[lbo-talk] TomDispatch on Afpak

Chuck Grimes c123grimes at att.net
Tue May 18 13:28:18 PDT 2010


I was thinking this morning, oh, yeah, I forgot. We are at war. Wonder how that's going. Below is a link to TomDispatch. It is a longish essay on AfPak.

``For all the policy reviews and shuttling officials, the surging troops, extra private contractors, and new bases, Obama's wars are worsening. Lacking is any coherent regional policy or semblance of real strategy -- counterinsurgency being only a method of fighting and a set of tactics for doing so. In place of strategic coherence there is just one knee-jerk response: escalation. As unexpected events grip the Obama administration by the throat, its officials increasingly act as if further escalation were their only choice, their fated choice.

This response is eerily familiar. It permeated Washington's mentality in the Vietnam War years. In fact, one of the strangest aspects of that war was the way America's leaders -- including President Lyndon Johnson -- felt increasingly helpless and hopeless even as they committed themselves to further steps up the ladder of escalation.

We don't know what the main actors in Obama's war are feeling. We don't have their private documents or their secret taped conversations. Nonetheless, it should ring a bell when, as wars devolve, the only response Washington can imagine is further escalation.''

http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175248/tomgram%3A_engelhardt%2C_obama%27s_afpak_flip-flop_/#more



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