Afghanistan is still in my you broke it you bought it category. We must eventually leave, but while we’re still there we must do everything we can to at least undo the harm to which we contributed.

Precisely what damage do you believe we did? Did/do we owe them that for selling all their drugs here?

Maybe they would be getting off easy if we just left…them in their poverty and despair and then made opium legal here, so they would have a much lower profit-margin (if any).

Remember too, our Constitution says nothing about nation-building or helping any non-Americans. Our rationale for being there is self-defense, not to help ‘em out.

OTOH, we do help nations around the globe for various self-interest reasons. What’s our self-interest in helping Afghanistan?

I can see us being there to help Pakistan in their war, but if we’re not there to burn the poppy crop, then what’s our purpose? An oil&gas pipeline? I don’t remember Obama talking about that and I can’t see that as a reason the American public would accept for occupying a foreign country.

LOL 707

I think wars tend to destroy a country and then with luck it’s rebuilt better. Isn’t that a much better description of what happened to Germany?

In Afghanistan our goal is/was to destroy Al Qaeda (and the Taliban to the extent they got/get in our way) and to help the Pakistanis to fight the Taliban which serves their purpose and helps reassure us the Taliban won’t get within a mile of any nukes. The idea of building a modern Afghan country or government seems like a stretch.

1?
3- How did you figure out the age, sex, or affiliation of the people killed in the missile strikes?
4-What indiscriminate bombing? When? Where?
6-Surely, you don’t mean to suggest that the 600,000 isn’t inclusive of Afghans.
8- Goofy.
BTW-Goofier.

First, you have to disregard everything Obama says about anything because even if he means it when he says it, no one can safely assume that he will not change his mind.

Second, to discover his actual intent, you must ignore what he says and watch what he does.

Third, he dramatically increased the number of Hellfire missile attacks by pilotless drones on both sides of the Pakistan border, but mostly in Pakistan to levels far exceeding what happened during the Bush Administration. Appears most of the victims are innocent women and children with an occasional suspected insurgent or two thrown in. We don’t know if they really were insurgents or Taliban based on our government’s atrocious record of indefinitely detaining innocent people to indulge its torture fetish. The Afghan government has to pay $2,000 per innocent bombing victim and often pays the victim’s family after verifying the claim while the military still insists (a) no one was killed and the family is lying because they want the money, (b) if anyone was killed, they were insurgents or Taliban and not innocent civilians, (d) if innocent people were killed, the insurgents or Taliban killed them before the missile exploded, if the missile exploded the number of dead civilians was far less than claimed, etc.

Fourth, the high civilian death toll from our indiscriminate bombing is turning the civilian population against us.

Fifth, Obama has no intention to rebuild Afghanistan because there aren’t any firm plans to do it and no materiel or contractors there to do the job.

Sixth, the military already has decided we need something like 600,000 troops to pacify and control the country because the NATO members of the so called coalition of the willing have left or are about to leave and there aren’t enough armed and trained Afghan Army and police to assist us.

Seventh, the new troops were sent to Helmand Province to take and hold a major oil pipeline. That’s about all they can handle right now.

Eighth, Obama’s real goal in Afghanistan after securing the oil pipeline, is to encircle Iran, demand they abandon their nuclear power plants and stop building nuclear bombs which he knows they aren’t building, and launch an invasion when they refuse to shut down their plants.

BTW, Obama also is aggressively pursuing a plan to encircle Russia.

Are you suggesting we go to war against every brutal dictatorship, every women-hating ideology (you’ve got a bit of a christianity problem with that one, too), every brutal regime?

This line of argument fails unless you are advocating american military intervention in upwards of twenty five nations from Somalia to Zimbabwe. So spare me, and tell me what AMERICANS spending blood and treasure in Afghanistan gets AMERICA. ‘Cause I’m all for global initiatives to solve the problems of impoverished and failing states, but the American military exists to address threats to American security. And as much as I agree with you that the subjugation of Afghan citizens under either the (Mullah Omar) Taliban or the Warlords is a BAD THING, it is NOT, repeat NOT a justification for an American military presence, and if you think it is, you’re going to have to be more strategic and less “empathetic” (sorry) in your justification…

mikey