Tag Archive | afghanistan

Obama is Re-evaluating Afghanistan War Strategy

Sep22

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For weeks, military officials have been laying the groundwork to request additional troops. Army Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, the top U.S. and allied commander in Afghanistan, warned in a classified assessment that the Afghan mission risked failure if more troops were not sent. A declassified version of McChrystal’s assessment became public after it was leaked to the Washington Post website this week.

In part, the shift in the White House stance came after Obama ordered 21,000 additional U.S. troops to help with last month’s Afghan national election, a ballot widely seen as fraudulent. But the debate goes deeper than troop levels.

Obama has questioned whether McChrystal’s broad counterinsurgency strategy — combating corruption, improving government and economic development — is worth committing the extra troops it requires.

Appearing on CNN on Sunday, Obama asked, “Are we pursuing the right strategy?” On NBC, he said he would expand the counterinsurgency effort only if it contributed to the goal of defeating Al Qaeda.

“I’m not interested in just being in Afghanistan for the sake of being in Afghanistan . . . or sending a message that America is here for the duration,” Obama said.

After Obama approved the strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan in March, military officials moved to implement a counterinsurgency approach. At the same time, Pentagon officials replaced the former top Afghanistan commander, Gen. David D. McKiernan, with McChrystal.

McChrystal had led special operations forces against Al Qaeda leaders in Iraq and Afghanistan. But he quickly outlined a strategy to expand efforts to protect the Afghan people from the Taliban and other insurgent groups.

“He, of all our military leaders, understands the Al Qaeda threat,” said a former military official who has advised the Obama administration on Afghan policy. “When he comes back with a broad-based, counterinsurgency mission, it is extraordinarily credible.”

It is not yet clear how many more troops McChrystal’s strategy would require.

But several top administration officials have harbored doubts about the wisdom of a stepped-up counterinsurgency plan.

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Bin Laden Describes Obama as “Powerless” to Stop the Afghan War

Sep14
Osama Bin Laden - Dang, how come we cannot find this man?!?!?

Osama Bin Laden - Dang, how come we cannot find this man?!?!?

(AOL News) CAIRO -Al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden described President Barack Obama as “powerless” to stop the war in Afghanistan and threatened to step up guerrilla warfare there in a new audiotape released to mark the anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks in the United States.

In the 11-minute tape, addressed to the American people, bin Laden said Obama is only following the warlike policies of his predecessor George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney and he urged Americans to “liberate” themselves from the influence of “neo-conservatives and the Israeli lobby.”

The tape was posted on Islamic militant Web sites two days after the eighth anniversary of the 2001 suicide plane hijackings. The terror leader usually addresses Americans in a message timed around the date of the attacks, which sparked the U.S.-led war in Afghanistan the same year, and then in Iraq two years later.

Bin Laden said Americans had failed to understand that al-Qaida carried out the attacks in retaliation for U.S. support for Israel. If America reconsiders its alliance with the Jewish state, al-Qaida will respond on “sound and just bases.”

The Saudi construction magnate’s son-turned “holy warrior” and his deputies have frequently sought to wrap al-Qaida in the Palestinian cause, seeking to draw support in the Arab world, where the issue is one of the public’s top concerns.

“You are waging a hopeless and losing war for the benefit of others, a war the end of which is not visible on the horizon,” he said, according to a translation of the tape Monday by SITE Intelligence Group, a terrorist-monitoring firm, and by The Associated Press.

If Americans realized the extent of the suffering “suffering from the injustice of the Jews … you will realize that both our nations are victims of the policies of the White House,” which he described as “a hostage” to interest groups and companies.

The message was issued late Sunday by al-Qaida’s media wing, Al-Sahab, in a video in which the audiotape plays over a still picture of bin Laden. IntelCenter, another company that monitors terrorist propaganda, said the message is the 49th release by Al-Sahab in 2009. Al-Sahab is averaging one release every five days so far in 2009, IntelCenter said.

August May Be Deadliest Month for U.S. Troops in Afghanistan

Aug27

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(ABC News) US death in Afghanistan ties August for deadliest month of 8-year war with 44 US troops lost

A U.S. service member died Thursday in a militant attack involving a roadside bomb and gunfire, a death that pushed August into a tie with July as the deadliest months of the eight-year war.

The death brings to 44 the number of U.S. troops who have died in Afghanistan this month. But with four days left in the month, August could set a new record.

The number of roadside bombs deployed by militants across the country has skyrocketed, and U.S. forces have moved into new and deadlier areas of the country this summer, in part to help secure the country’s Aug. 20 presidential election.

Violence is on the rise in Afghanistan even as it falls in Iraq, where nearly twice as many U.S. troops are still based. Five U.S. troops have died in Iraq this month, three fewer than in July.

A statement from the NATO-led force in Kabul said the U.S. service member died in southern Afghanistan when the troop’s patrol responded to the bombing and gunfire attack. No other details were released. Thousands of new American troops are operating for the first time in Helmand and Kandahar, two of the country’s most dangerous provinces, in part to secure the country’s Aug. 20 presidential vote.

Reports of the militant death toll from Wednesday’s firefight varied widely. The spokesman of the governor of Paktika province said 12 militants died, while police said two were killed. The U.S. military did not report any deaths. It wasn’t clear why the tolls differed.

Obama Believes the Afghan War is ‘Fundamental’

Aug18

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PHOENIX | Owning an increasingly difficult struggle in Afghanistan, President Obama told 5,000 veterans to brace for a daunting and perhaps bloody period in a war the United States has no choice but to fight.

“This is not a war of choice; this is a war of necessity,” Mr. Obama told a gathering of the U.S. Veterans of Foreign Wars, the nation’s largest military veterans group. “This is not only a war worth fighting; it is fundamental to the defense of our people.”

“The insurgency in Afghanistan didn’t just happen overnight, and we wont defeat it overnight,” Mr. Obama said. “This will not be quick. This will not be easy.”

The Obama administration is in the midst of an escalation in Afghanistan, with 62,000 American troops now on Afghan soil, including 21,000 whom he dispatched as part of a “surge.” The president’s speech appeared in part to be aimed at preparing the country for the rough road ahead.

As he prosecutes the Afghanistan war, Mr. Obama said, he will carefully look after the needs of returning troops and work to eliminate wasteful spending that he thinks is keeping the Pentagon from using the funds it needs to get the job done.

The Afghanistan war, he said, “will be based on good intelligence and guided by a sound strategy. … I will give you a clear mission, defined goals and the equipment and support you need to get the job done.”

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