Jeff Huber (at-Largely): Just Say No to McChrystal

[laststeamtrain]

October 08, 2009
Just Say No to McChrystal

Posted by Jeff Huber

President Barack Obama’s war council is meeting to consider Gen. Stanley McChrystal’s proposal to increase troop levels in Afghanistan by 10,000 to 40,000 troops. Nobody seems to be pondering why we have troops in Afghanistan at all.

President Obama has reportedly taken the option of withdrawing all our troops from Afghanistan off the table. Republican John McCain, who the Pentagon wishes had won the 2008 election, is shouting about the perils of taking “half measures” and wants Obama to give McChrystal everything he asks for. Blue Dog Democrat Ike Skelton has cautioned Obama against taking a “half-ass it and hope” approach.

The best measure we can take, though, is to start backing out from a bad situation.

Our mission in Afghanistan supposedly has something to do with countering international terrorism, but the various flavors of Taliban and other militant groups in that country aren’t international terrorists; they’re just hooligans with guns who want us to leave. McChrystal confesses he sees no sign of al-Qaeda in Afghanistan. National Security Adviser James Jones says the “maximum estimate” says al-Qaeda now has fewer than 100 fighters.

The logic boils down to We have to escalate or Afghanistan will fall back under control of the Taliban and they’ll let 100 or fewer terrorists back in the country. What unabashed piffle. Our lessons from the last eight years of woebegone war should have taught us a number of things:

Military force is the worst possible means of combating terrorism. As the analysts at the globally respected Rand Corporation stated in 2008, the best way to proceed in our so-called “war” on terror is with “a light U.S. military footprint or none at all.”

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http://www.atlargely.com/atlargely/2009/10/just-say-no-to-mcchrystal.html

[FiveGoodMen]

1. K&R

[tularetom]

2. One thing I've learned from all this - what would have happened had Humphrey been elected in 68

Pretty much the same thing that happened after Nixon was elected.

If you are a hammer everything looks like a nail to you.

If you are a general, every problem has only a military solution.