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Aug 31 2009, 5:48 pm by Chris Good

A Conservative Voice For Afghanistan Withdrawal

So reports Politico: in his column later this week, conservative columnist George Will will call for "substantially reduced" forces in Afghanistan, conducting extremely scaled-back operations from offshore, using drones, airstrikes, and small special forces missions. Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the top U.S. and NATO commander in Afghanistan, today called for an overhaul of military strategy there as part of his anticipated assessment of war efforts. So after five years of Democrats calling for an end to operations in Iraq, I guess we've come full circle. Will raises the question of whether nation-building is plausible, and, as Politico notes, it's a prescription that likely won't sit will with the national security wing of the Republican Party. Will is a fiscal conservative, and if his recommendation takes hold for fiscal reasons, there will be true symmetry: in 2006, the cost of Iraq was arguably the reason for withdrawal that Democrats pushed most aggressively.

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Comments (3)

Pineview1997

Kill Osama B=bin Laden and go home.

denisarvay

RE: nation building.

Ironically, one of the reasons I voted fro W (once) is that he loudly proclaimed opposition to nation-building, while Al Gore supported Clinton's ridiculous Balkan intervention.

I was a chump, but an unforgiving once-burned chump.

Nation-building is impossible, unless we want to empty our treasury. For the record, Germany and Japan were already nations when they were rebuilt with the Marshall Plan. Basic institutions and infrastructure, and a population with a lot to lose if they chose to resist.

Not so in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Obama seems to be falling for the delusional "leader of the free world" ego-trip trap set by the military/industrial complex. Now he's boxed himself into a no-win political hole with a choice between endless war a la Vietnam or "who let Bin Laden escape" charges from the Republicans.

The latter will fade away by the time of the next presidential election, unless we're hit again by another 911. If the wars are still raging -- it's Lyndon Johnson time.


norbizness

So what caused Will's seven-year coma?