With the health insurance reform fight occupying his attention, Pentagon brass have seized the opportunity to open a new front against President Obama.
The nation’s top military officer pushed back Tuesday against Democrats who oppose sending additional combat troops to Afghanistan, telling Congress that success would probably require more fighting forces, and certainly much more time.
That assessment by the officer, Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, stopped short of an explicit request for more troops. But it signals that the military intends to have a public voice in the evolving debate as many Democrats express reluctance to expand the war and President Obama weighs options.
Mullen is getting a big assist in the push for escalation from John McCain but so far the president is admirably resisting.
Mr. Obama said Monday that the public should “not expect a sudden announcement of some huge change in strategy,” and he pledged that the issue was “going to be amply debated, not just in Congress, but across the country before we make any further decisions.”
Secretary Gates however, not so much
Previously, Mr. Gates expressed apprehension over a force so sizable that Afghans would view the Americans as occupiers. Now, Mr. Morrell said, the defense secretary was taking to heart General McChrystal’s “explanation that it’s not so much the size of the force, but the behavior of the force that determines whether or not it is accepted by the Afghan people.”
General McChrystal is of course absolutely correct and therein lies the problem. How do you think Afghans view a foreign “Christian” force propping up acorrupt and illegitimate government?
The Aug. 20 ballot was racked by egregious voting fraud and ballot stuffing, international and Afghan election observers have said, throwing Afghanistan into an electoral crisis even as the Taliban gains ground in the rugged countryside.
Some Western officials fear the drawn-out process risks derailing American and NATO efforts to stabilize the country, by diminishing the government’s standing among Afghans and undermining support for troop increases in the United States and Europe, where disapproval of the eight-year-old war is rising.
Army Captain James Kearns Goodwin just back from Afghanistan has an Op-Ed
Yet this electoral chicanery pales in comparison to the systemic, day-to-day corruption within the administration of President Hamid Karzai, who has claimed victory in the election.
People were so incensed with the current government’s misdeeds that I often heard the disturbing refrain: “If Karzai is re-elected, then I am going to join the Taliban.”
If there is any entity more reviled in Afghanistan than the Karzai government and coalition forces, it is the Taliban, so I never took these desperate exclamations to be literally true. But these outbursts reveal a disgust with the current government so pronounced it cannot be dismissed. And the international community’s reluctance to fight corruption head-on has inextricably linked it with the despised administration. As we continue to give unequivocal support to a crooked government, our credibility is greatly diminished and the difficulty of our mission greatly increased.
You’d think this lesson was learned by now. After all it was disgust with the very warlords that Karzai has allied himself with, that helped the Taliban come to power in the first place. Those warlords replaced Najibullah a Soviet puppet no more legitimate than Karzai himself.
Beyond Afghanistan we have our sad history propping up illegitimate quislings most notably the corrupt Diem regime in Viet Nam that also stole an election. Remember how that worked out?