Last Tuesday night the American people listened intently as President Obama laid out plans for the War in Afghanistan. Most of us were less than enthusiastic about the announcement of 30,000 troops to be added to a failed war.
The cold hard truth is that we are more or less writing off the last eight years of battles and deaths in Afghanistan. It seems that the administration has adopted a policy of beginning the war. We are taking a Mulligan. President Obama could have stood before the American people and called for a “do over” and been as impressive. Sadly, it is as if the past eight years of military activity was the warm up for war. That’s hard to swallow considering the number of American troops who have been killed and maimed in Afghanistan.
The other cold hard truth is that President Obama inherited a war in Afghanistan that had become so diluted and neglected that he apparently feels he had to claim the war as his own. He did. The War in Afghanistan and American blood spilled on Afghan soil is on the hands of President Obama.
Perhaps President Obama’s waging of war would have been better accepted if the American people believed there was real hope of victory. There is no hope of victory. In fact to date no one has defined what an Afghan victory would look like. For all the alliteration — disrupt, destroy, dismantle — no one has defined how we will know when we disrupt, destroy, and/or dismantle anything in Afghanistan. The words play well on the ear. But, that seems to be it.
The Tuesday night address seemed to be designed to play to all audiences, giving each something to cling to. For those who are steadfast in their belief in the war the announcement of additional troops, reminiscent of the surge in Iraq. For others there was the summer of 2011 withdrawal date. There was the steadfast statement that we are not nation building, but the deployment of troops to Helmond Province seems to indicate otherwise. Perhaps the President chose to say we are not nation building because he realizes that the government of Afghanistan is so corrupt that no American would be willing to build on that foundation.
As the week has played out and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates have testified before Congress and made the Sunday morning talk show rounds one thing has become abundantly clear. We are sending more troops into Afghanistan. Beyond that the mission is unclear — unless someone defines disrupt, destroy and dismantle. Pretty words, vague meanings.
As we see it America bailed on the Afghan people in 1989. We are trying to make up for that failure to follow through with an undefined plan that will only delay our bailing on the people of Afghanistan once again. The cost in American lives and American dollars is too high a price to pay to help set up a corrupt government that sooner or later will become the enemy. Remember our support of Saddam Hussein before we hunted him down?
For now we are in Afghanistan to “disrupt, destroy, and dismantle” something. In our opinion we are fighting ghosts. We failed to disrupt, destroy and dismantle when the opportunity was present. Now we will chase the ghosts of a failed mission, starting anew, and perhaps diverting our attention from the real enemy once again.
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