December 22, 2008

Can you refresh my memory about "change" again?

Good thing is the lefties are going to be livid. And that always warms the cockles of my heart...

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) - The top U.S. military officer said Saturday that the Pentagon could double the number of American forces in Afghanistan by next summer to 60,000 - the largest estimate of potential reinforcements ever publicly suggested.

Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said that between 20,000 and 30,000 additional U.S. troops could be sent to Afghanistan to bolster the 31,000 already there.

This year has been the deadliest for U.S. forces in Afghanistan since the 2001 invasion to oust the Taliban for hosting al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden. Suicide attacks and roadside bombs have become more dangerous, and Taliban fighters have infiltrated wide swaths of countryside and now roam in provinces on Kabul's doorstep.

U.S. commanders have long requested an additional 20,000 troops to aid Canadian and British forces in two provinces just outside Kabul and in the south. But the high end of Mullen's range is the largest number any top U.S. military official has said could be sent to Afghanistan.

Posted by George Moneo at December 22, 2008 11:00 AM

Comments

Don't want to sound like a contrarian here, or second guess Mullen or McKiernan but more troops, in it of themselves, are not the solution in Afghanistan...

To extrapolate from the both the successes and failures of strategy in Iraq would be a mistake. Afghanistan is different in so many ways...

Since the era of Alexander the Great, many an empire has lost or have not been able to quell that land.

The SWAT/NWFP is particularly difficult and that new regime in Pakistan does not lend credibility to the struggle needed.

Posted by: Carlos Echevarria [TypeKey Profile Page] at December 22, 2008 12:47 PM


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