Well, there you have it: More meat for the grinder, says the prez (video here). Can’t say I’m happy about it, especially the caveat about withdrawals beginning in July 2001 to be dependent upon “conditions on the ground,” the ground in that part of the world being unstable in more ways than one (earthquakes and crazy mean bastards). Here’s the CIA World FactBook rundown on the joint for those of you who, like me, have never been there.
I like the idea of a deadline: “You have this long to help us kick the bad guys’ ass or you can fight them by yourselves.” Ditto the diversion of American money from the mayor of Kabul — a.k.a. President Hamid Karzai, a gent who by all accounts is so crooked that he can meet himself coming around a corner — to local officials in the boondocks.
I also like the long-overdue recognition of the financial toll here at home: “Um, yes, wars cost money, just like everything else, only more so. This one will be in the budget; we don’t care how the last guy did it. Will there be anything else? May I interest you in some health care, environmental action and jobs, perhaps?”
The fact that the Repuglicans are lining up against the prez should be encouraging, but is not, given their behavior to date. It’s not hard to get a dumb dog to bark.
Dexter Filkins, author of “The Forever War,” appears to have his doubts. So do I. I just don’t articulate them as well.
• Late update: Looks like Steve Benen at Political Animal shares my skepticism.
Mad Blog Media 
This is stupid. If our country has the option of whether or not to be in this war, then this war cannot be about protecting our sovereignty, and therefore there is absolutely no reason continue the war. The very fact that we are having a discussion at all about whether or not to continue the war in Afghanistan tells us that we should get the hell out.
That, and have you seen the price of heroin lately? Sheesh!
As far as the Elefinks, whats troubling isn’t that they will oppose Obama. Hell, they would oppose motherhood and apple pie if Obama gave a speech in favor of those treasures.
The R’s I’ve heard on the radio this morning want an even deeper commitment over there, no strings attached. It will be other people’s blood and treasure, i.e., Joe Taxpayer.
As I see it, we have not made a distinction between your garden variety fundamentalist Islamic worshipper who is shooting at us to get us the hell out of his backyard vs. the fundamentalist Islamic international terrorist trying to book a flight to Sodom-Gomorrah International Airport here in the USA (by the way, is Interbike still on there?). That creates another issue: the war over there is a game of whack-a-mole, and I don’t see a clear way to end the threat simply by blowing things up.
I think the Soviets showed how futile it was to try to own that space. In a part of the world where people get deeply into suicidal Islamic fundamentalism, how do you convince them to go ahead and ruin their own space, but leave the rest of the world alone? Kinda like trying to keep Fundamentalist Christians out of my government and bedroom, if you get my drift.
Plus, Pakistan is still the elephant in the room. The other elephant, that is.
So, shall we have Strategic Hamlets, anyone? I wish Obama luck on this one, but have grave doubts we will succeed in whatever we are trying to succeed in. Emphasis on grave. Lots of ’em.
Gents, no matter what the prez says, it still reminds me very much of Vietnam. “Would you rather fight them over there or over here?), for starters. Here, please, where we have the advantage of knowing the terrain, to say nothing of a civilian population that is better armed than most nations’ armies. The notion of American Exceptionalism seems alive and well, despite the departure of Daffy and Fudd from the War Room. We can succeed where the Brits and Soviets failed. Uh huh.
And Strategic Hamlets indeed, K. Who can’t see scary similarities between this plan and that one? Hearts and minds, baby. It reminds me of a grunt talking to Michael Herr in “Dispatches”: “Vietnam, baby. Bomb ’em and feed ’em, bomb ’em and feed ’em.”
And yeah, Pakistan. Less of an elephant, more of a dragon. How you douse that rascal’s nuclear fire I have no idea. But the prez seems to want to start with unleashing the spooks. Naw, that doesn’t remind me of ‘Nam.
Spooks and drones in Pakistan? No, that doesn’t remind me at all of “not” being in Cambodia….”not” being in Laos…”not” bombing the Ho Chi Minh Trail…
What these folks seem to want to forget is that many of those boundaries over there were drawn up by drunken Westerners. Does anyone think the Pashtoons and other tribes over there give a rat’s ass about what we call “borders”?
If I thought I had a solution, I’d run for office and fuck things up myself.
I gotta hope Obama, who is a smart guy and certainly knows more about the entire situation than most folks, is doing the right thing here, especially since Daffy/Fudd did exactly the wrong thing since the planes hit the Twin Towers. Could the US have better played into Bin Laden’s plan? Daffy/Fudd acted like they were personally gonna profit from the whole mess (hey, wait a minute…) What I wished W had done back then was go on TV and say something about bringing those responsible to justice on OUR timetable and not playing into the hands of the terrorists by starting wars, kidnapping, torturing and all the other stuff that quickly destroyed the sympathy of the world towards us while inflaming passions of all kinds of people against the US. Sadly, Obama has to clean up the whole mess including the bill that was left by Daffy/Fudd. He’ll end up looking like the bad guy and be out of office after one term just like Carter when he tried to clean up the Nixon/Ford mess left to him. Daffy/Fudd could have conducted an Israeli-style commando detail to get Bin Laden and saved us a pile of dough Perhaps our economy would not be wrecked now? But of course Blackwater and Halliburton wouldn’t have been enriched with a low-key and effective plan. It’s hard to believe Daffy/Fudd were so stupid…they must have wanted this mess to happen, knowing they’d be skipping out of DC with piles of kickbacks in their pockets way before the shit really hit the fan. Obama needs to stick to the deadline and not end up in a quagmire of endless escalation in Afghanistan while ending the Daffy/Fudd Iraq adventure asap.
