Why isn’t leaving Afghanistan a serious option?
President Obama and General Stanley McChrystal meet on board Air Force One on October 2 (Pete Souza/White House)
President Obama told Congressional leaders that he does not plan to substantially reduce forces in Afghanistan or shift the mission to “just hunting terrorists there,” but he hinted that he remains undecided about the major troop buildup proposed by his commanding general, Stanley A. McChrystal.
The President is currently considering McChrystal’s request for as many as 40,000 more troops. This debate occurs after a majority of Americans have already stated that the war is not worth fighting, and that it is not worth the cost. These facts don’t seem to register with Obama. In fact, the New York Times reports that the President is getting pretty peeved at this “get out” nonsense.
Meeting with leaders from both parties at the White House, Mr. Obama seemed to be searching for some sort of middle ground, saying he wanted to “dispense with the straw man argument that this is about either doubling down or leaving Afghanistan,” as White House officials later described his remarks.
Mm’k. Why isn’t this about leaving Afghanistan? According to an August Washington Post-ABC News poll, 51 percent of adults now say the war is not worth fighting. Less than half, 47 percent, say the war is worth its costs. Those strongly opposed (41 percent) outweigh strong proponents (31 percent).
A serious, logical belief that the United States should leave Afghanistan is not a “straw man argument.” A straw man argument is all about misrepresenting an opponent’s position, but the “leaving Afghanistan” opinion isn’t about manipulating the pro-Afghanistan war argument, which is that the surge theoretically — one day — will “work” (whatever that means.)
The “leaving Afghanistan” opinion is based on the opinion that the United States has no right to nation build in autonomous countries, and is making life hell for Afghans. “Leaving Afghanistan” is based on the reality that democracy cannot be exported to other countries. Democracy is a grassroots, populist movement that grows organically from indigenous peoples, and cannot be cultivated in some Pentagon backroom. “Leaving Afghanistan” is about fixing home before criticizing the neighbors. America could use war budgets for good, decent things like improving schools, creating jobs, providing health care, fixing infrastructure, and reversing the damage inflicted on our environment.
“Quagmire” is now too sterile of a term to slap across the flaming remains of Afghanistan. The United States has made it painfully clear that its idea of “nation building” is to obliterate a country’s infrastructure and then prop up an embarrassingly corrupt leader. No wonder only 40% of Afghans think their country is heading in the right direction. Afghans hate the Taliban, but they’re not too fond of the United States, either. According to the BBC, only 32% think US forces are doing a good or excellent job now. Gee, all those hours of blackouts, gallons of tainted water, and a stolen election can’t even buy America a “thank you?” Ungrateful ingrates.
It appears as though Obama thinks the consensus opinion of the American people is merely a straw man argument. It has no value. The American people can kick and fuss all they want about wanting government run health care, and the end of the Afghanistan war, but their leader isn’t interested in hearing from them. The backbone of the democratic process — one person, one vote — is cute, but not necessary. Getting out of Afghanistan is an almost adorable proposal — an unserious hissy fit — something that would get one laughed out of the War Room.
It’s weird because I recall back in September 2008 when then-Senator Obama spoke to a very appreciative audience in New Philadelphia, Ohio. “If we don’t take our government back, then none of these changes are going to happen,” he said, “I need your help doing it.” I guess he should have said, “I need your help doing it…unless you disagree with me. In which case, shut up.”
The Times reports that the “tone was civil and restrained” at Obama’s meeting with Congressional leaders. That’s a shame. It would be a great time for one of our elected leaders to stand up and actually speak for the American people. Shouting would not be inappropriate, passionate dissent, invaluable. The only unacceptable approach to Afghanistan is to ignore the will of the American people, who are paying for the war, and the will of the Afghans, who are dying because of the whims of a tiny tribe of D.C. chicken hawks.
Meanwhile, there are a plethora of domestic issues (health care and the failed state of California, to name only two) that need our politicians’ time and attention. Now would be an awesome time to end this stupid, destructive, wasteful, pointless war. But I guess that’s another straw man argument.
Post Your Comment
You must be logged in to post a comment
T/S Members
Log in with your True/Slant account.
[...] from Allison Kilkenny’s blog. Also available on Facebook and Twitter. Share and [...]
Great question. We all liked to pick on the Neocons for being chicken hawks, but on Afghanistan Obama is a chicken hawk, too.
