White House Weighs Talks With Taliban After Afghan Successes

New York Times ^ | March 13, 2010 | HELENE COOPER and MARK LANDLER

[La Lydia]

With American troops pouring into insurgent strongholds in Afghanistan and the United States succeeding in killing insurgent leaders with drone attacks in Pakistan, the Obama administration is beginning to consider whether it has gained the upper hand sufficiently to justify an effort to begin talks with the Taliban. President Obama met with his war cabinet on Friday, and the issue of reconciling with the Taliban is gaining traction, even as administration officials debate whether the time is right.

A senior administration official pointed to recent successes by American and Pakistani forces in capturing and interrogating senior Taliban leaders in Pakistan. In addition, administration officials have sought to maintain a full-court press to persuade their Pakistani counterparts to keep attacking Taliban operatives, the official said.

Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, Gen. James L. Jones, the national security adviser, and Adm. Michael Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, have all traveled to the region recently to try to keep the pressure on both Afghan and Pakistani officials.

“It is now more a question of ‘when’ than a question of ‘if,’ ” the administration official said, when asked about the idea of reconciliation talks with senior Taliban officials.

Another official, who like the senior administration official spoke on condition of anonymity because internal administration discussions were still at an early stage, said, “There’s been a lot of energy applied to the reconciliation issue in the last few weeks....”

[La Lydia]

I don't think we should talk to them until they are all dead.

[loveitor..]

snatching defeat from the jaws of victory

[ErnBatavia]

With this regime, victory is not an option...

[Rational Thought]

This administration doesn’t understand our enemy.

This enemy views the very idea of us wanting to talk with them as a sign of weakness.

[LurkLongley]

Here’s a scenario for you: why doesn’t the Obaminator invite the taliban and achmadini-whack-job to the White House for a beer and BBQ. I’m sure that we’d all be pals within hours.

What a bunch of Morons. When they have the Taliban by the throat and have every fighter that has taken American lives eating dirt then it will be time to talk.

[PghBaldy]

the issue of reconciling with the Taliban IIRC, we were never "conciled" with them in the first place. They have always been outlaws. EVEN the UN never approved of them. They were never considered the legal govt of Afghanistan.

[Rational Thought]

I really wonder if this administration feels some sort of sympathy for terrorists, as many of them were supporters of domestic terrorists in the past.

[Marty62]

Why wonder. The thought of Taliban standing for a Photo-op at the WH is stomach churning.
This is a direct spit in the face of our troops by the Zero admin.

[Bulldawg Fan]

Thats a good idea, kick their butts and then beg them to negotiate. Nixon did that at Christmas 1972 and it cost us that war too.

[John W]

This is one of those bad ideas these clowns are floating every few weeks via their media whores to see what the reaction is. This isn’t the first time its been out there.

[LurkLongley]

I don’t think they have some sort of sympathy, I believe that they actually agree with most of what the Islamists spout; America is the great Satan (maybe not Satan but certainly the cause of the terrorist’s discontent), we defend the indefensible state of Israel (witness Bam’s insults and ultimatums to Bibi) and all the rest.

There may be a few normal thinkers in the administration, but, for the most part these are academics with a myopic view of the world too often focused through a Marxist lens. In their view of the dialectic, in this case we are the bourgeois and the islamists are the repressed proletariat.

[La Lydia]

I know. I have posted it every time they float it.

[Rational Thought]

Good point.

[SailormanCGA72]

Why should we propose talking to them when killing them is much more effective and enduring.

[elpadre]

I think the WH must keep their noses out of Afghanistan and Iraq and let the military handle it as they have from the beginning, and doing a pretty good job of it.

[maine-iac7]

This administration doesn’t understand our enemy.

the Taliban is not the enemy to this POS in the WH

[ExTexasRedhead]

Anything this Thug Administration does is a pathetic joke, IMO.

[Diogenesis]

---

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."
George Santayana

[La Lydia]

“If you kill enough of them, they stop fighting.” — Curtis Lemay

[SunkenCiv]

Hey, what could go wrong with that? In fact, as a gesture of good will, and to entice them into talks, Obama should fax over various mission-critical aspects of our Afghan operations.

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