Afghanistan

Congressman David Obey, Afghanistan And Domestic Reform

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Long time Wisconsin Democratic Congressman David Obey, Chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, has called upon the President to ask for a war surtax if he intends to escalate the war in Afghanistan.

His argument is that the Afghan War will cost $40 billion more per year if we send 40,000 more troops there, which is the proposal of General Stanley McChrystal being considered by President Obama. Obey says we cannot afford that cost, and that it will destroy the entire domestic reform agenda of the President, as we cannot sustain escalating the war and also pursue domestic change.

So Obey suggests that it is time for us to pay for an escalation of the war by taxing the American people, instead of just the troops sacrificing their lives, and taxpayers not having the responsibility as in past wars to pay taxes as their sacrifice for the war.

I think David Obey is absolutely correct in his statements. If we as a people are for this war, then let’s pay the taxes for it, instead of just waving the flag but otherwise making no sacrifice for the war we supposedly believe in.

Of course, a better answer is get out of this war and promote the domestic agenda. Isn’t it interesting how Republicans have no issue with spending for the war, but tell us we cannot afford a domestic reform agenda? However, is this really new, or just the old GOP hypocrisy about government spending?

Let’s remember that most of our national debt is due to militarism and war, not domestic reform, and that most of the national debt occurred under Presidents Reagan and Bush II. And yet the GOP has the gall to claim that the Democrats are the big spenders!

The White House Debate Over Afghanistan

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The New York Times reports today that various alternative plans on Afghanistan are being considered, and that the President is about to have his eighth meeting on the subject with his advisers later today after his involvement with the Veterans Day commemoration at Arlington National Cemetery.

The various alternatives all seem to involve different levels of new troops going to Afghanistan, although the top advisers continue to be split on the subject.

Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Mike Mullen all seem to favor a major escalation of troops, while Vice President Joe Biden and White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel remain skeptical to such a growth of troops.

This decision is extremely important, and I feel that if President Obama goes the route of more escalation, he will come to regret it, and it could cause a loss of support within his party for his domestic initiatives. Ultimately, it could cause a failed Presidency and an untold growth in the national debt, which seems not to worry the Republican opposition which screams and yells about unacceptable levels of debt to deal with the Great Recession and domestic reform, including health care, but sees defense spending as not an issue that upsets them.

I say to President Obama that he must ignore the opposition attacks and do what is best for the nation, so I repeat: Listen to your vice President, Joe Biden, as he is leading you down the proper and sensible path. Do NOT escalate in Afghanistan and instead build up our homeland security and solve the many domestic problems that this country faces and that you campaigned on. Keep your commitments, and to hell with the conservative and Republican opposition as they wish you and the country ill in their mad quest for taking us to the extreme right, the real threat above all to our nation’s long term future!

Dick Cheney And Afghanistan

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Dick Cheney, as Vice President, failed to promote a major effort to win in Afghanistan after September 11, as he helped to push President George W. Bush to intervene in Iraq, taking the eye off the ball, so to speak.

Now Cheney has reared his ugly head again to denounce President Obama for “dithering”, that is, delaying a decision on major troop increases in Afghanistan. Interesting, as Cheney and Bush failed to send adequate troops to either Afghanistan or Iraq, which has led to failure in both wars.

Cheney has a lot of nerve, and the best thing for Obama to do is totally ignore the former Vice President, as he has lost all credibility when it comes to making judgments in the war on terror. His only solution seems to be to utilize torture, which has undermined the US image in the world and put our soldiers on any battlefield under greater threat of equivalent treatment.

President Obama is smart in not letting the attacks of a repudiated Vice President affect his decision making timetable. The hope is still that Obama will realize that more troops are not the answer, and that to have a successful Presidency, he must stop committing major expense and troop levels in a war that cannot be won by soldiers on the ground. Again, Afghanistan is not a place for victory and never has been! Do you hear, Dick Cheney, what is being said? Enough is enough! 🙁

The Growing Role Of Senator John Kerry In Foreign Policy

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When Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts lost the 2004 Presidential election, it seemed as if he would be a forgotten figure, an also ran who failed to win the White House and receded into the background, never to be significant again.

Instead, Senator Kerry has become a very important figure, as the election of Barack Obama led to the promotion of Senator Joe Biden to the position of Vice President, and to the selection of Senator Hillary Clinton, Obama’s opponent in the primaries, to the position of Secretary of State.

