Remember - always refer to native discontent as Taliban-led, and by extension, fundamentalist-led. No sane people would object to having their children blown up - only Muslim extremists who want to set up a Caliphate from London to South Africa to Kamchatka do that. http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/201...efinitely-top-us-intel-officer/#ixzz0c4h4y0ll At the end of the day, for American and NATO forces in Afghanistan, there will be a "Saigon Moment", when these military personnel will have to leave the country, just as the military personnel from the old Soviet Union had to leave. Ultimately, the only people who will have "won" here are the corporations providing mercenaries and logistics services, and the drug lords. And then, the US will have to negotiate with whatever government is left standing about the cost of installing the pipelines with which to control Eurasian oil, just as the Bush administration was doing as late as August of 2001. Wars are never cheaper than negotiations.
"Taleban-led" must be the new tacit way of saying that there are a lot of people fighting who aren't Taleban.
Well, the problem here is that we're funding the Taliban vis a vis the Pakistani's, and the government in Afghanistan is actually worse than the Taliban government it replaced.
Of course, the OP ignores the fact that the United States can sustain and even expand its level of military committment...indefinitely. For that matter, if the U.S. wanted to get rough, we could sustain the effort there until the last Afghan was rotting in a grave.
So? They don't care about that. They care about jobs, food, money - all of which are increasingly horded by government officials. The people of Afghanistan are increasingly disgruntled and disappointed with their government, and that can only mean an increase in support for the Taliban.
Of course... It would make a huge difference it we were actually fighting a war in Afghanistan. Whatever happened to Obama's campaign rants that we were fighting the wrong war and that he'd make sure we'd get those responsible for 9/11? Oh yeah. That was campaign bull, wasn't it?
