Interpreting Obama’s Afghanistan Strategy
October 24th, 2009 § 4 Comments
The United States’ top Commander in Afghanistan General Stanley A. McChrystal recently stated that he requires 40,000 additional troops and plans to remain in the country for the long-term if he is expected to meet America’s objectives in the region. Meanwhile some public opinion polls conducted in the US seem to indicate that Americans are almost split down the middle over the question of whether to send in more troops.
While President Barack Obama revealed that he intended to increase America’s troop presence in Afghanistan during his presidential campaign, his administration has so far not made any official moves. He also recently suggested that the formal decision probably won’t be announced until after the Nov. 7 run-off in Afghanistan during an MSNBC interview:
I think it is entirely possibly that we have a strategy formulated before a runoff is determined. We may not announce it.
Where is the Obama Administration heading with regards to Afghanistan? Below are some different answers in the form of political cartoons.
He HAS a strategy?
Catch up with the steadily declining level of commitment to the occupation among US civilian staff charged with administering it.
http://washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/hp/ssi/wpc/ResignationLetter/pdf
The correspondences with the US effort in S.Vietnam and the current one in Afghanistan as depicted in Matthew Hoh’s resignation letter are unmissable.
This link to the letter should work-
http://www.comw.org/warrereport/fulltext/HohResignationLetter.pdf
If not the story and letter covered at kanan48.wordpress.com
Thanks Freeborn. War in Context also has the full letter available in html. For those interested, I recommend reading it in conjunction with these critical pieces on Matthew Hoh’s letter:
Depraved Indifference: Drone Wars, Whack Jobs and Imperial Terror – Chris Floyd
The Denial Continues, and the Horror Remains Unrecognized – Arthur Silber