President Obama announced in June that the United States would reduce its presence in Afghanistan, a nation that Obama suggested could operate independently. Lena Bae of the Harvard Political Review, however, writes that large problems persist within Afghanistan. Presenting an outline of smart policies for Afghanistan, Bae suggests that that the playbook for the region needs significant revisions. Read the ... Read More
Long-term success in Afghanistan requires a shift in focus from clearing the ground to domestic institution-building and regional relationship management.
The labeling of failed states as “intentional” clouds the actual lack of control governments in such states often have.
Would the Gipper really be disappointed in the absence of hawkish tendencies in this Republican field?
This week there have been many reports about the change in the troop withdrawal date. The New York Times reported that the Obama administration is changing its policy to include a withdrawal period at the end of 2014. This month, senior White House officials have cited 2014 as the new transfer date. Such an announcement makes the initial policy look ... Read More
War spending is out of control and a cause for worry. We get weekly reports of the costs of the war and the burden placed on tax payers. This week the Washington Post reported that U.S. government agencies cannot account for spending in Afghanistan before 2007. This presents yet another point for citizens and the White House to rally behind ... Read More
Makhdoom Shah Mahmood Qureshi, foreign minister of Pakistan, at the Institute of Politics
Bob Woodward’s book, Obama’s War, hit shelves this week amidst turf wars in the White House between war advisors and political advisers. This is wholly appropriate. While the book paints Obama as a strategic war president, a man dedicated to closely considering all strategies before independently creating his own policy, the book’s main aftershock is to impress its readers with the depths ... Read More
Chris Cilizza, who has writes the political blog The Daily Fix for The Washington Post, this week named General Petraeus as the man who had “The Worst Week in Washington”. Truthfully speaking, President Obama’s decision to name General Petraeus as the head of military operations in Afghanistan leaves the General in an impossible situation. After brilliant tactical strategies and unwavering ... Read More
So I’m sure that we are all thinking the same thing: What exactly was General McChrystal thinking when he starting saying how he truly felt about the Obama administration? He had to have known that in the end things weren’t going to turn out well for him. But apparently he felt that letting the public know how uncomfortable the president ... Read More
This afternoon, I came across George Orwell’s “Revenge is Sour” in a collection of his essays. Originally published in the Tribune in November 1945, it speaks to the emptiness of revenge and — more topically for today — to the disconnect between civilians and soldiers in war. Below is the final paragraph: The Belgian averted his face as we went ... Read More
The New York Times Magazine has a fantastic article about the puzzle of the paucity of valor awards–those medals given for high acts of courage. Only six Medals of Honor have been awarded in Iraq or Afghanistan: a fraction of previous wars either absolute or percentage terms. In the Pentagon’s defense, the article quotes one spokeswoman: Addressing the drastic drop ... Read More
I just finished watching Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks’ The Pacific, an HBO miniseries following a group of marines in WWII. And it was truly epic. Melodramatic and overwrought maybe, but the war in the Pacific was no jungle romp. As The Pacific vividly shows, it was unimaginably gruesome, traumatic, and relentless. The marines battled the unyielding and suicidal Japanese on malaria-infested, ... Read More
I’m hardly an expert on modern warfare, but this New York Times op-ed is pretty clearly silly and deserving of refutation. Defense consultant Lara Dadkhah is discussing the way that NATO air forces have voluntarily drawn down their airstrikes and are thus tying one hand behind their back. She argues that this is incredibly harmful since “America does not have ... Read More
