13
Oct

PBS Frontline: ‘Obama’s War’, Naw…Our War

   Posted by: Pat   in Uncategorized

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This afternoon I watched the half hour preview of PBS Frontline’s ‘Obama’s War’ and it was riveting.  The small portion shown focuses on a group of Marines attempting to protect a village of civilians in Helmand Province.  Their amazing efforts are awe inspiring to me.  My only problem with PBS’s job is the name.  The war in Afghanistan is not just ‘Obama’s’, it is ‘our’ war.  The United States will win or lose the war.  If one wants to designate the war to anyone specific, it would be these marines doing the fighting, peacemaking, and dying.

And here’s a 30 second preview:
YouTube Preview Image
Also worth checking out (reading necessary):
Michael Scheuer’s ‘Get Nasty or Get Out‘ in Afghanistan.  He gets to the point pretty quick doesn’t he?
Japan’s new government is leaning toward ending its supplying of fuel and water to US forces in Afghanistan.  Not a good sign.
India and the United States held major joint military manuevers today, a positive sign of the two powers growing partnership.  More about this in the next GPP Rankings.
I have lots more to share, but we’ll have to wait.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 13th, 2009 at 7:16 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

2 comments so far

micraig
 1 

Since he didn’t start the war it can hardly be Obama’s war. But because it started on Bush’s watch does not signify that is his war either. I agree that this is our war. We set out upon this course of action to attempt to stop Al Qaeda in its efforts to attack the US. I am concerned because now the war seems to have equated the Taliban with Al Qaeda and as I understand it, they are not a single entity. I am further concerned because Afghanistan is known as the “graveyard of empires.” Has the war with Al Qaeda morphed into a war with the Taliban? And is this war even winnable? Is Afghanistan the primary sanctuary for Al Qaeda or is that sanctuary actually Pakistan? I don’t see any good options here.

No questions that our soldiers are doing a wonderful job and I appreciate your support of them!

October 14th, 2009 at 9:19 am
Pat Frost
 2 

Your three final questions should take a whole post for me to answer (like I or anyone else’s knows it!), but the one thing that does trouble me is the administration’s growing separation of the Taliban and Al Qaeda. Yes, they should be separated and treated differently for many good reasons, but there is one central reason to be afraid of taking this too far. The two groups share largely the same goals: 1. get rid of the US/NATO 2. destroy the Kabul government 3. Bring back their Islamic Emirate. I hope i don’t need to remind our readers what happened the last time this occurred. Taliban leader Mullah Omar choose the suicidal action of protecting Osama and his cadre in 2001 and one should be weary of such a callous decision. I would think he’d do it again. This is an unacceptable outcome to me. But I think the Obama administration understands this and they are just trying to bring back moderate Taliban members and groups, though these have been hard to find except in academic and policy papers.

I suggest reading these warnings….

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2009/10/12/go_big_or_go_home

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10/13/AR2009101302796.html

October 14th, 2009 at 8:42 pm

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