Let me know if you want in or out.
Links: FR Index of his articles: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/keyword?k=victordavishanson
His website: http://victorhanson.com/
NRO archive: http://www.nationalreview.com/hanson/hanson-archive.asp
Pajamasmedia: http://victordavishanson.pajamasmedia.com/
| Planning Victory in Afghanistan. Nine principles the Obama administration should follow |
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| NRO ^ | February 09, 2009 | Frederick W. Kagan President Obama has said many times that America must succeed in Afghanistan. He is right, and he deserves our full support in that effort. Afghanistan is in many respects harder to understand than Iraq was. Even with a good strategy and sufficient resources, success will almost certainly come much more slowly. But as a great man said two years ago, hard is not hopeless. The keys to finding the right approach lie in nine fundamental principles. 1. UNDERSTAND WHY WE’RE THEREAfghanistan is not now a sanctuary for al-Qaeda, but it would likely become one again if we abandoned it. Mullah... |
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| General Petraeus: Afghanistan Will Get Harder Before It Gets Easier [NRO title] |
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| NRO ^ | February 09, 2009 | General Petraeus Afghanistan has been a very tough endeavor. Certainly, there have been important achievements there over the past seven years – agreement on a constitution, elections, and establishment of a government; increased access to education, health care, media, and telecommunications; construction of a significant number of infrastructure projects; development of the Afghan National Army; and others. But in recent years the resurgence of the Taliban and Al Qaeda has led to an increase in violence, especially in the southern and eastern parts of the country. Numerous other challenges have emerged as well, among them: difficulties in the development of governmental institutions... |
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Mr. Hanson, would you have time to visit some of my family living in Princeton, NJ and explain that their views of the Iraq War are phoney and twisted? I have tried talking to them when Her Heinous was running but had the phone slammed down in response. I have no desire to try and explain the truth to them, as well as another part of my family who voted for Bambi. Two things they have in common are plenty of money and squishy brains. Thanks for article, it is, as usual, terrific.
Most people have by now forgotten that on the eve of war in Iraq, North Korea started rattling sabers and threatening to invade South Korea in a rather transparent effort to distract us.
There was a long line of Democrats who went on camera on every talking head show out there to demand that we confront North Korea, “the real enemy”. This, as our troops gathered in Kuwait, right before they crossed the line into Iraq.
For anyone paying attention, this places Saddam, North Korea, and the Democrats all in the same bed.
What I’ve found is that Democrats, when they need to sound “butch”, will often beat their chests and preen and pose valiantly as they demand a war you are not in, in an effort to scuttle a war that you are in. Its a double whammy. They undercut the war you’re in without being labeled anti-war. But they can never be counted on to back you through any war, certainly not once the going gets tough.
In Iraq, most Democrats voted for war and most of them also went straight out to news conferences to denounce the war... within minutes of the vote. Their seat in the senate was still warm when they were on camera railing against the war they had just authorized. This allowed them to play it either way as events unfolded. If it went well, they were for it right from the beginning. And if it went badly, they were against it... right from the beginning.
VDH always does good work.
Also worth pointing out that liberals fundamentally agree with the terrorists about the “root causes” of terror. They see it as fundamentally OUR fault, and so their enthusiasm for “smoking out” OBL and his pals in Afghansistan is superficial at best.
Part of that has already taken place as the chronically obnoxious Cindy Sheehan and Code Pink have shifted their focus from a war they failed to influence the U.S. to lose to another they'd like us to. That sort of thing is to be expected, but Obama's and the Democrats' gymnastic posturing on the topic has left them in the really ugly position of having to prove that Bush was wrong by proving that their emphasis on fighting in, and not running from, Afghanistan, is the optimal strategy. Even with the nearly unanimous media support the Dems enjoy the shifting from this position to one of pulling out of Afghanistan altogether is going to be a very tough sell. The clear-cut victory in Iraq will only make that more difficult, one reason we've heard so little of it. The media are hedging their bets.
At this point there is an additional hazard, which is that any motion from Iraq that causes any less stability than we're seeing at the moment is going to be impossible to pin on Bush. And Obama has stubbornly insisted at least on the illusion of such motion. That is all risk and no reward, a clumsy and callow political move.
It will be even more interesting to see how far he is going to attempt to maintain his position that we must move ground troops into Pakistan. That was a position taken largely to attempt to posture as a hawk and is, in fact, ground on which Bush trod very carefully. For Obama now to blunder into that potentially very violent arena out of a sense of adherence to macho posturing is one way to get a lot of very good troops killed for nothing but vanity.
My guess is that little bit of armchair generalship from a complete amateur will be allowed to drop quietly out of existence by the media as if it had never been. It had better be. The very last thing we need is hesitancy and half-measures in any such attempt. We either go in to win it and accept the damage that is likely to do to the tribals there or we don't do it at all.
The Democratic party mantra: that “stupid” Bush invaded the wrong country and that we should have invaded Afghanistan instead.
I suspect that if Gore or Clinton had been president when 9-11 occurred they would have ended up doing what they always did. Make some noise, consult with our European allies, and end up with nothing much more than a UN resolution. But let’s give them the benefit of the doubt. They accused Bush of ignoring Afghanistan? He sent a couple thousand special forces. They hooked up with the Northern alliance, who were encouraged to go on the offensive. With help from our air power they quickly put the Taliban out of business to the delight of the people in Kabul.
Compare this with what would have happened if the Democrats did what they say they would have done. 300,000 American troops conducting some ham fisted occupation? Look what happened to the Russians! And the American people could’t even stomach Iraq! Obama was even dumb enough during the campaign to even consider invading Pakistan.
I remember a conversation I had with a buddy who supported Obama. I listed the disastrous things he was promising to do as my reasons for not supporting him. My buddy’s answer was, “yes, but he’s not really going to do those things”.
And thats the way I see Obama supporters. They read onto Obama’s blank wall whatever they wish to read onto it. They don’t worry about contradictions in his program because they believe they know what he’s really going to do. They all believe he’s brilliant because they believe he agrees with them. Even when he disagrees with them they somehow believe he secretly agrees with them.
If in the end he does exactly the same thing Bush did, they’re OK with it because they know Obama is doing it reluctantly, regretfully, with his heart in the right place, whereas we all know Bush did it with evil intent.
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Nice vocabulary word, and with VDH you know it is being used correctly, probably in its original classical sense.
| 1. | Rhetoric.
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| 2. | a phrase, sentence, or verse formerly interpolated in a liturgical text to amplify or embellish. |
| 3. | (in the philosophy of Santayana) the principle of organization according to which matter moves to form an object during the various stages of its existence. |
