Green | February 17, 2009 | 23 comments

Newest US troops in dangerous region near Kabul

source: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090216/ap_on_re_as/as_afghan_surge_begins

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Mobius2012
LOGAR PROVINCE, Afghanistan – Close to 3,000 American soldiers who recently arrived in Afghanistan to secure two violent provinces near Kabul have begun operations in the field and already are seeing combat, the unit's spokesman said Monday.

The new troops are the first wave of an expected surge of reinforcements this year. The process began to take shape under President George Bush but has been given impetus by President Barack Obama's call for an increased focus on Afghanistan.

U.S. commanders have been contemplating sending up to 30,000 more soldiers to bolster the 33,000 already here, but the new administration is expected to initially approve only a portion of that amount. White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said Monday the president would


Umm....I thought Obama was talking about change.....Ohhhh, i get it, they're just changing their focus, instead of staying in Iraq, they've changed their direction and are now going to focus on Afghanistan... I get It.....
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23 comments // Newest US troops in dangerous region near Kabul

  • PrimeTime
    • 0
      PrimeTime  

    • Thank you for making everyone know that the word Obama loves (change), is code for the same thing , just different words then bush would have used.

    • 3 years ago
  • mendokusai
    • 0
      mendokusai  

    • just because u think there is a legitimate reason for u to be there doesnt mean that u shud be there

      even after 8 years of of "war" in afghanistan the american people n the west in general still dont have the slightest clue about that part of the world n its history. america has no business bein there n wud sooner do itself a favor by withdrawing n letting the locals decide their own fate. there were no afghanis involved in 9/11 n if u wanna say that bin laden is hidin there then so wat it doesnt take 8 freakin years to look for that person u either found him or u didnt dont keep sendin young americans to die for an indefinite period of time with a poorly defined goal

      it wont be til things are so bad in america that the govt will finally say oh shit we need our troops back home n then leave that area worse than when they got there im tellin u they need to bounce up outta there n let people handle their own mess

    • 3 years ago
  • Mobius2012
  • fun_size
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      fun_size  
    • mendokusai:

      We were making HUGE progress in Afghanistan in 2002/2003 and were really close to taking out Bin Laden on multiple occasions. Then our assclown of a president decided that Iraq needed to be "liberated" and left so few troops in Afghanistan that they could not complete the mission that we had sent them there for.

      So yes there is a legitimate reason for us to still be there and a legitimate reason for us to increase the number of forces stationed there. That is unless of course nearly 3000 American lives mean nothing to you.

      So please with your unlimited wisdom and terrible grammar and spelling enlighten me. Why should we pull out of Afghanistan?

    • 3 years ago
  • mendokusai
    • 0
      mendokusai  
    • mendokusai:

      the fact that u pay more attention to the packagin than the content shows ur petty nature but watever ive been known to entertain

      So.

      I assume your "legitimate reason" to be in Afghanistan is to capture Osama. One may argue that helping to relieve the chaos known as Haiti or targeting a truly psychotic leader such as Mugabe would be more "legitimate", but that is a whole other discussion.

      As I mentioned before, just because you may think you have a legitimate reason to be somewhere does not necessarily mean that you should be there. Hamid Karzai is a classic puppet that was installed by the US and has done nothing but offer a carte blanche to Western forces since his time in office. While this may seem like a wonderful achievement to the shortsighted American, the problem is that his presence and cooperation with the US has worked to completely discredit himself and other moderates in the area. That compromise that was signed in Pakistan just 2 days ago was the direct result of American interference along the Afghan-Pakistan border which has spurned practically every community in that area to enroll in the newer, more improved, Salafi-driven agenda. It's Taliban 2.0, courtesy of the direct presence of American troops.

      I don't know if you're still reading this, but I'll summarize it for you: a single crazy extremist country that never targeted the USA is now in direct conflict with the USA (and making gains, mind you) and has now extended and continues to extend its sphere of influence to its neighbor (which, oh by the way, already has a nuclear bomb).

      Keep in mind that this whole scenario is the direct result of the same kind of poor planning and geopolitically retarded policies of the 1980's when the CIA was in Afghanistan recruiting the future members of the Taliban and was partnering up with ----> guess who? That's right. Your boy, Osama.

      I purposefully decided to leave out the thousand years of history from the Aryans and Moguls to the British and the Russians; this part of the world has been as resistant to invasion and stability as any other. If you knew the culture of inhabitants any better then you would realize that for as much as they fight amongst themselves, fighting against foreigners comes as second nature.

      I will end this post with a comment regarding your rhetorical question about the nearly 3000 American lives which have been lost in the course of the conflict in Afghanistan. Besides the fact that your argument only accounts for the deaths of soldiers and not civilians, you sound hauntingly similar to the hawks of 1975 who were pushing for continued conflict in Vietnam. After 60,000 American casualties, the justification to continue the war had become the war itself. "We didn't let those boys die in vain." Yeah, well. The greater mistake would be to let 3001 soldiers die for nothing.

    • 3 years ago
  • fun_size
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      fun_size  
    • mendokusai:

      We have already destabilized the country and the reason that we have not captured Osama or removed the militants from the region is due to a lack of resources and of course, lack of a cohesive and workable strategy. The way to truly win in Afghanistan would be to win the hearts and the minds of the people there. Building infrastructure and especially schools would be the most effective way to pacify the region and imo to truly win the war on terror. In order to protect infrastructure and reduce the number of militants in the region more troops are needed.

