While the initial invasion of Afghanistan went remarkably smoothly (only about 2,000 US Special Forces troops were used), this was largely because much of the actual fighting was accomplished by the Afghans themselves (of the ‘Northern Alliance’) with US air cover/interdiction and close coordination/communication via the US SF troops.
Up until the past year, we have been essentially doing nothing but a ‘holding’ program in Afghanistan while the focus was on Iraq. This essentially was a combination of the old ‘fire-base’ concept from Vietnam (which didn’t work there either!), and very small-scale ‘search and destroy’ missions by special forces backed up by enormous airpower.
Simon Maloy For Media Matters: President Obama never had a chance … It didn’t matter what decision he came to regarding troop levels in Afghanistan, or what he said about the ongoing conflict there, because Fox News and the rest of the conservative media had already reached two conclusions. First, he took too long. Second, [...]
As I listened and digested the words of General McChrystal and Ambassador Eikenberry last week at their side-by-side brother-to-brother session in Congress, my mind drifted back to a time when their voices expressed public frustration and stark contrasts. Turns out it was only two months ago, which tells me my short term memory is currently [...]
The year was 1983, and it shares more in common with 2009 than one could imagine. The first and most glaring similarity is 10.2% unemployment, a high-water mark for this ‘great recession’ we are currently in the vast middle of. Without making this so much of a doom and gloom narrative of our ailing economy, [...]
One thing that has remained true since the inception of this republic: Our leaders do not trust the populace. It has been that way since the beginning. Even a quick overview of The Federalist Papers, which are a collection of 3 of the Founders’ arguments in favor of the Constitution, reveals that our whole system [...]
