Were the wars on Iraq and Afghanistan the right response to 9/11 but badly executed? If not, what should the response have been? I don’t think the war against Afghanistan could have been won even with unbridled rules of engagement or using more troops. The weeds always come back.Ted Belmanby Daniel Pipes
Cross-posted from National Review Online, The Corner
Barack Obama’s announcement today that the
number of U.S. troops will be reduced to 9,800 by year’s end and to zero
two years later virtually declares that this war, which will have
lasted slightly over 15 years and nearly all of four presidential
administrations, will end in total American failure.
That’s because the Taliban and other Islamist
forces have already made a substantial comeback; because the
coalition-sponsored Afghan leaders have proven themselves corrupt and
inept; and because Americans and other Westerner populations remain
unconvinced that this war is worth their lives and treasury. As I have
often predicted, about both Afghanistan and Iraq, it’s only a matter of a
few more years before the impact of thousands of lives and trillions of
dollars devoted to their liberation will disappear with little more
than a trace.
Republicans are quick to jump on
Obama and blame him for this sorry state of affairs. But not me. The
two problems they point to – an inadequate number of troops to win and
an arbitrary deadline for the troops to withdraw – can both be traced
back to George W. Bush. He initiated the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq,
starved them of troops, and imposed a deadline for troop withdrawals
from Iraq as arbitrary as Obama’s for Afghanistan.
BHO & GWB: they made similar mistakes in Afghanistan & Iraq.
Only when Republicans take ownership of the problem that GWB created
and bequeathed to BHO can they regain credibility on foreign policy
issues. (May 28, 2014)Posted by Ted Belman
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