So does being Anti-War mean the Army should leave Afghanistan yesterday ?

[UndertheOcean]

Drop everything and just abandon the country to the barbaric Taliban ?

Must things be black and white ? If your arm is wounded you just cut it off ?

Surely the other option to a bloody and seemingly endless war in Afghanistan is not total abandonment of the country , does it have to be ?

There are no simple answers , and Obama is in a tough position on this issue.

[YOY]

1. They've had 8 years of non-Taliban rule to prepare.

If they cannot keep out the crazy theocrats themselves soverignly by now then the Taliban just won themselves a country. Help anyone get out before they do. Cause if the people of Afghanistan are willing to be ruled by religious fundementalists then they are getting the government they deserve.

If they are not ready by now then they will never be ready.

Pretty goddamn simple here and not in need of more psuedo-analysis.

We are not the world's policeman.

[LWolf]

2. It means that Obama has had 18 months to effect the removal of our troops,

and that he chose to escalate the war rather than wind it down. He's had plenty of time; the "drop everything and just abandon" meme is a false construct.

[Radical Activist]

3. It's not a simple issue.

We could spend more years in Afghanistan trying to set up a stable government and still have the country be taken over by an oppressive dictatorship. Leaving now may cause an injustice. Staying could cause a greater injustice and may not accomplish any positive goal.
:shrug:

[gratuitous]

4. Being anti-war is recognizing that military action is very poor tool

Military action sexy. It's noisy. It blows things up real good. But it's a piss-poor tool for doing anything constructive. If we had spent nine years and countless billions of dollars on practically any other approach to Afghanistan, I can’t guarantee that it would be a modern day Shangri-La, but it would almost surely be in better shape than what it is right now.

[VioletLake]

5. Good comment. n/t

[AlabamaLibrul]

6. In this case, yes, absolutely. (eom)

[Oregone]

7. Plenty of grey area

I'm all for leaving in 2 days, instead of yesterday. Thats called "pragmatism"

[dtexdem]

8. Not necessarily: today would suffice.

Oh yes, something needed to be done to defeat the barbaric Taliban. But that pooch was thoroughly screwed.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

9. There are other options to continuing a lost war.

There are regional powers in the area that have a decided interest in Afghanistan and certainly don't want the Taliban in power. Pakistan, India, Iran, and China. Involve them in a peace keeping process with other nations.

Escalating the war has, and will, solve nothing and will increase hostility to the occupiers and more instability in the region.

Involve the UN as potential peacekeepers and facilitators for reconstruction and establishing "safe havens" if necessary.

It is fruitless not to negotiate with Taleban and it's allies for an end to the war.

At this point the war is being fought,not for the hapless Afghans, but for political PR. It's long past time to end it.

[Dogtown]

10. We've created problems that we can't resolve.

The Afghan people need to self-determine. Killing more people and getting more of our own killed and maimed isn't going to solve anything.




Besides, a major reason for continuing the wars is economic. No-one wants to flood a market already saturated with job-hungry de-mobilized troops.

The Republicans are still in charge.

[rug]

11. Yeah, that's about right.

Certainly doubling down is not anti dumb war.

[NNN0LHI]

12. I have never claimed to be anti-war or a pacifist

I am anti-stupid war. I was completely against invading and occupying Afghanistan. For about one tenth of what we have spent so far we could have bought off every Afghan in the country and have convinced them to become more civilized towards their own people without setting one foot into that country. The country that empires go to die in.

But now that the warmongers got their way we have to extricate ourselves in some way that protects the people there who have been helping us and try to evoke some level of face saving after losing yet another stupid war.

Don

[EmeraldCityGrl]

13. Sure go ahead and try to transform Afghanistan into

whatever perceived utopia you have in mind. It will be at the expense of our own nation, economically, culturally, continued decline of infrastructure and
loss of international support and respect. It's not like eight years, thousands of American and Afghani civilian lives and trillion of dollars have put a dent in
changing the culture or how corrupt business is conducted there.

I thought I elected Obama to improve the lives of Americans. Americans that are in crisis beyond anything naive warmongers can possibly imagine. But
knock yourself out and enjoy the war that you watch from your TV screen or monitor...at least the tiny bit they allow you to actually see.

[kiva]

14. Or looking at it from another direction:

how long should we stay? What are the goals? Do we stay until the Taliban is eradicated? Until they move to another country and, if so, do we then pursue them across the border?

What if the Taliban leaves and the democratically elected government chooses to continue some of the practices of the Taliban? Should we overthrow the government and put one in place that is more to our liking?

Or the short answer: Yes, we need to get out now.

[midnight]

15. I think high unemployment, having children go without food,

, health care,or housing, banks collapsing, and no funding for education unless it is privatized here in American means the Army should leave Afghanistan Now. To me it is a no brainier- our infrastructure is crumbling here at home. Now, add to this no brainer decision, and then we have the severely injured soldiers who are being hidden in hospitals that are themselves falling apart. How many more indicators do those claiming we have to stay at war need? No matter how this war is being justified, the bottom line is. we can't afford to be in the business of war....

[abelenkpe]

16. For me?

Yes. Leave yesterday. They had more than enough opportunities and time to oust the taliban and drug lords. They have chosen not to. Bye.
And while we're at it we should leave Iraq too.

[LostinVA]

21. +1

[superduperfarleft]

17. Were you as concerned for the people living under Saddam's brutal regime? n/t

[damntexdem]

18. Nonsequitur: switch from Afghanistan to Iraq.

And actually, re Iraq, I am more concerned about the people who've died, as well as those who are living, through years of incompetent but murderous U.S. occupation. In fact, given the realities of the no-fly zones (which allowed considerable autonomy, especially for the Kurds in the north, but also for Shia in the south), Iraq WAS better off in the last years of Saddam than it was once the U.S. invaded.

[superduperfarleft]

20. The appeal to emotion in order to keep us mired down in Afghanistan is what I was responding to.

The "think of the poor people of Afghanistan before pulling out" not only ignores the fact that scores of civilians have died at NATO's hands, and illustrates the hypocrisy of so many on the "anti-war" left who seemed more concerned with being anti-Bush as opposed to anti-war.

So how about this, if the discussion requires that we only talk about Afghanistan: where were the "think of the people of Afghanistan" crowd before Bush invaded? I know there were many women's groups prior to 9/11 screaming into the wind about the plight of Afghan women, but were the people who now want to jump on their bandwagon in order to justify Obama's agenda also calling for a full-scale invasion prior to 9/11?

[LostinVA]

19. The Taliban pretty much never didn't have the country

Thanks to our Government the last 30 years.

[zipplewrath]

22. Doubling down wasn't one of them

He had alot of options presented to him that weren't the one you mentioned. He picked escalation.

[chrisa]

23. In simple terms, yes, abandon the country.

We have no obligation to be there. It's bankrupting us, and its an unwinnable war.

More will die if we stay than if we leave.

[Regret My New Name]

24. That same question was posed five years ago too... Not much has changed

at what point do you say that perhaps us being there is causing more harm? (if it is, I dunno.. I'm sure there are many compelling arguments on both sides) It's horrible position for the everyday regular Afghans though... There doesn't even appear to be an tangible goals that are being aimed for.

[Winterblues]

25. Naww let's "glass em"

:shrug: I loved it when Clinton got us out of Somalia, and the world didn't end..Imagine that....