Afghanistan: For US Things Don’t Look Very Good At All
October 30, 2009: U.S. political leaders are dithering on the decision to send 40,000 additional troops requested by military commanders. It’s more politically useful, in the U.S., for Afghanistan related problems to just go away, or at least require less American money and troops. But Afghanistan won’t go away. For thousands of years, Afghanistan has been a refuge for raiders and a staging (and recruiting) area for invaders headed for Pakistan and northern India. But now the threat is hordes of fierce tribesmen, but rather Pushtun heroin smugglers and terrorists. Afghanistan’s neighbors are frantically trying to keep this threat out, and are not succeeding. The drug smugglers are moving through Central Asia, Iran and Pakistan, and the heroin is showing up in more places, more cheaply. The terrorists are still operating their training camps, and the graduates are still being caught in the West. The more graduates there are, the greater the probability some of
