I think it’s time we let some of these countries worry about their own problems. We have scores of jobless people in this country that want to work. We shouldn’t be spending a nickel to help other country’s people (most of whom hate us) when we have children in our own borders who go to bed hungry at night. If our government spent the money it’s using on foreign occupations in our own borders, instead, I can only imagine the difference it would make.

Our country is falling apart and we continue to spend billions of dollars on what is never going to be a ‘victory’. We can’t police these countries for the rest of eternity, and whether it’s now, or 10 years from now, these people will be killing each other again 5 minutes after we’re gone. They’re mentally ill. We’re talking about people who would stone their own sister to death because she was raped so that the family would not be dishonored.

Get the hell out of there. It’s a no win for the U.S. Stop trying to control the world. Enough of us were hurt in Vet Nam. Will this government ever learn?

Obama is no different than Bush when it comes too thinking about unemployment figures if everyone returned home. It would be devastating to this country to have another 100,000 unemployed and Mr. Wonderful President knows it as much as all the ones before him.

It’s time for this county to start thinking about spending on a fool proof defense system against attack from other countries. Our national guard is fighting our wars overseas, is that what they were intended to do?

Bin Laden has made a fool of our forces already. Get our people home and let them start working on a system that will stop any weapons attack to our country from abroad. It seems like a better idea to build our own steel and stone house instead of chasing after something that we can’t control.

Politics, politics and more politics. It’s a sad day when we are having our people die for a useless cause to save face for the politicians.

Kurt:
Do you realize the death toll that the US Federal Govt has caused? Are you kidding with this blog? Are you trying to make light of the bloody mess that US Federal Govt caused and is still causing in Afghanistan?

And B: We are the problem that Afghanistan has! We won’t go home and stop occupying their country. Why do you think they’re fighting back? Clue: To prevent the US Federal Govt from taking over their country.

Amen, b and Tom. This one is easy. Get out. Do not pass Go, do not collect $200. Get out. Now. today. Bring in the dogs, pee on the campfire, and declare this hunt over.

We learn nothing from either our futile history or others. Russia depleted its money and resources on Afghanistan and finally gave up. Why do we think we can do anything? The Taliban is stronger now, thanks to having the U.S. to mobilize and unite against, then they were pre-911. Get out. Get out NOW. And while we’re at it, get out of Iraq.

A thought — just a thought: Maybe we need to relinquish our spurious, self-proclaimed title of World Big Brother. Maybe the Muslim countries wouldn’t despise us so much if we’d get leave them alone, get our bases out of their lands and stop disrespecting their cultures. And while we’re at it, stop expecting them to embrace Western values, which they never will. Just a thought.

You’re asking US??? LOL First off, we should listen to the best military minds as the previous admin did NOT and look where it got us. A wrong war in the wrong area. I hate to call that a mistake, but rather an agenda played out with the worst consequences possible. We are spread too thin. That’s obvious. You’d be hard put to get folks off of their butts and fighting without a massive draft. This country is broke and owes “former enemies” billions. And we have the banking crisis in its infancy with more chicanry to be revealed into 2010. Anybody want to take bets as to how long the conservative wealthy can get the middle class repubs to remain apologists for that big mess? It’s in god’s hands now. God help us all!

The best move for the United States would be to get out of the country. Given that leaving is unlikely to happen since the Democratic party platform calls for raising soldiers and winning in Afghanistan we will have to operate with what is given. So comes time for strategy. Face it Afghanistan itself is mostly a worthless collection of rocks good only for the 30 million people that suffer in poverty there. So we do not want to be involved in nation building. We would like to win the hearts and minds but that is very unlikely and nearly impossible. We could win with ground forces but they are vulnerable to attack on the ground. It has been proven time and again that the United States Army can be attacked on the ground. Our men are easily killed on the ground. Anybody’s ground forces can be attacked on the ground that is just a fact of military life. Of course we win the body count but the people will tire of the struggle. We can use technology to inflict harm on our enemies this we can do. This is our strength. We can let our enemies regroup over the border and attack from the air with success. But in the end we will leave and the sooner the better. We really are just entangled with these people so others can go joyriding around the world. If we did not let those people into our hemisphere they would not be here to attack us.

I’m the one that always brings up the political parties on every issue. However, in my lifetime which is starting to go back a farther than I like to think about, I can’t go back and blame any one party. Maybe you can bring up more facts than I can remember to prove otherwise.

You have to remember that Obama was going to pull out of Iraq as soon as he was elected. That hasn’t happened, although he has reduced the number of troops in Iraq, he has only attempted to increase the number in Afghanistan. It seems that war or conflict is a part of politics no matter what party is in control.

In vietnam the question was always, why are we here? The common people didn’t want the U.S. involved. Their lives were not going to change much one way or the other no matter who was running their country. I think that question exist today when we attempt to push our culture and lifestyle on others.

If we were to manage our neighborhoods much like the politicians try to manage other countries, we would all have a bunch of broken windows, slashed tires, many hit trash cans, mailboxes and bags of dog crap set on fire at your front door. Another words, leave people alone to live as they wish.

I find understanding what’s actually going on in Afghanistan to be a fairly time-consuming process these days…. I found this article by Ambassador Robert Finn, who is the former U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan, which gives a pretty good overview of the situation. I highly recommend it:

http://blog.psaonline.org/2009/10/21/afghanistan-still-wrong-after-all-these-years/

The Afghanistan/Pakistan parallels with Vietnam/Cambodia are obvious. Eventually we will declare victory and withdraw regardless of the situation on the ground. Twenty five years down the road the outcome will be the same. Our troops deserve better. Stop putting political careers ahead of American lives.

If it is essential for U.S. national defense, declare war constitutionally and go big. Otherwise, stay home.

Walk away. Admit we blew it and go. It’s too far broken to fix. Also, it’s my observation of US history that the US military does it’s best under two general situations: true defense of the Republic and when they are fighting a war of Liberation.

Serving as occupiers or regime changers has rarely, if ever, worked very well.