If you read Filkins’ “The Forever War,” this news should scare the hell out of you. Afghanistan is a nightmare, where nobody really cares who wins, because the folks there are just as happy to stab their friends in the back as they are their enemies. As long as they get to stab SOMEBODY…
I’m pretty sure Afghanistan’s internal shit is not really our primary concern. Afghanistan is a convenient place to park and watch Pakistan, Iran, etc. Also, it’s a good way to get nearer some unbelievably huge oil fields. There are some big pipelines that run through Afghanistan that our forward posts just happen to line up with. Hmmmm. Oh, and we have a massive military/industrial complex that can employ the unemployed and recent high school graduates.
As Iraq winds down, we gotta feed the dragon somewhere. Now we don’t have to ship all those troops and their stuff home.
I’m convinced Cheney/Wolfowitz/Rumsfeld were sure we could win the sympathy of the Iraqis by driving out Hussein and get a free pass to establish a USA colony on a budget. It didn’t really work out that way. So now we’re going to move the colony to Afghanistan where the resistance isn’t so concentrated and the news stories don’t include a lot of innocent bystanders. If we happen to get Bin Laden, great. If we don’t, okay. We still get to camp there.
We will be out in 3 years? No way. We’ll be there forever or until we figure out how to supply ourselves with non-petroleum based power, or we get to move into Iran. At some point, some president will admit we’re there for strategic reasons that have nothing to do with the Taliban, Bin Laden, or Islam. It’s about the oil and the nuclear threat from those who have oil.
Next theatre of operation will be Africa. It would look bad if America and Western Europe just showed up and re-colonized Africa. China doesn’t care what they look like, so they’re heading in now. Multi-nationals are there trying to exploit the resources before China simply runs them over. Once the cost of a barrel of oil climbs back over $110, we can justify sending in the troops to back up the multi-nationals. When I say “we,” I mean the U.S. AND Europe.
Here’s the most recent find in Africa that looks promising:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/katine/2009/dec/02/oil-benefits-rural-uganda
Unfortunately, the Ugandan people won’t get much out of it. The technology will get shipped in. The oil and the money will get shipped out.
Best hope for Uganda is to get very good at tourism aimed at Westerners. Oil and gas engineers hate to get shot at. They like to play golf, fish, and hunt. They’d like for their families to come visit now and then and maybe see an elephant or a giraffe. They like their prostitutes and drinking water disease-free. They like the help to speak English and to smile. They like their beer cold. And they’d really like for the locals to get the fuck out of the way when it’s time to work.
Thanks for reminding us of the economic geopolitics, Jeff.
“There’s a wind on the eastern side…NOw I know what they mean/I just want to scream…A smallish man in Afghanistan/A watchdog in a nervous land/They’re only there to lend a hand…Short memory…Storm brewed in a teacup…Be careful what you say…Divided world the CIA/Who controls the issue…It’s better to die on your feet than to live on your knees…Throw the pearls before the swine ebb and flow, turning tide…Super computer, the new contraband…Somebody’s trying to tell me something.”
Midnight Oil, 10,9,8,7,6,5,4,3,2,1 (1983)
Khal,
I moved to Houston in 1994 not knowing anything about oil, gas, energy, grids, commodity trading, shipping, derivatives, international trade, scarcity, etc. Now I live in it everyday.
The stuff I wrote last night is almost verbatim from three separate conversations I’ve had with people I know here who make their livings either working in these countries, analysing these situations, or selling stuff related to oil and gas or defense.
KBR and Halliburton are here. All the multi-national oil and gas companies have a huge presence here. Baker, the Bushes, and enormous numbers of back-channel folks either live here or commute here. The sheikhs of every Middle Eastern country come here (and bang extremely expensive self-employed types at the Hotel Derek).
Corporate Houston was genuinely worried that Obama was going to say no to a troop build-up in Afghanistan. Disaster averted. The three-year plan? Whatever. Africa as the next military depot? The infrastructure sales guys are already planning bids for everything from transportation contracts, private security, power, sewage, room and board, construction, you name it.
I am completely amazed everytime I have one of these conversations here in Houston. I actually believed in democracy, fair trade, the Golden Rule, taking care of the less fortunate, all that shit. Now? Not so much. I need to stop being so amazed.