Afghanistan's (and America's) Future

The war in Afghanistan is not going well.  It is like Iraq in some phases.  We can see the concern in today's James Carroll column in The Boston Globe.

So, I found this blog post at Chicago Boyz interesting:

Voices from many quarters are saying dire things about the American-led campaign in Afghanistan. The prospect of defeat, whatever that may mean in practice, is real. But we are so close to the events, it is hard to know what is and is not critical. And the facts which trickle out allow people who are not insiders to only have a sketchy, pointillist impression of the state of play. There is a lot of noise around a weak signal.

The blog is proposing to have a roundtable on what the results of an American defeat in Afghanistan might be in 2050.

This is not to say that I believe that the US backed Afghani government will fail and that we will be forces to withdraw, as were the Soviets, some 21 years ago.  But, war is an uncertain enterprise.  Mr James Carroll says "the Taliban has refused to cooperate with America’s Afghan strategy".  Well then, it is a bad strategy.  Strategy is about putting the other person in a corner and encouraging him to give up.  Mr Carroll is correct in noting that we are currently not doing well in that area.

Regards  —  Cliff