Thomas Friedman on the Afghanistan decision—It Has to Start With Them

Posted by Kendall Harmon

When President Obama announced his decision to surge more troops into Afghanistan in 2009, I argued that it could succeed if three things happened: Pakistan became a different country, President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan became a different man and we succeeded at doing exactly what we claim not to be doing, that is nation-building in Afghanistan. None of that has happened, which is why I still believe our options in Afghanistan are: lose early, lose late, lose big or lose small. I vote for early and small.

My wariness about Afghanistan comes from asking these three questions: When does the Middle East make you happy? How did the cold war end? What would Ronald Reagan do?

Read it all.

Filed under: * Economics, PoliticsDefense, National Security, MilitaryForeign RelationsWar in Afghanistan* International News & CommentaryAmerica/U.S.A.

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Posted June 26, 2011 at 12:02 pm [Printer Friendly] [Print w/ comments]
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