Afghanistan In a Downward Spiral
By Douglas Farah
The prospect of building a successful strategy in Afghanistan is getting more and more complicated. The government of Kyrgyzstan is going to close a key resupply center, the Manas Air base-largely, it seems, at the instigation of the Russians. (Guess whose side Russia is on?)
The broad policy reassessment underway seems to point to retreat on governance issues and an emphasis on the military hunt for the Taliban.
Obama said Tuesday night in an interview with NBC News' Brian Williams that there is already "convergence between myself and the Joint Chiefs and my national security team about what we have to do." Obama added that "there's a shared view that Afghanistan is getting worse, not getting better."
"Afghanistan is really hard," Obama told NBC. "And we're going to have to bring all the elements of American power to bear in order to solve the problems."
The Joint Chiefs' plan reflects growing worries that the U.S. military was taking on more than it could handle in Afghanistan by pursuing the Bush administration's broad goal of nurturing a thriving democratic government.
This could be recognition of reality-we do not have the time and resources to do a multi-pronged approach. My full blog is here.