Tulsa Peace Fellowship

There never was a good war or a bad peace. ~Ben Franklin

Obama and Afghan Occupation: What he wants is withdrawal

Obama's Afghan war strategy: End it

Bob Woodward's new book sheds light on the president's intentions. He clearly wants out.




October 3, 2010


http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-mcmanus-column...

What are President Obama's intentions in Afghanistan?

He told us 10 months ago, at the conclusion of an agonizing, weeks-long
strategy debate, that he would give his generals the 33,000 additional
troops they wanted and 18 months to show what they could do with them.
Then we would begin drawing down.

According to Woodward, Obama is determined to get out of this war. Time and again in the narrative, we hear the president say he's looking not
for victory but for closure. "I want an exit strategy," he's quoted as
saying. "This needs to be a plan about how we're going to hand it off
and get out of Afghanistan." What worries him most, it seems, is the
"opportunity cost" that the war exacts — the money and attention it's
diverting from other, more important priorities.

When Obama imposed his July 2011 deadline, he said he intended it, in part, to speed up the Afghan government's training and deployment of its
own security forces and encourage them to take decisive action against
corruption. Only half of that equation has worked. The Afghan security
forces are slowly improving, but President Hamid Karzai has stubbornly resisted any serious political reform.

Petraeus and the generals will ask for more time (not more troops — they know that's a nonstarter). Obama will insist on starting his
drawdown.

"I have two years with the public on this," Woodward quotes him as saying. And, summoning the ghost of Lyndon B. Johnson: "I'm not signing on to a failure. If what I proposed is not working, I'm not going to be like these other presidents and stick to it based on
my politics — my political security."

That sounds like a man who meant what he said.


For much of the past year, it's been difficult to determine exactly what Obama wants in Afghanistan. But it's now clearer than ever that what he
wants, above all, is to get out.




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Comment by Tony Nuspl on November 7, 2010 at 9:42am
We counted 318 supporters today, that is, people giving us either a honk for peace or a peace sign. That's 159 supporters per hour. Multiply that by say, 8 hours of peak traffic per day, and you've got 1,272 antiwar pro-peace people driving through that intersection every day.

And there were about 3 detractors, today. Again, underlining my rule of thumb, that for every 99 supporters there's only 1 crank.
Comment by Tony Nuspl on November 6, 2010 at 10:26am
JOIN US TODAY for peace vigil, Saturday, 12 noon to 2pm, Nov 6th 2010, corner of 41st & Yale.

Volunteers to hold signs, placards, and banners should arrive at 11:45 am. Meet in parking lot of strip mall, NW corner.

The theme of the TPF peace vigil continues to be: "U.S. Out of Afghanistan Now!"

Bring your own sign, or carry one of ours.

The ballot box was no good to us this year, so it's back to the street protest! After the mid-term election outcome, and the threat from warmongers in Congress to escalate the Afghanistan quagmire even further, our presence in the public's mind is all the more needed, on behalf of peace.

Queremos Paz,

TPF Steering Committee



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Midterm Election Results a Setback for Peace
Tom Hayden
November 4, 2010

The November election was a setback for the peace movement, not only because of the defeat of Sen. Russ Feingold but for deeper reasons.

Both parties collaborated in keeping Afghanistan out of the national election debate and media coverage – while during the period June-November alone, 274 American soldiers were killed and 2,934 were wounded on the battlefield.

(The official American toll under Obama in Afghanistan has become at least 730 deaths and 6,400 wounded; the taxpayer costs under Obama currently are $113 billion per year.)

With Republican control of the House, antiwar Democrats will have little room to hold hearings or maneuver against the wars. There were 162 House members, nearly all Democrats, who voted against funding the war or in favor of an exit strategy earlier this year, one-fourth of the House. In the Senate, Feingold authored similar legislation that obtained 18 votes, a number not likely to increase either.

Obama’s pledge to begin a July withdrawal may draw little or no peace movement support unless he includes a timeline and substantial numbers, and shows progress in diplomacy and talks with the Taliban. The president’s situation is similar to his problems with health care when he appeared to over-promise and under-deliver, leaving his base dispirited once again. (It should be noted that Obama took the strongest exit strategy position among his internal advisers, according to Woodward, with Hillary Clinton immediately supporting whatever troop escalation Petraeus wanted.)

The next test for Obama will be whether his December review of Afghanistan policy results in only another ratification of Afghanistan status quo. Then comes another budget battle, with antiwar forces in Congress at a greater tactical disadvantage than last year.

The 2012 national election predictably will be fought over Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan and the Long War favored by the Republicans and the generals, with Obama positioned as favoring gradual troop drawdowns in order to invest in his domestic agenda.

The wars will continue in any event, with increasing risks of terrorist attacks on the US, bloody quagmires on the battlefields, and the US propping up unpopular regimes in Kabul, Baghdad, Islamabad and Yemen. The wars are unwinnable and unaffordable, but no one in power dares say it.

The peace bloc – activist groups, anti-war Congress members, writers and artists, here and across the NATO – can exercise a massive drag against the war-making machine through 2012 [because] the wars remain deeply unpopular.

http://www.thenation.com/article/155849/midterm-election-results-se...

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