward, with full funding, then start pulling back depending on what’s happening on the ground. And the Afghan government should be given the same deal as the Iraqi government has been given: fight your own battles. And we should be providing the tools that they need to get the job done. The Afghan Army should be the strongest military force in the country, not the Taliban and not al-Qaeda. And the same thing goes for the Iraqi Army in Iraq.
We owe it to the soldiers who have died there to make sure that their sacrifice wasn’t in vain. And to make sure that we won’t be back in either country in the future, retaking the same ground AGAIN that’s already been paid for in blood.
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