This series of developments led to Kerry being elevated to the chairmanship of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, which had been headed by Biden, and Kerry is making the most of this opportunity.

Taking the advice of the late Senator Edward Kennedy in how to make a loss a way to advancement, as Kennedy had experienced after losing the presidential nomination to President Carter in 1980 but making the most of it in pursuing a more important career path in the Senate, Kerry has become a major player in foreign relations and is regularly consulted by the administration.

Kerry makes a good point, already enunciated as well by Rahm Emanuel, the White House Chief of Staff, that until the Afghan national elections are settled, it cannot be expected that more troops will be sent, if at all. We are still awaiting the final determination, not only of that election, but of what US policy in the future will be toward that nightmare situation in Afghanistan.

The Growing Influence Of Vice President Joe Biden In Foreign Policy

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Vice President Joe Biden is rapidly becoming as influential Vice President close to the level of former Vice President Dick Cheney, but politically the exact opposite of Cheney.

Cheney promoted a hawkish view of foreign policy, while Biden is promoting a more dovish view, that we should not promote more troops in Afghanistan, but rather depend on drones and intelligence in Pakistan to hunt down Al Qaeda while, for the time being, NOT withdrawing the 68,000 troops already in Afghanistan. The history of Afghanistan is that no nation has ever, going back to ancient times, conquered or won in an intervention in that country.

This is wise advice in my view, and it is hoped that President Obama will listen to the Vice President. But the suggestion by Ariana Huffington that Biden should resign if he loses the battle over troop increases in Afghanistan is preposterous.

The way to change policy over time is to stick it out and work to change the President’s mind, even if not possible immediately.

Biden is one of the major assets of the Obama Administration, and he is a man of much wisdom!

Eight Years Of An Interminable War In Afghanistan: Enough!

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Today marks eight years since the invasion of Afghanistan after the attack on September 11, 2001.

For a brief while, President Bush’s decision to invade united the American people, and it seemed as if we would find Osama Bin Laden and overcome Al Qaeda and the Taliban.

Then we messed up big time and were further diverted by deciding to go to war against Saddam Hussein and Iraq, and that war dragged on and took our eye off the ball.

Now after eight years, longer than any war in US History a month from now, we have had 865 Americans killed and 570 of our NATO allies, and we are no closer to victory, whatever that is.

The belief is that the war will drag on for years, with heavier losses and with mounting national debt, and without any guarantee or likelihood of victory. Can we continue to throw our money and our youth down the chute in what is basically an impossible terrain with a corrupt government which has never been able to unite the tribesmen of the area, a country which Alexander the Great, the British, and the Russians could not conquer?

The answer is NO, that it it time to cut our losses, simply use aerial bombing and drones and intelligence gathering to keep Al Qaeda and the Taliban at bay, but we cannot be the world’s savior, and at this time, many NATO allies are planning to scale back, and that is what this nation needs to do.

We can promote the defense of our nation without sacrificing courageous young men and women in a hell hole that no one can possibly expect to win. In fact, we have to ask: What would be a win anyway? Enough is enough! President Obama: Have the courage to say NO MORE and bring our troops home!

The General Stanley McChrystal Problem For President Obama

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Unfortunately, General Stanley McChrystal is complicating the problem for President Obama on Afghanistan policy.

The General has been extremely vocal publicly regarding what he sees as the essential need for 40,000 more troops in Afghanistan as soon as possible.

The Obama Administration is in the midst of what may be the most important decision making of this Presidency. Should the President get this country more deeply involved in a country where the war is being lost, and historically, no one has ever been able to win control?

Retired General James Jones, the National Security Adviser, and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates have both roundly criticized McChrystal for such public advocacy, and there are rumors that Obama is furious with the Afghanistan commander for making this such a public issue. In many ways, it reminds one of General Douglas MacArthur challenging President Harry Truman in public about Korean War strategy, leading to his dismissal by Truman in 1951.

Under our system of constitutional government, the President, whether we agree with his strategy on military policy, is the final determinant of our military strategy. So McChrystal is wrong, but this major public flap could lead to Obama firing McChrystal, or the general resigning, in either case creating a massive political problem for Obama.

