Hearts and Minds

"Yes I think we need more troops [in Afghanistan]. I have been saying that for over a year now, and I think we have to do it as quickly as possible.... We cannot separate Afghanistan from Iraq, because what our commanders have said is we don't have the troops right now to deal with Afghanistan. So I would send two to three additional brigades to Afghanistan.... We have four times more troops [in Iraq] than we do in Afghanistan, and that is a strategic mistake."

Then presidential candidate Barack Obama uttered these words during a debate just this past October, apparently a lot has changed in a year. President Obama ran on the premise that Iraq was the bad war, the war of choice, while Afghanistan was the “good war” the righteous war against those that plotted and launched the terrorist attacks that claimed the lives of 2751 innocent people. While I was no supporter of Obama during the campaign, I did agree with his premise that the war in Afghanistan must be won, decisively.

Shortly after his his inauguration it seemed as if taking the fight to Al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan wasn't going to be a lofty campaign promise. On February 17th President Obama signed the order to send 17,000 more troops (8,000 Marines, 9,000 Army) to Afghanistan. This was an even 50% troop increase over the 34,000 current American forces in country. It seemed as though the era of the Taliban and Al Qaeda home videos in this region may finally be coming to an end.

On June 10th Obama got his choice of commander in Afghanistan, General Stanley McChrystal, confirmed by the Senate. By the end of June operation Khanjar (strike of the sword) was in full force and full ownership of the war in Afghanistan belonged to Obama. With Generals in Afghanistan adopting a new “hearts and minds” strategy, things have gone from bad, to worse, to unacceptable. For those of us that are familiar with military history we understand the failures of the “hearts and minds” strategy in Vietnam.

I got an uneasy feeling in my stomach on the 4th of July when I read that Brigadier General Lawrence Nicholson, commander of 2nd Marine Force Expeditionary Brigade (Task Force Leatherneck), told his troops:

"Our focus is not the Taliban, our focus must be on getting this government back on its feet."

“We're doing this very differently, we're going to be with the people. We're not going to drive to work. We're going to walk to work."

“We're not going to measure your success by the number of times your ammunition is resupplied... You're going to drink lots of tea. You're going to eat lots of goat. Get to know the people."

It's at this point that I shouldn't have to, but I feel compelled to say that I have nothing but the utmost love and respect for our troops. Although I never served in our armed forces I donate to veterans charities and do whatever I can to lobby for them to have the best training, equipment, pay and compensation for injuries. I cannot express in words the respect and gratitude I have for those that serve, this is why what follows makes my blood boil.

August 30th General McChrystal submitted a 66 page report to Defense Secretary Robert Gates calling for the deployment of 30,000 – 40,000 more troops to be deployed to Afghanistan. This report was leaked September 20th to Bob Woodward of the Washington Post. Needless to say that this set off a firestorm in the media and in Washington as McChrystal sits accused of politicizing the war. It wasn't until after this report was leaked that it was learned that McChrystal only met once with Obama since he was appointed in June. We also learned that Obama only held one meeting in regards to Afghanistan the first three weeks of September. Obama put the war on the back burner, while he was out pushing for socialized medicine, the hardest hit on the subject of Afghanistan came from McCrystal himself in his report:

"Failure to gain the initiative and reverse insurgent momentum in the near-term (next 12 months) -- while Afghan security capacity matures -- risks an outcome where defeating the insurgency is no longer possible,"

For those that can't read between the lines, what he's talking about is loosing the war in Afghanistan. I'm not sure if he's talking about a Somalia style loss where we simply give up and start pulling out troops and surrender the nation as a failed state, or if he's talking about a Vietnam style “Last Chopper out of Saigon”. One thing is for sure though our formerly tough talking President has suddenly lost his voice, and possibly his nerve.

What about all that tough talk from the president during the campaign and into the beginning of his administration? Where did all that direct talk go? Speaking with John King on CNN's State of the Union on September 20th, the day before the leaked report broke, put it clearly:

"I don’t want to put the resource question before the strategy question, Because there is a natural inclination to say, if I get more, then I can do more. But right now, the question is, the first question is, are we doing the right thing? Are we pursuing the right strategy?"

To those that don't speak politician, this is a dodge and a desperate attempt to kick the can down the road. Much to his credit McChrystal kept the pressure on him and FINALLY on October 3rd, after being humiliated by the Olympic Selection committee, Obama met with McChrystal for a total of 25 minutes. While no details of the meeting were released to the public, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said the meeting “was very productive”

It's worth mentioning at this point that the entire month of September has gone by since the President's hand picked General asked for reinforcements. August may have been the deadliest month for Americans in Afghanistan since the inception of this war 8 years ago this month with 51 honored dead, but 37 of our sons and daughters made the ultimate sacrifice in the month of September. That's 37 Americans that may possibly still be alive if our President would either commit to winning this war like he promised to so many months ago or cut our losses and get the troops out of dodge.

Now I sit here with two news articles before me. The first from the Associated Press,

“8 US troops die; new deadliest month in Afghan war”:

KABUL – Eight American troops were killed in two separate bomb attacks Tuesday in southern Afghanistan, making October the deadliest month of the war for U.S. forces since the 2001 invasion to oust the Taliban.

That brings the death toll this month up to 56. Coupled with the brave men and women who died last month and we have 93 mothers, fathers, sons and daughters that will not be coming home, all of whom have died since their commander called for reinforcements. I implore you to look at the chart below. You'll see that this is the same number of servicemen we lost in all of 2005, or more then we lost in 2001-2003 combined.




The second article I have in front of me is compliments of Andrew Breitbart,

“Obama says he will not rush Afghanistan decision”:

"While I will never hesitate to use force to protect the American people or our vital interests, I also promise you this—and this is very important as we consider our next steps in Afghanistan: I will never rush the solemn decision of sending you into harm's way," Obama said Monday during a visit to Naval Air Station Jacksonville. "I won't risk your lives unless it is absolutely necessary."

Now I know why Obama is continually kicking the can down the road with Afghanistan. He needs the support of his leftist precincts in order to get his Socialized Medicine passed. We all know that the left in this country is opposed to war no matter the justification for it. My question for President Obama, "Is the healthcare bill worth it?" Is his dream of some utopian medical insurance system back home worth the blood of our finest citizens abroad? If the latest version of ObamaCare dies on the Senate floor then how many lives will have been sacrificed for nothing, and if by some miracle the bill does pass, please remember those that paid the ultimate sacrifice so the President could get better publicity and more support back home. Right now we're averaging about 1 hero per hundred pages and that ratio is only going to get worse.