Afghanistan War
According to an article in the New York Times yesterday, “WASHINGTON — The top military commander in Afghanistan warns in a confidential assessment of the war there that he needs additional troops within the next year or else the conflict “will likely result in failure.”
What is missing here is a bit of the truth from the top Generals.
No matter how many more troops the USA pours into Afghanistan they are still going to fail. These career military officers by and large are smart and well educated. But their entire world view has become clouded due to the narrow mindset found among military people. The military culture teaches you to obey orders - maybe even to kiss ass, but certainly not to question the validity of what the top brass is saying.
They seem to have forgotten the lesson that the American military is incapable of being the world’s policeman. They failed in Korea and Vietnam, and they have failed almost every other place the politicians have sent them since WWII. This is not intended to in any way denigrate the US military. The USA spends many times more on warfare and killing than any other country, and we do have the world’s most lethal military. The U.S. military budget is almost equivalent to that of the rest of the world's defense spending combined, and is over eight times larger than that of China, the next biggest spender.
Any country would be foolish to ask their military to fight our military. Unfortunately almost none of the wars we have been involved in since WWII are situations where our guys in uniforms are fighting someone else’s guys in uniforms. In situations where our troops are battling people dressed in civilian clothing, and where our troops don’t even speak the local language, failure is an absolute certainty.
And last, Afghanistan may not be the biggest problem. Pakistan with its nuclear bombs may be the real worry. And the lunatic Muslims who knocked down the world trade center towers in New York City could easily decide to move their base of operations to some other country.
Bankrupting the USA by continuing to spend such massive amounts of money on the military without raising taxes to pay for these wars is short term thinking at its very worst. And since this is a democracy, all taxes going towards military hardware, private contractors, or the troops should be specifically labelled as "war taxes." That way they people will know where their money is going.
LINK: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/21/world/asia/21afghan.html?partner=rss&emc=rss
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