Apr 28 2009
Do we want to pour more money into war?
Last month, President Barack Obama announced he is sending 4,000 more soldiers (remember 20 percent are female) to assist 17,000 already in Afghanistan and this week Defense Secretary Robert Gates and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will speak before a Congressional appropriations committee to get another $83 billion to fund the anti- al Qaida fight.
The problem is no one is talking about repercussions in area countries such as its neighbor Pakistan. The fight will defintely be moving there, with little help from Pakistan.
“I think that the Pakistani government is basically abdicating to the Taliban and to the extremists,” Clinton said Tuesday.
Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai welcomed the additional help from Obama to train his country’s army and police force, saying in a statement Obama’s strategy “will bring Afghanistan and the international community closer to success.” We are not sure if Afghanistan is assisting terrorists, are we?
Obama said the situation in the region is “increasingly perilous,” more than seven years after the Taliban was supposedly removed from power in Afghanistan. Obama said the U.S. role will shift from military to diplomacy and humanitarian aid.
Will U.S. show of strength eliminate Afghanistan’s (and Pakistan’s) support for terrorism? According to the RAND Corporation, since 1968 only 7 percent of terrorist groups eliminated by outside forces ended because of military force. The others ended as a result of political reconciliation and intelligence work. In recent surveys by ABC and the BBC only 18 percent of Afghans favor an increase in the U.S. military presence.
Do we want to pour more money into a battle hundreds of years in the making? It will divert attention and money better used for domestic needs, and humanitarian and diplomatic foreign policies to make us safer. Troops and their families are taxed enough covering Iraq, Somalia, et al.
Call your senator on the appropriations committee chaired by Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii) to make your voice heard.
For more info: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/23/world/asia/23buner.html?th&emc=th
http://womenvets.today.com/wp-admin/www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29898698
