Afganistan

[weissman]

"While General McChrystal pushes for a buildup of forces, others, including Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., are advocating the opposite approach, a scaled back presence with a new focus on hunting Al Qaeda cells primarily through unmanned aerial drone strikes and special operations raids

Comments

[catku]

They're in a real pickle! Can't afford to lose and unwinnable war, can't nation build a tribal society (at least with IRag they were used to a central govt.) At the same time support for the wars has wanned and they promised to start the withdrawl " if elected".

Biden is a gaff machine and I voted for the man. Unfortunately McChrystal is not only very right and has very good ideas but the timing of this is 2 years too late. At this point, politically, this plan is close to suicide, no self respecting Dem who want re-election can support it. Bush's wars are becomming Obama's wars.

I honestly think the best we can hope for with A-stan is enough stability/instablity to keep the Taliban from taking over completely. That is a very long term to prospect and will require us to commit more people, but we may never be able to "fix" what is wrong over there.

[weissman]

I think the risks of backing out of Afganistan far out weigh the risks of finishing the job.

Imagine we back out and it becomesa ten times worse