Sadly this was all to predictable a situation we've ended up in. Rather than spending the money, time and effort to stabilize the area (and clean up the mess caused by getting the Russians out) and dealing with the remnants of a regime that was a) brutal and b) actually did harbour terrorists who were attacking the West - we got side tracked.
When the history of this period is finally written, there will be an awful lot of "just what in the hell were they thinking ignoring Afghanistan and going into Iraq".
If only we'd been able to predict this was going to happen...
Oh? Some people did? There's a shock...
I wish I knew the right answer. While the Taliban are standing in the wings wanting to take the country right back to 2000, I can only think of two sensible outcomes:
1) Stay in and do COIN 2) Do a bunch of damage, leave and get ready to rinse repeat in 10-15 years when it looks JUST like it did in 2001 all over again
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Date: 2012-03-14 05:03 pm (UTC)When the history of this period is finally written, there will be an awful lot of "just what in the hell were they thinking ignoring Afghanistan and going into Iraq".
If only we'd been able to predict this was going to happen...
Oh? Some people did? There's a shock...
I wish I knew the right answer. While the Taliban are standing in the wings wanting to take the country right back to 2000, I can only think of two sensible outcomes:
1) Stay in and do COIN
2) Do a bunch of damage, leave and get ready to rinse repeat in 10-15 years when it looks JUST like it did in 2001 all over again