California Conservative

According to this BBC article, it only took 60 days for President Obama’s plan to abandon Afghanistan surfaced:

“What we’re looking for is a comprehensive strategy [for Afghanistan],” President Obama told the CBS programme 60 Minutes on Sunday. “There’s got to be an exit strategy. There’s got to be a sense that this is not a perpetual drift.”

WRONG MOOSEBREATH!!! There’s got to be a sense of perpetual vigilance and perpetual focus. That comes from this simple strategy: We win. They get annihilated. Anything less is unacceptable.

Then-Sen. Obama spent the campaign telling audiences that Iraq was a mistake because “it diverted resources away” from “the real war on terror” in Afghanistan.

Exit strategies are for those who want to fight halfheartedly. It’s a strategy if you’re content with one Vietnam-like engagement after another. That’s a strategy for losers. That strategy’s only been used by Democrats.

I’m sure liberals will talk about this point in the Powell Doctrine:

Is there a plausible exit strategy to avoid endless entanglement?

There’s only one problem with citing only this portion of the Powell Doctrine: it’s citing only one part of a much bigger doctrine:

• Is a vital national security interest threatened?
• Do we have a clear attainable objective?
• Have the risks and costs been fully and frankly analyzed?
• Have all other non-violent policy means been fully exhausted?
• Is there a plausible exit strategy to avoid endless entanglement?
• Have the consequences of our action been fully considered?
• Is the action supported by the American people?
• Do we have genuine broad international support?

It’s amazing how quickly things change when exit strategy is put into context. Put in its proper context, it’s more likely a warning against fighting without a plan or the intent of winning. It certainly doesn’t imply setting timetables for withdrawal. It’s shameful to think of it as a rationalization for abandoning a valiant ally like Hamid Karzai.

Thus far, I’d sum up President Obama’s foreign policy actions like this:

Court our enemies and abandon our allies.

In other words, a Jimmy Carter repeat. Those of us who were of voting age remember how ineffective those policies were.

Mr Obama, who last month ordered the deployment of an additional 17,000 US troops to Afghanistan, acknowledged that military force alone would not be enough to achieve Washington’s objectives, which included the defeat of Taleban and al-Qaeda militants.

Military force won’t rebuild Afghanistan but rebuilding Afghanistan isn’t possible until we’ve annihilated the Taliban and al-Qa’ida. If there’s a lesson learned in Iraq that must be transferred to Afghanistan, it’s that it’s imperative to dramatically improve security on the ground if we’re serious about rebuilding.

Thus far, that concept seems lost on the Obama administration.

Technorati Tags: War On Terror, President Obama, Iraq, Jimmy Carter, Hamid Karzai, Afghanistan, Appeasement, Iran, Powell Doctrine, Vietnam, Hamid Karzai, National Security

Cross-posted at LetFreedomRingBlog

This entry was posted on Monday, March 23rd, 2009 at 9:04 am and is filed under Author: Gary Gross, Foreign Policy, Iran, Iraq, Middle East, Military, Obama, Terrorism. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.