[pissant]

When you see eye to eye with this "expert" when the contrary has been happening - namely we have been stacking up Taliban like cordwood starting when the NY TImes breathlessly reported the Spring offensive the Taliban launched- I can see why you are a pessimist. You've latched on to the opinions of those who are cheering on the enemy and see the US military as broke and defeated. Fortunately, the quagmire is only a NY TImes/Pat Buchanan generated mirage.

You are, as is this author, woefully uniformed of the cleanup the US and some NATO (namely Brit & Canadian) have been performing these last 9 months in Afghanistan.

ANd as I recall, you were holding these same quagmire defeatist opinions last year when I talked with you. At least you are consistent.

[Eternal_Bear]

I thought we have been "cleaning" up for the last 5 years. We will not get serious until we clean out the Taliban bases along the pakistani border. If that is not done, the war can go on forever. You can never defeat the enemy as long as you give them sanctuaries.

[Steel Wolf]

ANd as I recall, you were holding these same quagmire defeatist opinions last year when I talked with you. At least you are consistent.

Consistent, and correct. We've been cleaning up Afghanistan for longer than 9 months. We'll be doing the same at the 9 year mark, unless we get smarter about how we operate.

Cheerleading is a popular occupation around here, but pretending our problems away isn't getting us closer to victory. What brings us closer to victory should be the objective, not attacking those who point out where we're failing. Since when did covering for failed policies become a virtue?

[nathanbedford]

You have been so shockingly, so grand grand eloquently, so self righteously wrong about Iraq that one is left flabbergasted that you even have the guts to publish the same preposterous blather on these threads concerning Afghanistan. You have told us from the beginning that the mainstream press does not know what it's talking about concerning the war in Iraq, that we were winning,. In the beginning of that war and against my better judgment, I listened to the likes of you and I was deceived and held my tongue. Now you want to shop the same bilge about Afghanistan but this time, no sale.

The days when you can intimidate honest critics into silence by calling them "defeatist" died forever with the Republican majority at the last election.