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Sunday, September 13, 2009

It's time to get out of Afghanistan.

How many more of their people do we have to kill? How many of the people we are killing there now were old enough 8 years ago to be considered responsible for 9/11? There comes a point when the Afghanis are simply fighting for the liberty of their citizens. How many American soldiers do we want to die trying to convince them that they might be wrong about that?

11 comments:

Thad Wasson said...

A majority of the American people have forgotten that our men and women are still fighting in Afghanistan. I propose a 30 cent gallon tax increase on all fuel to pay for this war. This will accomplish two things. 1) Our citizens will all participate in the payment of this war. 2) Maybe we will not be so eager to go to war.

Bill Fleming said...

Not bad, Thad. But I think the fastest way to end the war would be to reinstate the draft. In fact, I believe that had the draft been in place in 2002, we would not have had the Iraq war.

Les said...

The one absolute hope I had in Pres Obama was, he would bring us out of the wars we are in. I am again right on my statement of "There is no difference in party agenda". We argue like fools over something that does not exist.

Thad Wasson said...

Probably true.

Bill Fleming said...

Les, we have to keep insisting.

ThatOneGuy said...

No one is more against war and quagmire violence than I, yet I must make the counter argument that the Afghan war is needed.
Remember that the Taliban made the case that they had no respect for the community of Man by their treatment of women and their destruction of Buddhist art. And, apparently Buddhists. The Taliban offered safe haven and support to Osama And his ilk. The Taliban made no secret of their desire to export their theocracy, especially to Pakistan.
There is no scenario I can find that makes Taliban control of a nuclear arsenal a good idea. Until the remnants of the Taliban are neutralized, and that could be a good long while from now, America needs to keep after them.
That said, Mr. Wasson's suggestion gets a hearty thumbs up from me.

Bill Fleming said...

We didn't invade the USSR to control their nuclear arsenal, TOG, even when they said "we will bury you." There certainly must be other ways to counter Taliban/AQ efforts that don't involve massive military presence and nation building. Besides, why this is a US problem as opposed to a UN problem?

Les said...

We Americans have no secure line of information as to why we are disliked or why the Taliban do what they do. We can choose to believe what we are told is right. World news from across the globe often contradicts what we are being told. The USSR could not bring their change to Afgan, what makes you think we should sacrifice our neighbors children to prove some point we would probably not agree with if we really knew why we are involved TOG? It is NOT 9/11 or we would have totally focused our efforts there shortly after.

Anonymous said...

Absolutely re-instate the draft but with no deferments (Cheney had 6), and no exemptions or substitutions (guard service comes AFTER active service - unlike Bush 43). When the Harvard, Yale & Stanford classes march off to these ill-advised, ill-conceived military electives then the nonsense will end.

Bill Fleming said...

Actually Les, we do have information about that, but it seems to date very few of us want to look at it.

Are you familiar with Greg Mortenson's work? He's a good friend of my son Jake.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greg_Mortenson

Les said...

Reverse roles Bill, think of the Afgan army, if they had one, coming in to tell you how to treat the boss in your house and how you would react. I have no problem with aid to the suppressed. Armies will never win friends amongst more than half the people and the other half will always be waiting for you. As can be seen in our own country, "the south is gonna rise again". :-) So is this action about Taliban invading the US, or is it about human rights, or is it about what ever it takes to keep us citizens locked in step so those who have profited from both sides of most wars in history can continue those profits?