Posted on 03/13/2017 1:14:55 PM PDT by Theoria
Remember Afghanistan? The longest war in American history? Ever?
When it comes to wars, we Americans have a selective memory. The Afghan war, dating from October 2001, has earned the distinction of having been forgotten while still underway.
President Trump’s Inaugural Address included no mention of Afghanistan. Nor did his remarks last month at a joint session of Congress. For the new commander in chief, the war there qualifies at best as an afterthought — assuming, that is, he has thought about it all.
A similar attitude prevails on Capitol Hill. Congressional oversight has become pro forma. Last week Gen. Joseph Votel, the head of Central Command, told Congress that the Pentagon would probably need more troops in Afghanistan, a statement that seemed to catch politicians and reporters by surprise — but that was old news to anyone who’s been paying attention to the conflict.
And that’s the problem. It doesn’t seem that anyone is. At the Senate hearings on the nomination of James Mattis as defense secretary, Afghanistan barely came up.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Something like 4% of the entire population of Japan (and 8% of Germany) was killed in a matter of a few years. That’s how to win wars.
> more training and support troops to get the Afghans back on the offensive <
What Afghan in his right mind would fight for the current Afghan government? The Taliban are just waiting to take back power, which they will swiftly do once the Americans leave.
1) By following bad intelligence GWB spend months bombing Tora Bora even though we now know in Dec, 2001, OBL and Al Queda were already in the hills of Pakistan.
2) We wasted millions of dollars and months on that effort to no avail
3) From what I get from eyewitness account related to television we are constantly fighting for position killing a handful of our enemies each day
4) Killing a dozen a day is getting us nowhere.
GWB was a tool.
The people who complain the loudest about the way something is done are most often the same people who scream even louder when nothing is done.
Includes many on Free Republic.
They offered to maybe turn him over to a third party "islamic organization for cooperation" or some such, providing that we gave them what they deemed acceptable evidence of guilt and stopped all military action in afcrapistan.
“Ah, after 8 years of doing nothing, now the NY Slimes has taken notice.”
Exactly...not a peep outta these lowlifes for 8 years of Obama, but now it’s suddenly a big deal again.
The Americans aren’t going anywhere...the number of terrorists in that part of the world mean its a target rich environment.
We’re much better off teaching the Afghan government forces to fight effectively, which can be done with more troops.
What was the purpose of invading a Country that we had totally contained
I rejected that charge, from the left and some on the right, at the time. But in retrospect he really was...and a tool of the Saudis.
FDR turned on a dime when the war started and told private industry, “build what we need. Cost is no object.” He cleared away all regulations and harassment. Funny how that works.
I cannot believe many of the comments here.
There is no winning in Afghanistan. Unless you are willing to kill 90% of the male population and that isn’t going to happen. Short of that, anyone who thinks they can WIN there is absolutely, beyond belief, delusional.
If you want to fight there just as a stalling tactic, fine. But fully understand what you can and cannot realistically accomplish.
they aren’t only laughing, they are doing what we did against them. There are reports they are supporting the Taliban.
“Now American military officers see a growing Russian effort to bolster the Taliban’s legitimacy and undercut NATO’s military effort there, seemingly disregarding the harsh lessons of its previous invasion — or perhaps seeing a chance at ironic form of revenge for America’s Cold War efforts.
“America’s top military officer in Europe, Gen. Curtis Scaparrotti, said Thursday that Russia had increased its support to the Afghan Taliban, including potentially the provision of supplies.
‘”I’ve seen the influence of Russia of late, increased influence in terms of association and perhaps even supply to the Taliban,” Scaparrotti told members of the Senate Armed Services Committee.
“Scaparrotti, who is also NATO’s top military commander, did not specify what kind of war materiel the Russians might be supplying to the Taliban.”
Excerpt from CNN yesterday by Ryan Browne
http://www.cnn.com/2017/03/28/politics/russia-afghanistan-libya-syria/index.html
Why aren’t we pulling out?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.