In my opinion, we’ve achieved one of the biggest aims of the reason why NATO was in Afghanistan in the first place, which was the marginalisation of Al Queda, and the kill or capture of Bin Laden.
The more NATO stays there, I predict the calls for withdrawal will become louder, and the narrative of it will be well Osama is dead, there’s no need for you to be around anymore. Simplistic but highly effective.
Now I am not calling for an immediate withdrawal, but considering some of the political legitimacy was tied up in the fact OBL was in Afghanistan, and he wasn’t, and Al Queda has been pretty much overshadowed by the resurgent Taliban, shouldn’t some framework now be immediately worked upon so that we can get out without leaving a similar scenario as to what happened in the 90’s?
We aren’t there to stop “crap like this” or to do any good in any way. The woman hating pedophiliac thugs we are supporting there are no better than the thugs we shoved aside to make room for them.
I don’t think ObL has been much of a factor in Afghanistan for quite awhile. I’ve wanted us out of there before, and I want us out now. The bigger threat is Mullah Omar, the leader of the Afghanistan Taliban, and he’s still out there. ObL’s death doesn’t change anything for me.
Umm…that happened while US forces had already been in the country for most of a decade. If we’re there to prevent things like that from happening, it apparently isn’t working.
We don’t seem to have a good rationale for bolting, at this point. I don’t see how ObL’s death really changes that equation. Now, if the Taliban are prepared to seriously sit down and negotiate a peace, that would be different. But, politically, I don’t see ObL’s death as giving the US an excuse to just leave, not considering the fact that Afghanistan is so unstable.
I agree with JM…I don’t want us to be there anymore. I was glad when we started pulling out of Iraq, and I’ll be glad when we pull out of Afghanistan, and let them happily go back to killing each other, if that’s what they want. I just don’t see how it’s a likely outcome right now, simply because ObL is no longer with us.
We aren’t there with a good rationale either, we don’t really need a good one to leave. Just say “We got ObL, mission accomplished”, declare victory and go home. It’s not like some better excuse is going to come along.
Threat to who? Did they launch attacks outside their borders? Have they threatened the US homeland? We are thousands of miles from home attacking them. I can see why they are fighting us.
That is to say, there isn’t really any rational reason ObLs death should make a difference in staying or going. But I think Obama was pretty skeptical of the mission during the last round of policy discussions on Afghanistan the led to the recent troop increases, and given that those troop increases don’t seem to have been very successful, I can’t imagine he’s become less skeptical in the meantime.
So I think he’ll use the death of Osama as an opportunity to declare victory and leave, even if the war hasn’t really been “about” Osama for many years.
If you recall, the entire stated point of the war (and I mean 100%, not as one thing on a laundry list) was to bring bin Laden to justice. The justification has been removed.
The whole mess has suffered from a giant case of “mission creep” since then, and while I would love to see Obama pull back from it, I think the Administration has bought into it.
Exactly, in peoples mind, whether right or wrong, a large chunk of the reason for being there is gone, which is why I bet good money on people demanding more loudly for them to be withdrawn.
I don’t know where you make that stuff up, but the “Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Terrorists” resolution by congress authorizing the use of military force in Afghanistan states:
That definitely includes the Taliban, not just bin Laden and AQ. As long as the Taliban exist and have a potential return Afghanistan to a safe haven for terrorists, they are a threat to our National Security and we need to be there.
Afghanistan was attacked because it was harboring AQ. The US issued an ultimatum for the Taliban to hand over bin Laden. The Taliban refused. The US attacked.
That is it. Period. So what if remnants of the Taliban still exist? AQ in Afghanistan has been virtually eliminated. There are plenty of places around the world where AQ has found shelter, in particular Pakistan. Are we to invade them all?
