The Afghan War was, at its inception, a just war.
If the Taliban would not turn over bin Laden and those who plotted the mass murder of 3,000 Americans, we had a right to go in after him, as Woodrow Wilson had a right to send Gen. John Pershing into Mexico to find and kill Pancho Villa after he murdered Americans in New Mexico.
But after the defeat of the Taliban by the Northern Alliance, the overthrow of Mullah Omar and our failure to capture or kill bin Laden at Tora Bora, we decided to stay on and convert the most tribalized and xenophobic land on earth into an Islamic democracy and strategic ally.
We will soon enter the 10th year of this war. And though 100,000 U.S. and 50,000 NATO troops are committed, the Taliban are winning — because they are not losing. They are more numerous, more deadly and more resourceful than they have been since their ouster in 2001.
Even Gen. Stanley McChrystal said the war was a draw. And Biden says we have reached the limit of our commitment.
Thus, what we are looking at is endless bleeding, now running at 60 dead U.S. soldiers a month, with no American military or political leader willing to say when the bleeding will stop or the war will end.
And the home front is visibly eroding. A majority of Americans now believe the war is unwinnable or not worth the cost, and a growing minority in Congress wants out. Some NATO allies are departing. Others are setting deadlines for withdrawal.
As for the Afghans we leave behind, who committed themselves to America’s war, they will, when we depart, suffer the fate of the “harkis” in Algeria, the South Vietnamese army and boat people, and the Cambodians we left behind to the tender mercies of the Khmer Rouge.
Have the politicians, journalists and think-tank geniuses who dreamed up these wars suffered ignominy and disgrace?
Not at all. They are debating and devising a new war — with Iran.
This blog is no longer active as of October 31, 2011
