Arizona’s twin embarrassments want no exit strategy for Afghanistan

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

After eight years of war, Afghanistan remains a failed state.

Bush puppet Hamid Karzai is barely the mayor of Kabul; he has no control over the Afghan countryside. Voice of America Newsreported that the Taliban have a "permanent presence" in 80 percent of Afghanistan. "Permanent presence" in a province is defined as one or more insurgent attacks – lethal and non-lethal – per week. Tabina Control Spreads in Afghanistan (September 11, 2009).

Political corruption is rampant. President Karzai's brother Ahmed Wali Karzai is a suspected player in the country’s booming illegal opium trade, and gets regular payments from the CIA. The agency pays Mr. Karzai for a variety of services, including helping to recruit an Afghan paramilitary force that operates at the C.I.A.’s direction in and around the southern city of Kandahar, Mr. Karzai’s home. NYT: Karzai's brother said to be paid by CIA – The New York Times

The recent presidential election was a farce. The first round of balloting was marked by massive electoral fraud. The run-off election was canceled and Hamid Karzai declared the winner by default after the U.S. convinced Abdullah Abdullah to withdraw. Karzai declared Afghan president – POLITICO.com The Karzai government lacks any legitimacy both within Afghanistan and abroad.

Against this backdrop, President Barack Obama will announce a new strategy for Afghanistan on Tuesday at West Point. "After eight years, some of those years in which we did not have, I think, either the resources or the strategy to get the job done, it is my intention to finish the job," Obama said at a news conference with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. Obama Says Will "Finish The Job" In Afghanistan – NYTimes.com Obama is expected to commit more than 30,000 additional troops to Afghanistan on Tuesday.

Arizona's twin embarrassments, Neoconservative war mongers John McCain and Jon Kyl have already weighed in.

Sen. McCain appeared on Faux News with Greta van Susteren last week, who asked the senator what he thought of reports that President Obama plans to announce his intention to send 34,000 additional troops to Afghanistan. Think Progress » John ‘100 Years’ McCain: Afghanistan Policy Needs Less Focus On ‘An Exit Strategy’:

McCain said he’s not concerned about how many troops Obama is sending, he just wants to succeed — regardless of whether we have an exit strategy or not:

VAN SUSTEREN: What do you think about that? Is that a decision that — that you think is a wise one or do you want the full 40,000 that was originally requested?

MCCAIN: Well, I’m not so much concerned about the number because I understand that it may be additional allied troops to help out, too. I’d like to look at the overall strategy. I would like to see the emphasis on succeeding, not on an exit strategy.

Greta, the exit strategy takes care of itself once you succeed just as it did in Iraq. But I’d like to hear the whole thing. I hope the president will make the right decision here. And I would like to support him if he does.

Watch it:

At least McCain is consistent; an exit strategy for the war in Iraq has been of little concern to him as well. When running for president, the Arizona senator and fervent Iraq war supporter said he would “be fine with” the U.S. military staying in Iraq for “a hundred years” and later “excitedly declar[ed] that U.S. troops could be in Iraq for ‘a thousand years’ or ‘a million years,’ as far as he was concerned.”

Arizona's other embarrassment, Jon Kyl, appeared on Faux News Sunday and made the following points:

President Obama, constitutionally the Commander-in-Chief, should "follow the recommendations of Gen. Petraeus and Gen. McChrystal" who asked for more than 40,000 troops for Afghanistan. (Do you think that Sen. Kyl would dare suggest that President McCain should be subordinate to his generals? Such contempt for the Constitution and a democratically elected president).

"Let's don't have talk of a phased deployment… you need to put in everybody you can as quickly as you can and deliver a knock-out punch to the enemy." (Where was this strategy eight years ago when it would have made a difference? "Osama bin laden was unquestionably within reach of U.S. troops in the mountains of Tora Bora when American military leaders made the crucial and costly decision not to pursue the terrorist leader with massive force, a Senate report says." Senate report: Bin Laden was 'within our grasp')

"Secondly, talk of an exit strategy is exactly the wrong way to go… I certainly hope the president doesn't do that because all that does is signal to the enemies and also to our allies, to the folks in Pakistan as well as the Afghanis, that we're not there to stay until the mission is accomplished, and they've got to know that we will be there for them until the mission is accomplished or they'll make other arrangements and it won't be to our benefit." (Now that kind of talk is "reminiscent of Vietnam," senator).

Watch it:

Mike Wallace later described President Obama's dual policy as one of "escalation and exit."

After describing his visits to the region, Sen. Kyl concluded "that's why I think all of this talk about an exit strategy is really dangerous. It tells the Taliban just to lay low until we leave, and it does not encourage the Europeans for example, our other NATO allies, that this is a cause worth sending their troops to support."I really hope that we can stay away from all this talk about an exit strategy"… If we continue to hear this talk about an exit strategy, then as much as we want to support it it's not going to succeed… [he needs] to try to dissuade people from talking about eventually leaving, we cannot leave until the mission is accomplished."

George W. Bush never had an exit strategy for Iraq and Afghanistan, and senators McCain and Kyl want to keep it that way. A new "hundred years" war may be good for the military-industrial-congressional complex and Neoconservative fantasies about a Pax Americana empire, but this is not supporting our troops and their families who fight our wars. Multiple combat deployments is an abuse of our troops and their families. It is destroying our military readiness and leaving the U.S. more vulnerable. The financial cost of these wars is bankrupting this country and is lost opportunity costs for other critical needs in this country.

If you support our troops and their families you understand that there must always be a clearly defined mission and an exit strategy – something senators McCain and Kyl neither understand nor appreciate.