I Need A Political Blog And the U.S. Needs To Get Out of Afghanistan

I need a political blog and a whole other blogging identity. But all these online identities were confusing. 

I'd be kind of crazy to turn this into a political blog, but for now I need a place to think through Afghanistan and why the U.S. so desperately needs to get out of Afghanistan.

And I will confess that I kind of fell for the stabilization idea, for a while, because the Pakistan-India conflict has worried me ever since I read about 7 years ago that Pakistan and India nearly had a nuclear exchange.

Anyway, for now no one reads this so it is a convenient place to organize links.

The Nation: The Fifty Year War

Afghanistan is a trap for Obama. If we 'lose' (and God knows what that would mean) in Afghanistan, it will appear to be on his head. Unless he sends in the 80,000 troops or who knows what. McChrystal has set up Obama. He's falling for it. It's all very depressing, as many more people will die, all for nothing.

I guess people usually die for nothing. So it is better to put it this way: People will be killed for nothing. And of course, people are almost always killed for nothing. How often is there a good reason to kill people? So really, it is better simply to say: Many more people will be killed than otherwise. 

Failure is hard to accept in these situations. Can we do no good at all, with our gigantic bombs? Nothing, really nothing can be done. That is perhaps the most amazing thing about war. It really is a situation where billions and billions of dollars will be spent and nothing good will come of it. Just the opposite. And that is the usual situation.

How do you get people to accept failure, a completely hopeless scenario? Amazingly, it is not by pointing out all the hopeless experiences of the past. In this, the U.S. reminds me of someone who keeps dating, over and over again, the wrong people. Essentially, it is a pathology, some deep seated thing in the culture and I am now doubtful that experience or any rational argument can have an effect.

Comments

[Sue]

You write ...Afghanistan and why the U.S. so desperately needs to get out of Afghanistan..." that's the question I answer me so often, especially when I hear that another of our Aussie soldiers was wounded or killed. More: I wonder what do we Aussie's have to do with that country and why Kevin Rudd let our soldiers there? Who can understand the policy, the motives behind all this war shit? Me not! But maybe I am not smart enough or have not enough political knowledge, who knows. But thank you anyway for this very interested blog.

[ozma]

Dear Sue,

There is always a 'reason' called regional stability or some such nonsense. But it is rarely a good reason. Wars do not often lead to regional stability. It is in Australia's interest to some extent to not have Pakistan fall to militants and avoid a Pakistan-India nuclear confrontation. Of all the reasons to be in the war in Afghanistan, that is the best one. However, the problem again is that the war in Afghanistan likely inflames the militancy in Pakistan. (To be honest, though, of all countries Australia might be in the best position to stay out of everything.)