Serious Bad News from Patreaus in Afghanistan...expect a bloody Summer.

[bvar22]

"General David Petraeus, the top U.S. and NATO commander in Afghanistan, says he is excepting a brutal fight in the spring when Taliban insurgents try to return from their winter safe havens to areas already cleared by the international forces.

"When you have 110,000 more of us than we had a year ago, we're obviously in many, many more places," he said in an interview with NATO TV. "We have taken away areas that matter to the Taliban and they have to fight back."

But he doesn't see more violence as mission failure.

"When you're on the offensive... the insurgents have to fight back and violence goes up, it's a necessary part of any counter-insurgency."

Last year was the deadliest for American troops in the 10 year war, with 499 service members dying in the line of duty."

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503543_162-20031135-503543.html

Patreaus says he has "110,000 more of us than we had a year ago".
Who are these 110,000 he is talking about?

The Obama Surge of 30,000 troops was in place before last Summer (2010).
As cynical as I am about the US Government, I don't believe they could get away with a secret escalation. Right?

Are these 110.000 Afghan troops ("more of us") that have been "trained & equipped" last year,
and expected to fight for the USA and the corrupt Karzai puppet this Summer?

[msongs]

1. Patreus and his boss have never read Afghan history, or if they did, learned nothing from reading n

[truebrit71]

10. ..they don't call it the graveyard of empires for nothing..

...as in Vietnam the US thinks that those that preceeded them did it wrong and they can do better...the Brits and the Soviets got their asses handed to them in Afghanistan..at this point as things stand there is no reason to think that the US won't become the third empire to fail there...

[SharonAnn]

21. I just watched "Charlie Wilson's War" last night. Very interesting!

And the movie closed with these lines, (after the Russian had to leave Afghanistan):

"These things happened. They were glorious and they changed the world... and then we fucked up the endgame."

We're still dealing with the blowback from that.

Afghanistan. Where empires go to die!

[WhiteTara]

2. I think it's time for our summer sit in on the WH lawn.

We need to stay until they say they are leaving now. It might take longer than Tunisia and maybe less time than Egypt, but we must stop the bloodshed.

[truebrit71]

3. I hate the price that has to be paid, but the Taliban needs to be put down..

...

[Angry Dragon]

7. We went to Afghanistan to find bin Laden and

Al-qaeda..... Now we are fighting the Taliban??

[uppityperson]

15. No. We went to Afghanistan to prepare to invade Iraq.

bin Laden was simply an excuse, as was invading Afghanistan.

[Angry Dragon]

20. I am just quoting what I was told by little bush

We stay for the minerals and trying to stop the Chinese from getting them

[gratuitous]

8. And how is that worthy goal to be accomplished?

So far, the United States has spent about nine years and hundreds of billions of dollars on violent solutions. Is there something else that might be tried? Or is this a problem that can only be solved by the application of more violence in a more ruthless manner?

[truebrit71]

9. Step one, remove the politicians from the military decision-making process..

..step 2) give the military clearly defined objectives, step 3) give them as many troops and as much materiel as they need to get the job done, step 4) get out of their way and let them do their jobs..

[gratuitous]

11. Number 1 seems to conflict with number 2, and number 3 is totally political

But it seems that the upshot is that the solution is more violence, more ruthlessly applied. Good luck with that. Say hi to the Soviets when you get to where they are.

[truebrit71]

14. Yes the upshot is more violence, more ruthlessly applied.

The time for half-measures has passed. You can't get a little bit pregnant. Either do it right, or don't do it at all.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

18. We heard the "more time, more troops, more money" song before.

It was particularly popular in that other lost war in another part of Asia.

[obxhead]

19. When all of that continues to fail what do we do?

You think the USSR did not do that very same process with a much broader set of rules of acceptable torture?

So, when unlimited resources, troop counts, and no political oversight fail what would be the next step?

We can make a choice between 2 options in Afghanistan. We can choose to pull out showing the world we do not have the will to win or we can expend every available asset we can borrow and pull out anyway proving to the world we do not have the ability to win. Personally I would rather keep it a matter of speculation whether we could have won or not.

[polly7]

4. Exactly wth are we in Afghanistan for, seriously? n/t

[Angry Dragon]

5. When you can not win a war with today's military in over

9 years, it is time to pack it up and come home.....

[gratuitous]

6. "We're obviously in many, many more places"

I wonder if those "many, many more places" are as secure as The Man Called Petraeus thinks they are? I also wonder if the "areas already cleared by the international forces" was because of positive action, or because the "Taliban insurgents" had left for their "winter safe havens"?

[Hubert Flottz]

12. Petraeus survived the BushCo purge for a reason...

He kissed the neocon's ass 24/7. And it looks like he's still at it.

[dkofos]

13. looks like a retread headline of the past 10 years.

And it will be used every spring that we are there.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

16. Memo to Petraeus: You lost. Get out. Get over it.

[uppityperson]

17. k&r with sadness for kid of friend who is there, k&r with sadness for the Afghani people

k&r with anger towards those seeking power and oppressing people, whether they be "little" warlords or Taliban.

[bvar22]

22. Thanks for the Rec.

Looks like there are those who don't want a NEWS report from CBS with direct quotes from the Commanding General in Afghanistan to be circulated on DU.

[uppityperson]

23. You are welcome. It is odd, guess Afghanistan is old news or something.

[bvar22]

24. Afghanistan?....War?

Hello?


Anyone?


Last night On Bill Maher, the panel agreed that there was NO Anti-War movement in the USA anymore.
Looks like they were right.