True. Unfortunately, Democrats are hesitant to state the obvious while their team is in power.
In response to another comment. See in context »In what universe did you live in during the campaigns, debates and elections? Obama never indicated he would back down from Afghanistan, so the sudden insinuations of backpedaling or backstabbing are completely unfounded.
I find it pretty unseemly that, a few months into the new administration, Americans (if polls are to be believed) suddenly want to take our ball and go home, consequences to the country we invaded be damned. As another commenter pointed out, according to polls, Americans also think the invasion of Iraq was a good idea and Saddam Hussein was responsible for 9/11. Polls also indicate that a majority of Americans don’t believe in evolution, so let’s throw Darwin out of our school curricula. I wouldn’t rely so heavily on opinion polls of the American populace to make your case.
The fact is that the previous administration is responsible for nearly all of the failures, both military and civilian, in Afghanistan. Poor decision-making, lack of focus and general corruption and incompetence abound. However, rather than trying to engage any of these problems, there’s lots of “Focus on domestic priorities” coming from both Democratic and Republican strategists and columnists.
Who’s triangulating now?
In response to another comment. See in context »I find the one point frequently overlooked about Afghanistan is Iraq.
Al-Qaeda attacked the US. The US had a legitimate reason to strike al-Qaeda and its Taliban support network in Afghanistan – to make sure these attacks couldn’t happen again.
But it wasn’t the war Bush wanted to fight, so he diverted 150 thousand personnel (and equipment, and the budget) and moved it to Iraq.
Now, 8 years later, Afghanistan is again at risk of becoming a safe haven for revitalized terror network.
I agree that there is a point at which one must consider pulling out of a hopeless war. But what’s being overlooked is that the hopelessness was of Washington’s making, while the reasons for invading in the first place remain a threat.
You’re begging the question: Was the invasion just? All the Administration had to do was hand over its evidence to the Taliban and they would’ve released bin Laden and anyone else to the US.
Were that to have happened in late 2001, Afghans would hate their de facto government, Sharia whack-jobs would be killing civilians and the Pakis would be highly unfavorable of the US. This is what we have now except a COIN strategy positivistically props up the unfavorable local gov’t, making it easier for the Sharia whack-jobs to recruit more whack-jobs and Pakis are fed up with the US embassy being erected by DynCorp, positivisically propping up a corrupt gov’t with a two-faced intelligence agency backing both sides of the coin (no pun intended)–the SECOND nasty Pak regime propped up by the US in eight years.
COIN is political. You can’t just throw troops at the problem. Gen. McChrystal’s report says it’s important ISAF isn’t viewed as occupiers by the Afghans, but COIN requires propping up Karzai. Counterinsurgency in Afghanistan is self-defeating. It would’ve been in 2002 and it is now in 2009.
In response to another comment. See in context »The entire safe haven argument makes no sense. Why exactly do terrorists need Afghanistan for a launching pad for attacks on…America which half the world away? Many of the plotters, most in fact, plotted the attacks of 9/11 in Germany and the US. You don’t need a land mass to plot terror attacks, and it’s especially dumb to choose one so far away. A couple of guys in a basement in brooklyn can do it.
My sis is a counterterrorism analyst and I used to do a little contract work for homeland security, so I’m not like some kind of out there hippy, I just think this entire argument is way out in right field.
In response to another comment. See in context »Perhaps so many Afghans are dissatisfied with the US presence is because we have failed to bring them what they want, security.
We have never treated Afghanistan seriously. We have provided only a bare minimum of effort as other issues took our focus away. And now that our minimal efforts have failed to resolve a conflict that was brought upon us, many Americans want to simply give up.
Understand full well the horror that you are advocating for Afghans. The return of the Taliban will not be a pleasent one. There will be beheadings, women will be barred from education, people will be hung from goalposts for the most arbitrary of reasons. Take a serious look at the Taliban’s history of ethnic cleansing and terror. Be absolutely sure that you are willing to throw the Afghan people to the Taliban before advocating your position of abandonment.
And be fully aware that our leaving Afghanistan will be seen as a victory for the Jihadists. It may take some time, but the war will come back to us. Only the next time we go back, our betrayal will be well remembered and the Afghans will show us what a quagmire truly is.
