McMaster Defines ‘Winning’: ‘Allowing Afghanistan to Be Afghanistan’

breitbart ^ | EDWIN MORA

[caww]

That will never happen again...already tried before....It’s a tribal country ruled by the dope Kings that push it....no different than hood gangs here running the streets and neighborhoods.

It’s there ONLY trade...therefore it will not end.

[shanover]

There is no such thing as Afghanistan. A land mass cobbled together by other countries does not make it so. That being said, Socialism ended a "modern" Afghanistan as we knew it. The Soviets sealed the deal and the rest is history. Islam is permanent.

If my military son or daughter died there,I would say,"For what?"If we let the military do its job,let the gloves off and keep the State Department away,maybe we can turn a corner.

The ultimate opportunity with a moral/righteous high ground,very little political opposition, blank check/blank slate was right after 9/11. We squandered it all which includes the inexplicable turn to Iraq MID-CONFLICT! That's what happens when leaders become armchair generals while hubris and grandiose idealism (nation building) sets in. BTW,I was never anti-Iraq War and understand full well that generals can also make very bad decisions. My unit was sent to Iraq.

The policies in South West Asia and Mideast is overall a colossal failure and disaster post 9/11. All I can say is thank God we at least have President Trump and not Hildabeast.

[SFConservative]

Whenever we are done in Afghanistan, within 12 months of that point it will again be like pre-war Afghanistan because that way of life is baked into the culture and the minds of the local people. You will again wind up with 20 or so regional autocratic chieftains and amazingly, people will settle back in to their former lives as if nothing happened.

Crazy Idea: If we committed to paying each chieftain $200M per year for the next 50 years so long as they brutally stomp down any resurgence of the Taliban in their region, treat their people humanely, and meet a few other conditions, it could become a self-regulating thing. We would have a few observers in-country to verify that they are meeting the conditions. Anybody steps out of line, they don't get the money and $100M goes to their nearest rivals. $4-5B per year - a bargain.

[catnipman]

“administration will win in Afghanistan by allowing the country to “be Afghanistan””

uh, which historically would be a land of perpetual, savage tribal warfare between rival savage tribes who treat their goats better than their women.

[Lorianne]

To be honest, I’m not sure.

I am hoping that containment is the strategy going forward and I see some hopeful signs that it is ... but then I hear other murmering which tends the other way, the unrealistic no-win way IMO.

I suspect Trump is caught between two warring factions in his own administration and worry he could be led towards perpetual nation building type ‘war’. Even though his speech said no nation-building it had a lot of familiar nation-building aspects to it.

I have no doubt Trump is a smart man with a highly tuned BS detector, but even very smart people can be led astray. He is also on a much bigger playing field than he is used to ... which of course is true of every President. He might be playing one side against the other, biding time until he understands the field and the players better. No way to really know, just my hope.

[Lorianne]

Well said and thank you.

[trebb]

Versus being a camp for Iran and Pakistan to fill with hard core terrorists ....