The President is hinting at a declare-victory-and-leave strategy, once proposed for Vietnam and more recently for Iraq, to end our decade-long war in Afghanistan.
In a TV interview, he says, “By killing Osama bin Laden, getting al Qaeda back on its heels, stabilizing much of the country in Afghanistan so that the Taliban can’t take it over…it’s now time for us to recognize that we’ve accomplished a big chunk of our mission and that it’s time for Afghans to take more responsibility.”
There will be no banners on aircraft carriers, but as Robert Gates leaves and Leon Panetta arrives as Secretary of Defense in the face of the troop drawdowns scheduled this summer when the “Surge” began at the end of 2009, the stars seem aligned for rethinking our mission there.
Add the pressures of public fatigue with the war, a temptation of huge budget savings and the shifting Middle East picture with Arab Spring uprisings, the original motives for waging the War on Terror in Afghanistan seem to have faded into some distant past.
Just as in Iraq, there is no just-get-up-and-go option, but a tipping point is clearly on the horizon.
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