The American people may well favor leaving Afghanistan. They also favor lowering the tax rate and spending our country into bankrupcy for their own entitlements. Ultimately the American people must be heard, but it’s not uncommon for what the American people want to be wrong. Few politicians are willing to risk their positions for doing what is right, not simply what is easy. We shall see what kind of president Obama is.
Ms. Kilkenny,
The basic problem is that no one knows how to withdraw our troops and not have the Kabul government disintegrate. At this point the choice is seen as either the current military stalemate, sending in more troops to “win”, or something that might be called “Somaliastan”. There are also question about what the borders of Somaliastan might be, they could in theory extend quite a bit beyond the current Afghan border.
So with those options, withdrawal does not seem to be a realistic option, at least not from a domestic electoral perspective. The Democrats don’t what to have the Republican asking “Who lost Afghanistan?” (I hope that here are enough people reading this who understand the historical reference here. Just in case, in the last 1940’s the Republican Party hounded the Democrats with the question “Who lost China”.). This is to say nothing of the huge lose of prestige for the US military and government that the people in Washington are fearful will occur if the US is forced to leave Afghanistan without “victory”. Mr. Obama is looking or “Peace with Honor” (another bit ancient historical referencing).
To get US troops out of Afghanistan is a new option. The question is, what is it.
If the Afghan gov’t were one that could be propped up without creating more enemies among the local population, fear of the gov’t disintegrating wouldn’t exist.
There is no “win” in Afghanistan. There aren’t even stated achievable objectives–let alone those worth the cost of generational theft to send more kids to die, get maimed or come back wanting nothing but to die.
In response to another comment. See in context »Hello 6dbl5321,
I won’t disagree with you about anything you wrote. However but the question is, what is to be done on a practical level? The Kabul government is useless and corrupt. It is under attack by feudal lords whose militias are funded by the opium trade with the assistance of the Taliban and al-Qaeda and would collapse in a matter weeks, if not days, without NATO support. Is Somalia-stan, located right between Iran and Pakistan and not far from India and Iraq better than what we have right now? Maybe it is, I sure don’t know. I certainly know that sending 40,000 more targets to be shot at by al-Qaeda is no solution.
If we are going pull out, we have to be prepared for the resulting meltdown. It has to be a planned melt down.
In response to another comment. See in context »The straw man argument, Obama is saying, is framing the debate as only All In or All Out, while he is trying to find a middle-ground solution.
I agree that we should focus on Pakistan, where the real action and nukes are, and reduce our commitment to Afghanistan. Obviously if we just sent 21,000 more troops early this year and things are deteriorating, merely another 40,000 troops will not be enough. The only reason I can see for nation-building in Afghanistan is my concern for Afghan girls and women, but I decided I will no longer use this general emotion-driven argument. I no longer believe that even a full Taliban return will pose a direct terrorist threat (if they sponsored another successful attack in the US, it would mean their annihilation) and that is our primary stated goal for being there. Pakistan is a much bigger problem.
Obama has proved to be a Clintonian centrist who only looks liberal next to Bush (or so he did at first). He is beholden to the military industrial complex as much as any other president. The will of the people only counts at all closer to elections.
Still, IMHO reading a poll and thinking you understand the will of the American people when it involves a complex situation is about as presumptuous and simplified as you can get, multiply that by 100 for trying to presume the will of the people of Afghanistan. Especially when all your poll numbers are in the 30, 40 and 50 percents.
When strongly opposed hits over 70 percent maybe you could start extrapolating the ultimately undefinable will of a people to use for an idealistic argument such as this one.
The issue isn’t considered because the president is not a liberal or a progressive but a Clinton triangler. The solution to being blackmailed by the pentagon and a general who questioned his commander-in-chief in London???
Look for an increase in the troop level…maybe 15 to 20 thousand…that should satisfy everyone.
Me? I’d fire the bastard and lay down the law to the joint chiefs.
The job of the joint chiefs is to advise the president on military matters, not to tell him what he would like to hear.
Bush didn’t want to hear what the joint chiefs had to say about Iraq, so he ignored them and we went into an unnecessary war with far fewer troops than were needed to occupy that country. Things did not go well.
I hope that Obama listens to the general’s advice. If he does not, the general will salute and carry out the orders he is given despite being asked to do an incredibly difficult job without the support needed to do it.
In response to another comment. See in context »Yesterday, the U.S. Senate approved the largest military budget bill in the history of our nation: $626 billion.
