Obama Should be Drawing Down in Afghanistan

Opinion – (even more so than usual)

A quick thought about Afghanistan and Obama’s decision to ramp up the troop numbers.

Obama was very much for the Afghanistan war during his election campaign. Is it possible that the reason he was so pro this campaign was to provide a foil for his anti Iraq war stance?

This way he could oppose a deeply unpopular war (Iraq) but still appear strong on National Security by taking an extremely hawkish position re Afghanistan.

We all know that, to stand a chance of winning the US Presidency one must show a definite willingness if not pleasure at the thought of killing foreigners and blowing up their stuff. Yep, the extreme right, especially the neocons have poisoned the well that much.

I assumed that, after Obama won the presidency, he would quietly start drawing down in Afghanistan and take the hits from the right early in his term probably using as a defense the line that “Now that he knows the entire picture he, with a heavy heart, feels it would be better to withdraw as quickly as is possible with minimum risk to the forces out there.’

I was wrong. He was either deadly serious in believing that this is a winnable war or feels that as he campaigned on a continuing strategy he has to go through with it.

This doesn’t add up, he is far to intelligent to believe that victory or even a face saving status quo is possible and he seems to have a solid enough moral and ethical base not to expend human life and treasure needlessly.

The only thing that can be hoped for is that he is in possession of the biggest juiciest chunk of intelligence that backs up his decision in ways that the rest of us cannot even imagine.

If he doesn’t he is screwed, this is not Iraq and no foreign power ever comes out of a shooting match in Afghanistan in top position.

Perhaps my biggest fear is the one touched on by Keith Olbermann on Countdown this week, and that is that the Pentagon have Obama bamboozled. A common theory about the USA that I heard constantly when I was growing up in the UK was that the Presidents number one task was to stop the lunatic American Generals i.e. The Pentagon from blowing non American stuff up at every available opportunity.

Please watch the above clip if you haven’t already, it. Olbermann’s special comments usually make me a bit squeamish but this is a very measured critique without hyperbole or theatrics.

I hope that Obama is not taking the “advice” coming from the right that he should heed his Generals at all times. There is an extremely good reason that these decisions are in civilian hands and that is that civilians, by and large, don’t actually like wars.