      To simply up and leave would do a disservice to the Afghani people and to the American servicemen who have already lost their life in the conflict. It would simply amount to a waste of blood and money with no gain.

      Time will tell how our operation in Iraq has fared but as of right now, democratic elections are being held and the turnouts are significant. People said that the war in Iraq could not be won either but the Iraqi people are beginning to step up and embrace democracy. Whos to say that is not possible in Afghanistan as well?

      In regards to Pakistan, that nation is run by corrupt military dictators that are doing very little to actually combat the terrorists in their own country. With the compromise between Al Qaeda and Pakistan it only shows that Pakistan actually supports the terrorists, something weve known about for quite some time already.

    • 3 years ago
  • mendokusai
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      mendokusai  
    • mendokusai:

      in order to understand this situation ur memory needs to go back further than 9/11

      there is a reason why there is a sayin that has been proven true over n over again "afghanistan is where empires come to die" to understand this u need to understand the history of that part of the world

      n once again the deaths of 3000 american soldiers "in vain" are not sufficient justification to continue a failed policy. not unlike gamblin at some point in time u will either need to cut ur losses or u will run out of chips the only difference here is that with gamblin at least u have a chance to win

      anywho its pretty obvious u got ur mind made up doesnt matter tho since neither u nor i are the ones makin the decisions have fun tryin to rationalize

    • 3 years ago
  • fun_size
    • 0
      fun_size  

    • What so because Bush fucked up and pulled troops out of Afghanistan and sent them to Iraq for no reason we should just give up? You do remember that there is a legitimate reason why we are in Afghanistan as opposed to Iraq or does everyone in this country just have ADD?

    • 3 years ago
  • Bisbonian
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      Bisbonian  

    • "What do you think will happen to the women who expressed their freedom, or the Afghans who sided with us during the invasion?"

      Most likely they are already dead. Have you been paying attention to what has been going on in Afghanistan?

    • 3 years ago
  • current89
    • 0
      current89  
    • Bisbonian:

      Oh, so every single one of them is dead? And don't beg the question by asking another question. I'm quite aware of the acid attacks and murders that go on in Afghanistan. Additionally, it's better to respond to a specific comment by using the reply button.

    • 3 years ago
  • Bisbonian
  • current89
  • Bisbonian
    • 0
      Bisbonian  
    • Bisbonian:

      Which raises yet another question. Do you really think we went there to protect the women? Better yet...did we go there to protect the people who would cooperate with our invasion?

    • 3 years ago
  • current89
    • 0
      current89  
    • Bisbonian:

      No, I highly doubt that we went there to protect the woman.To a certain extent, the original intent of the invasion is inconsequential. It's what our intent is now that matters.

    • 3 years ago
  • Bisbonian
  • current89
  • current89
    • 0
      current89  

    • As much as I oppose war, Afghanistan cannot be abandoned. Before we invaded Iraq so hastily, and decreased troops levels in Afghanistan, progress was being made. Additionally, we can't abandon our allies to the slaughter, we've done that too much too often. We've done that in Iraq (with the Kurds), in Cuba , and in Vietnam, just to name a few.

      I pose a question to the naysayers of this conflict. What do you think will happen to the women who expressed their freedom, or the Afghans who sided with us during the invasion? Contemplate it. We involved ourselves based on irrational decisions. So, is it any better for us to withdraw based on an irrational, emotional reaction?

    • 3 years ago
  • jubal
  • Highr0ller
  • Highr0ller
    • 0
      Highr0ller [removed]  

    • Recipe for Disaster in the Middle East

      Gas may be cheap again, but the bursting of the petro bubble has sent unemployment soaring to 40 percent among Middle Easterners 15 to 24 years old, stirring unrest. Dubai’s airport parking lots are littered with abandoned cars as foreign nationals flee. Egypt, with half a million newly unemployed headed home from abroad, could see a repeat of last year’s bloody economic riots.

    • 3 years ago
  • Highr0ller
    • 0
      Highr0ller [removed]  
    • Image

    • Neocons Plot to Co-Opt Obama

      Possibly this is the course that Barack Obama will decide upon. Here and elsewhere in policy choices for the region, he will be under heavy pressure from his campaign promises to Israel to, in effect, continue Bush administration policy for the Middle East. But that is not what the people who voted for him expect.

      A big struggle over control of Obama’s foreign policy has already begun with his first White House staff nominees. Many of the people currently advising him, and all of those behind past Bush policies, are going to tell him his administration must choose between “weakness,” on the one hand, and “strength” plus “global leadership,” on the other hand. The latter means a quest for American hegemony that wouldn’t be any more successful under Obama than it was under Bush, and along the way would destroy his presidency just as it destroyed George Bush’s.

      Visit William Pfaff’s Web site at www.williampfaff.com.

      ==================

    • 3 years ago
  • JanforGore
  • rosyjane
    • 0
      rosyjane  

    • "i think that they need to know the real issue here...Terrorism is too dangerous specially when thieves are around us... i know that some of them might dead already and fake leaders Lead the war to protect their own community...the question is..WHO IS THE REAL LEADER? WHO IS THE REAL PRESIDENT? THERE ARE PLENTY OF THIEVES AND IDENTITY THEFTS EVEN HERE IN THE PHILIPPINES... STEALING THE NAMES OF THE POOR AND THE WEAK!!!"-Donabell C. De Apera

    • 3 years ago
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