Next, the bill will be sent to a conference committee and then back to the House and Senate for final passage.
There remains a short window of opportunity to stop this wasteful military madness.
Tell your members of Congress to vote “NO” on the 2010 defense appropriations bill:
http://bit.ly/stopfundingwar
It’s a much bigger problem than Obama, it’s part of a largely mentality in Washington that the only tool we have is a hammer and all our problems are nails.
I’m sorry, but a lot of these writers on True Slant simply respond to what the mainstream media, like the NY Times, puts out there. There is so much back and forth about Afghanistan, when the real issue, for many reasons is Pakistan. It’s like the gov’t wants everyone to debate Afghanistan to limit the focus on Pakistan. Pakistan is Nukes, Pakistan is the Taliban (just read Wikipedia), Pakistan is (hopefully) why we’re in Afghanistan.
Pak didn’t get the bomb yesterday and ISI’s had one foot in bed with Pakistani militants since before that. The threat of Pak’s nukes and ISI’s partnerships with militants is directed at Delhi over J/K, not D.C., and Pak knows that it would be wiped off the map were the possession of the nukes to become an issue.
Pak did a fine job of pushing the militants back to the northwest when Islamabad seemed to be at risk. Pak has a very strong army (or India would’ve wiped it off the map any one of the numerous times it wanted to crush that army) and is perfectly capable of guarding its nukes.
Ms. Kilkenny is voicing the option not seriously undertaken among the powers that be. Obama made is very clear that nation-building by forceful occupation or “Biden Option” of search/destroy remobilization of near current troop levels are the serious options. Saying we should invade Pak or bribe them into the US leading a COIN there is insane. That’s begging for the PPP to be ousted by Musharraf-type hardliners that’ll prop up BJP-whack-jobs back into power in India and you’ll see the Indo-Pak wars occurring as often as Olympics again.
In response to another comment. See in context »Good points. I feel the need to remind everyone that Pakistan is a major factor in the debate. From speaking with friends in the military, one of the main reasons why the argument for fully withdrawing from Afghanistan is not on the table is the stability of Pakistan. A destabilized Pakistan is a worst case scenario and may be very unlikely but I’m just amazed at how in story after story on what to do about Afghanistan, it is implied that Pakistan is a nonissue. This might change a little now with the UN terror attack there by the Taliban and below
October 7 Ny Times: “The legislation passed by Congress last week gives Pakistan $1.5 billion over the next year for the Zardari government to build roads, schools and other infrastructure, a gesture intended to shore up the weak civilian government and turn around the widespread antipathy toward the United States among Pakistanis.
Instead, the aid package has served to widen the distrust between the military and the civilian government, even though the new aid comes in addition to America’s aid to the Pakistani military, which had totaled more than $10 billion since 2001.”
Maybe no one brings it up because we’re impotent there. It still should be acknowledged (but granted, maybe this wasn’t the best thread for it)
In response to another comment. See in context »As a life-long liberal, one who would most certainly agree with you on most points, I regret to say that I found your article on today’s Huff post incredibly naive, ignorant and hypocritical.
Isn’t it ironic that women like you, Arianna and Susan Sarandon support leaving Afghanistan in f#%king tatters, just waiting to be ruled once more by the Taliban.
I don’t care what you tell yourself when you look in the mirror at night, but you and your like should have NO ILLUSIONS. If we pull out and leave…..
…we are ABANDONING the women of that country. We are abandoning them to a life of violence, fear, ignorance and servitude. Slavery, that’s what your proposing. Slavery.
And I won’t even go into the countless Afghans that will be killed for helping our soldiers.
You want to quote POLLS???!! How about this? 60% of Americans thought it was a good idea to invade Iraq. SIXTY. PERCENT. Who can blame o’le Bushy? He was just following the will of the people.
But you and yours hardly care about common sense, backbone or sacrifice. Have fun sipping your lattes and donating to HumanRights.org and trying to save the world…..
…all the while ushering in a rebirth of the Burka.
“Get out your bedsheet, LADIES!”
I have a question:
When all the fake negotiations and delay-tactic meetings end between the U.S., U.N. and Iran, and it starts flexing its nuclear capabilities, what army will we use to contain that beast?
The one in Iraq, or the one in Afghanistan?
Just askin’