Obama aide says no more troops to Afghanistan

[kpete]

Source: Reuters

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama's top security adviser has told U.S. military commanders there are no plans to send more troops to Afghanistan for now and that the focus instead will be on economic development and reconstruction, The Washington Post reported on Tuesday.

National Security Adviser James Jones delivered that message last week in Afghanistan, where Marine Brigadier General Lawrence Nicholson hinted he could use more "thousands more" troops, the newspaper said.

Jones' message seemed designed to cap expectations that more troops might be coming, although the Obama administration has not ruled out additional deployments in the future, the Post said.

"This will not be won by the military alone," Jones told the Post during his trip. "We tried that for six years."

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSTRE5600KV200...

[Mari333]

1. economic development and construction paid by whom?????

jesus f christ, how about we start doing that here instead. and no more troops. anywhere.

[msongs]

3. the administration has priorities for who gets economic help nt

[ohio2007]

9. you mean who will be getting the oil pipeline contracts ?

[laststeamtrain]

2. (Reuters): Q+A-The new U.S. strategy in Afghanistan

Q+A-The new U.S. strategy in Afghanistan
Wed Jul 1, 2009 6:00am EDT

By Jonathon Burch

KABUL, July 1 (Reuters) - Concrete signs of Washington's new strategy for Afghanistan are taking shape with the final elements of some 8,500 U.S. Marines arriving in southern Helmand province, a Taliban stronghold, to bolster over-stretched British forces.

The Marines are the biggest single wave of an additional 17,000 extra U.S. troops and 4,000 more to train Afghan forces ordered by President Barack Obama, who has identified Afghanistan as his main military priority.

U.S. troop numbers will rise to 68,000 by year's end, more than double the 32,000 at the end of 2008.

Former special operations chief General Stanley McChrystal has meanwhile taken command of the present 90,000 U.S. and NATO troops with the Pentagon saying it is time for "fresh thinking".

Following are questions and answers about the new strategy and the main areas McChrystal wants to address.

<more>

http://www.reuters.com/article/asiaCrisis/idUSISL507269

[Mari333]

4. clusterfck. quagmire. vietnam take two. nt

[Amonester]

5. All the while, States are about to "close the shop"

Focus instead on economic development and reconstruction... here?

And reconstruction there is for what, to blow it up again, and again, and again??

[natrat]

6. sorry, got to protect the oligarchs heroin trade,thems the breaks

[ohio2007]

7. U.S. Marines launch assault in southern Afghan valley ( They got what the asked for )

LOWER HELMAND RIVER VALLEY, AFGHANISTAN (Reuters) – U.S. Marines launched a helicopter assault early on Thursday in the lower Helmand river valley in southern Afghanistan, spokesman Capt. Bill Pelletier said.

snip

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20090701/ts_nm/us_afghanista...

The homeland of the Taliban tribes.

[Baclava]

8. US launches major offensive against Taliban

Thousands of U.S. Marines stormed into an Afghan river valley by helicopter and land early today, launching the biggest military offensive of Barack Obama's presidency with an assault deep into Taliban territory.

Wave upon wave of helicopters landed Marines in the early morning darkness at locations throughout the valley, a crescent of opium and wheat fields criss-crossed by canals and dotted with mud-brick homes, where firmly entrenched fighters defied NATO forces for years.

Hundreds more Marines raced by ground in convoys through a barren area known as the Desert of Death.

In all, about 4,000 Marines surged forward and thousands more were mobilised to assist them along with 650 Afghan forces, an operation by foreign ground troops on a scale unseen in Afghanistan since the Soviet withdrawal in 1989.

...more

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/articl...