Are we losing in Afghanistan?
 

In Afghanistan IEDs have so demoralised the Brits and American troops that there is tremendous fear of putting boots on the ground. Every time the coalition comes up with an high tech solution for the IEDs the taliban finds a low tech way around it.

Now there is a concerted high tech effort to go after the network of people who finance and support the IEDS. I hope this makes an effective difference.

http://journey-world.com/2011/12/attacking-the-network/

Probably.

Dave

Losing? We lost it ages ago. We gave most of the country to drug dealers (Northern Alliance) and their sponsors (former soviet union -yes, we gave them what they couldn't get on their own). We have a fraction of the troops we need in the ground to do the job, and then we blame Pakistan for the problems.

There should have never been a "war" in afghanistan. It should have been a monster special forces attack right around September 12 or 13th. And then brought the boys back home again.

Removing the Taliban from power is nothing like winning the war. Bush's boneheads couldn't figure that out tho.

Were we ever winning?

But wasn't it Obama who escalate? Or surge?

He did, didn't he? So did Bush. Come to think of it, I have escalated and surged a few times myself. It's usually followed by a long nap.

Makes no difference, dousing a raging forestfire with a shot glass is an exercise in futility anyways. Whether you do it alone or have a hundred people helping.

Dave

O ye of little faith.

:)

I'm certain the surge was planned all along. So Obama is once again continuing Bush's failed policies. Yes we can believe in change :p

Hitting the Taliban and walking away would've been as successful as Clinton lobbing a few cruise missiles at training camps.

Pete

We could leave today or ten years from now and I afraid the same thing will happen once we are gone. A civil war between the large cities and the rural areas. Pashtuns, and the Tajiks to name a few of the close to twenty ethnic groups have a long history of not playing nicely.
Then add outside countries influencing events it is a mess that will keep giving up surprises.




Barney

Define winning.

Chas

Not losing???