This Afghanistan timetable is CRAZY!!
I originally posted this entry last night on my main blog at www.bouhammer.com.
There is no way, NO WAY this is going to happen. In about 5 minutes I will be on a Blogger’s Roundtable talking with Mr. David S. Sedney, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Afghanistan, Pakistan and Central Asia, and Brig. Gen. John W. Nicholson, Jr. Director, Pakistan-Afghanistan Coordination Cell, Joint Staff. I am going to ask some hard questions about the timeline that the President just outlined.
Why does he think that a mere 1 year after he surges in 30,000 additional forces, that he can start withdrawing forces. How is that much progress going to happen in 12 months. In Jan, 2007 MG Durbin stated that he wanted Task Force Phoenix to start mentoring and training the Afghan Police and wanted them up to the level of the Afghan Army (which we had been embedded with for the last 5 years). We said then that MG Durbin was on crack to think we could turn around the ANP that fast. Well I am starting to think that again now of the President.
I wrote earlier about how there is no way they can have the logistics in place support this surge in the next six months. But despite that, they have to find enough ANA and ANP candidates that are going to stay around, that are not going to go AWOL, that are not going to run at the first bullets launched at them. Oh and then have to get them trained up to a competent level of performance so that a drawdown can start just 12 months after all the forces get there. No FRIGGEN WAY!! It is not going to happen. I am telling you there is no way.
But let me also say that I don’t except the drawdown to happen in Jun of 2011. He is hoping that that can happen, but the President said the “situation must allow it”. Lets call it like we see it. 2011 will be in the heart of the next Presidential Campaign window and it is all in his best interest for re-election to try and pull out of Iraq by end of 2011 and start a pull out of Afghanistan by mid-2011. He is “hoping” that he can do that, just like he is “hoping” that the NATO countries will pony up the additional 10,000 forces that are missing from Gen McChrystal’s original request. Just like my old Battalion Commander, COL Forney, used to say, ‘hope is not a method’.
The ‘Best Man for the Job’ (GEN McChrystal) asked for 40,000 troops, yet he is only getting 30,000, which is 3/4 of what he asked for. It took something like 83 days to come up with that? It only took 50+ something days to overthrow the Taliban and Al-Queda in 2001. Not giving the General who was noted as the “best man” what he asked for is a slap in the face of the General and of all the military.
The President is playing politics with our military and with our country. Shame on him with trying to appease both sides of the aisle. Don’t tell certain groups of Americans what you think they want to hear, tell them the truth.
There is NO WAY this is going to happen in the next 18 months.
Posted on December 2nd, 2009 by Bouhammer
Filed under: Executive Branch, Military Strategy, Other Blogs
Timelines are good things. It keeps everyone to task. More has been discussed about healthcare, no matter which side you were on in the past few months then the last decade.
If he were playing politics with the troops, he would given McCrystal half and no timeline. He actually gave McCrystal something better then 40K troops, he gave him a plan. Something we haven’t seen in a while.
I wish he would have produced more of a plan to pay for it, however.
NY-David