According to today’s Washington Post, Gen. David D. McKiernan warned that President Obama’s announcement of 17,000 troops heading for Afghanistan this spring comes up about 10,000 short due to increased violence in that country. McKiernan believes 2009 will be “a tough year,” and the U.S. will have to sustain about 60,000 troops in-country.
The questions are: What is the mission? And what is the endgame?
We have yet to extricate ourselves from Iraq, and now this build-up is underway. What is our purpose in Afghanistan, and what does a 3- to 4-year time frame really mean? Where do estimates like that even originate? It has the clank of a can being kicked down the road.
