DISGUISING THE FACT THAT HE PLANS TO GIVE IN AND GET OUT: MELANIE PHILLIPS
http://www.spectator.co.uk/melaniephillips/5593271/mcchrystal-undermined.thtml
McChrystal undermined
After a full three months of damaging dither, Obama has finally announced his strategy for Afghanistan. It is nothing less than surrender dressed up in deepest, blood-boltered hypocrisy. The media have reported the headline announcement of an extra 30,000 troops as if he has finally junked his anti-war persona and turned into George W Bush reborn. Even some hawks who should know better are purring that he has finally done the right thing in committing America more fully to fighting and winning the war in Afghanistan. Are they all nuts? This is nothing of the kind. Obama’s speech amounted to announcing an 18-month timetable for withdrawal – and the extra troops are being thrown in to mask the fact that he is running up the white flag.
After all, what kind of military strategist has ever announced the date of the end of a war – a ‘conclusion’, note, not ‘victory’, heaven forbid — even while he is sending more troops? A more calculated way to undermine your own side than announcing to the enemy that you will not stay the course until victory is achieved can scarcely be imagined. Quite obviously all the Taleban have to do now is write the date carefully in their 2011 diaries and sit it out until the coalition departs, while all the time blowing up the occasional American and British soldier for good measure.
What this means in all its sordid reality is that the American President is cynically offering up American soldiers’ lives as a fig leaf to disguise the fact that he is giving up and getting out. Obama has now compromised the safety of every single American and British soldier, given not just the Taleban but every watching jihadi a terrific shot in the arm and undermined the very difficult mission in Afghanistan – and with his slavering sock-puppet Gordon Brown marching meekly to Obama’s tune. No doubt General McChrystal deserves his stellar reputation in counter insurgency. But his Commander-in-Chief has surely dealt him the most treacherous of hands.
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