When do we know we can leave?
I had thought President Obama was angling for a decisive blow again Al Queada and then an agreement with the Taliban that would require the Taliban to internally police Afghanistan so that Al Queda could not launch terrorist attacks from there. This week, though, Obama seems to talk about Al Queda and the Taliban as one and the same, much as Bush did.
But are they? Al Queda is a stateless terrorist group, the Taliban are a political group that happened to be in charge of the Afghan government in 2001. Yes, the Taliban are straight out of the middle ages and oppress women in their society. Nevertheless, why conflate the two groups? I know Bush did because he saw the invasion of Afghanistan as a way to install a puppet government headed by former Unocal employee Karzai. Bushco wanted to use this "opportunity" to further American business interests who had long wanted to construct a pipeline across Afghanistan.
Is Obama intent on supporting Karzai? I frankly don't care who runs Afghanistan so long as they do not provide safe harbor to AL Queda.
Shouldn't that be our goal, disrupt Al Queda and then agree with whoever runs Afghanistan that we will leave provided they then police the terrorists within their borders, otherwise we will stay or, if necessary, come back?