Atlantic Sentinel | Preparing for Defeat in Afghanistan
Things aren’t looking pretty in Afghanistan. The Taliban are getting stronger, winning support as Hamid Karzai’s government in Kabul remains ineffective and corrupt. NATO allies are increasingly weary about the future of the Afghan mission and President Barack Obama has announced to start withdrawing American forces next year. Can the war still be won?
Writing in November of last year, retired US Army General Barry McCaffrey had some hope. Although the “Taliban believe they are winning” and the Afghan people “do not know who will prevail,” the Afghan National Army, he wrote, “is a growing success story” while “ISAF is reinforcing just in time to rescue the deteriorating tactical situation.” It may not be enough though.
In 2008, McCaffrey also warned that while NATO forces are militarily superior to the insurgents, they “cannot win through a war of attrition.” With the Taliban expecting the West to pull out next year, that is precisely what the war is turning into.
via Atlantic Sentinel | Preparing for Defeat in Afghanistan.
