President Obama’s Af-Pak war strategy

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

President Barack Obama has been consistent with his campaign promises and his plan for Afghanistan touched upon in this op/ed from July 2008 Barack Obama – Op-Ed – My Plan for Iraq - NYTimes.com:

Ending the war [in Iraq] is essential to meeting our broader strategic goals, starting in Afghanistan and Pakistan, where the Taliban is resurgent and Al Qaeda has a safe haven. Iraq is not the central front in the war on terrorism, and it never has been. As Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, recently pointed out, we won’t have sufficient resources to finish the job in Afghanistan until we reduce our commitment to Iraq.

As president, I would pursue a new strategy, and begin by providing at least two additional combat brigades to support our effort in Afghanistan. We need more troops, more helicopters, better intelligence-gathering and more nonmilitary assistance to accomplish the mission there. I would not hold our military, our resources and our foreign policy hostage to a misguided desire to maintain permanent bases in Iraq.

President Obama has now done what he said he would do. None of this should come as a surprise to anyone. Anti-war commentators who assert that the American people voted for Obama in 2008 to end the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are misrepresenting his positions, and misinterpreting the election results ("It's the economy, stupid.")

I will post the video of President Obama's speech at West Point outlining his Af-Pak war strategy, and post a link to the transcript. I will get around to analyzing the strategy in a later post. (Right now I am fighting an illness.)

Transcript of prepared Remarks by the President in Address to the Nation on the Way Forward in Afghanistan and Pakistan | The White House