This just adds to the growing sense that Obama has definitely lost his honeymoon and is being besieged on all sides, after nine months in office.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates’ View Of His “Boss”, Barack Obama

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Defense Secretary Robert Gates, a carryover from the Bush Administration and a Republican who served in the CIA under six Presidents, has come out in fulsome praise of his “boss”, President Obama.

He said he enjoyed working for him, saw him as very analytical, and desirous of learning everything he can about a situation or issue. Basically, he is saying that Obama is very smart, a nice change from the previous President.

While he did not say this, it is obvious that Obama is very different from his predecessor, George W. Bush. Gates did say that Afghanistan had been a “holding action” under Bush because of the war in Iraq.

It should be pointed out that Gates was not the Secretary of Defense when decisions were made about both Afghanistan and Iraq. Had he been there, instead of Donald Rumsfeld, maybe the history of the involvement in both countries would have been different, and we would not now be faced with the crisis we face, not only in Afghanistan, but the growing threat of Iran, which was only emboldened by US involvement in Iraq.

It is ironic that right wing critics attack Obama, but refuse to recognize that it was Bush who put us in the mess we are now in, which Obama needs to extricate us from as soon as possible!

The Internal Battle Over Afghanistan Policy In The Obama Administration

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We are reaching a path breaking, turning point moment in the struggle over Afghanistan policy, which will have a dramatic impact on the history of the Obama Presidency.

Should we send up to 40,000 more troops into that war as General Stanley McChrystal is advocating? Among those reported backing him on this are Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Richard Holbrooke, Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan.

But significantly, former Secretary of State and National Security Adviser and General Colin Powell is reported to have strong doubts about the wisdom of such an increase, and this is also strongly the view of Senator John Kerry, Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and Senator Jack Reed of Rhode Island, an army veteran along with Kerry. And of course, Vice President Joe Biden has been trying to convince President Obama of the lack of wisdom in committing more troops, and is joined by Rahm Emanuel, White House Chief of Staff, and National Security Adviser and former General James L. Jones. Much of the military seems divided on this issue, although the head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Mike Mullen, is supporting the request.

The key figure not yet to tip his hand is Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, a carryover from the Bush Administration. It will be interesting to see where his view ends up landing.

So again, this is the crucial moment in the Obama Presidency to this point, and no matter what happens, it will cause splits and divisions within the President’s party and, for certain, among Republicans, most of whom are fully behind an increased military force in Afghanistan.

The likelihood is that if Obama decides against an increased force, he will be accused of LOSING Afghanistan, just as President Harry Truman was accused of losing mainland China during his administration, but as then, the answer now would be that the United States cannot win a war if the people of that nation are not united behind their government and committed to fighting the war themselves. All we can do is help, but we cannot win a war in another nation without full public backing, which was lacking in China, and later in Vietnam, and is obviously the problem in both Iraq and Afghanistan.

So again, Barack Obama, listen carefully to both sides, and come down on the side of Powell, Kerry, Reed, Biden, Emanuel and Jones. I, somehow, have a feeling, that Gates will join this side, solidifying it, but even if not, this is the correct side to take.

Barack Obama: Please Listen To Joe Biden On Afghanistan!

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President Obama, it is time to face the facts: Afghanistan is an unwinnable war, not worth more American lives. We will never win in any typical sense, and the cost in lives and treasure is too heavy to bear, particularly when other NATO nations are unwilling to take a heavier burden in that war that was lost by George W. Bush by his obsession with Iraq. The American people want out, and they are right!

Your vice president, Joe Biden, is an expert on foreign policy, and he knows that escalating involvement in this war will doom your administration and add tremendously to the national debt. It will doom your domestic reform plans, which are urgently needed.

Do not go down the road of Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, and George W. Bush. Do not sacrifice our youth on wars that cannot be won. Work on intelligence, aerial bombing of key sites, and drones to deal with the threat, and spend more on homeland security and building up our defense structure, which is weakened by these endless wars that cannot be won.

Joe Biden is right! You made him your Vice President! Now listen to him and follow his lead, as he knows what is best! Be smarter and wiser than other Presidents! Do not let GOP attacks deter you, as they do not wish you well in any form, and were you to stay in Afghanistan, they would still condemn you!

Do what is best for America, and PLEASE listen to Joe Biden!