A couple of weeks ago, we reported on the death of a Brant Lake soldier, Jeremiah Monroe, killed in Kandahar, Afghanistan.<\/p>\n
Martha Foley also reported on the Canadian perspective, which is increasingly gloomy about the war and the prospects for aiding a culture so fundamentally different from ours. <\/p>\n
In the days since, the debate has heightened over where America should go next in this eight-year-old conflict. <\/p>\n
Is this Iraq, where a little more time and effort will buy us a kind of muddled, half-victory? Or is it Vietnam, unwinnable on almost any terms?<\/p>\n
My thought at this point is, neither. <\/p>\n
The United States is caught in the throes of something primal and tribal. We invaded in large part because that bitter conflict boiled over and contributed mightily to 9\/11.<\/p>\n
We also find ourselves protecting people who desperately need protection. I’m thinking primarily here of the women and girls of Afghanistan.<\/p>\n
Their treatment at the hands of the Taliban and Al Quaeda will be brutal. Abandoning them to such a fate is abhorrent to me.<\/p>\n
I’ve heard the joke from anti-war activists that if we leave, Afghanistan will slide back from the 11th century into the 7th century. <\/p>\n
The punchline, in theory, is that the situation is pretty much as bad as it can get. What are a few centuries, when you’re already in the Dark Ages?<\/p>\n
I think that’s wrong. I think any argument for pulling out has to confront the reality that the Taliban are nastier than anything we’ve seen in Sudan or Rwanda. <\/p>\n
People who advocated for more intervention in those conflicts should explain why we should abandon the Afghans to this brutal and Medieval set of clerics. <\/p>\n
Where do I come down? I think Afghanistan deserves more time and greater effort; and we should at long last give Afghanistan our full attention.<\/p>\n
It may be George W. Bush’s most lasting moral blunder that he diverted that attention from Afghanistan — a war of necessity — to Iraq, a war of choice.<\/p>\n
A renewed effort needs four elements to have a hope of success:<\/p>\n
1. An equal focus on security and nation building.
2. A full scale push by Americas diplomatic corps to improve the Afghani government.
3. An effort by the White House to articulate a full plan to the American people
4. A clear vision of what success will look like<\/p>\n
Afghanistan will never look like the West, or even like Turkey or Kuwait. But there is still a chance to prevent it from looking like Somalia or Cambodia.<\/p>\n
I think it’s our responsibility to try. Your thoughts? Post below.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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