[SevenMinusOne]

Yon has done a hell of a job reporting in Iraq - Is dead nuts wrong on Stan - And he knows very well he is too far away from Stan to start spouting such BS - Because that is exactly what the notion that we are losing (by any stretch of the imagination....or by any reasonable account) in Stan.

Yes, there is still much hard fighting to be done...and yes, that means dealing with the Pak border regions (to some extent.....and that depends on them...not us).....but we are winning and the Taliban have already LOST in Stan.

[Marine_Uncle]

I'm with ya on this analysis. Yon should hold off on any assessments regarding Afghanistan until he has put a year or so in country and moved about through it's entire geography.
He is putting the apple cart before the cart unknowingly. And committing the same type of miss judgements as he had cried about others doing regarding Iraq.

[denydenydeny]

There are several differences between Iraq and Afghanistan, the most significant one being the heavy attrition of fighters in Iraq. In Afghanistan the Taliban has taken even heavier losses, but they have an almost inexhaustible supply of madrasa graduates from Pakistan to throw at us.

As long as Pakistan remains the mess it is, then the war will continue.

[Billthedrill]

I think you nailed it there. For Yon to say we're losing in Afghanistan and then in the next sentence to say that he hasn't been there but he's going, is clearly to succumb to the very same disease he has rightfully criticized in the U.S. media.

Actually in most of that country we've done well. The challenge is in those areas closest to the sanctuaries over the Pakistan border. What the Taliban and their erstwhile guests al-Qaeda have there is the sine qua non of modern terrorism - a base that is protected by the "inviolability" (at least ostensibly in one direction) of the borders of a sovereign nation that cannot or will not keep its own territory from becoming a staging area for covert warfare.

That needs to change or there is nothing lasting that we can accomplish in a neighbor laid open to attack. The difficulty is that it is a formidable military challenge to be addressed by an upcoming administration that may well lack the experience, ability, and determination to carry the fight to the enemy, and who will have precious little in the way of allied assets capable of exerting themselves in that arena. Highest regard to the Brits, Poles, Canucks, and all of our other NATO partners, but that's the cold truth - this showdown will take place on the territory of a putative ally with nuclear arms who does not wish it to, and who will have the diplomatic backing of Russia and China, whose own foreign policies hope to achieve a cheap victory in an American defeat.

Frankly I am not optimistic. I don't think what needs to be done in the northeast of Pakistan will be, and if it is not, in a worst-case scenario, we could have the quagmire the Democrats have been praying for under a Democratic administration who will happily cede the field to the enemy in the midst of pious proclamations that it is, after all, the side of peace. And peace is the very last thing that will result.