Afghan Envoy Holbrooke and Senate in La La Land

[unhappycamper]

Afghan Envoy Holbrooke and Senate in La La Land
by Medea Benjamin | July 18, 2010 - 9:27am

"Man, those dudes are in La La Land," a young intern said to me on the way out of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on Afghanistan on June 14, his eyes rolling. "You can't win in Afghanistan. Don't they read history?"

It had been hard to sit through hours of Special Envoy Richard Holbrooke's storytelling about some far-off land he called Afghanistan. In his Afghanistan, there were new gains in agriculture and a reduction on poppy production for opium. We were empowering women and rebuilding everything from the rule of law to the electrical grid. President Karzai was really intent on tackling corruption. There was an exciting soon-to-be-unveiled program to integrate the lower-level Taliban. We were making significant gains in training the Afghan security forces, and we had real commitments from the Pakistani government to crush Al Qaeda.

We've heard this tall tale for the past eight years, which made some of the Senators a bit skeptical--although not skeptical enough to stop funding the war.

The most skeptical were the Republicans, who also happen to be the most anxious to keep fighting there, indefinitely. Senator Bob Corker said that despite more than an hour of testimony by Holbrooke, "I have heard nothing, nothing" about how progress will be measured. "I have no earthly idea what our objectives are on the civilian front."

Ranking Republican Richard Lugar was also confused about our objectives. Sometimes, he said, it seems that we are trying to "remake Afghan economic, political and security culture", which is "beyond our resources and powers." Other times it seems the goal is simply to prevent Afghanistan from being a haven for terrorists. Either way, Lugar didn't think we could accomplish the President's desire to begin withdrawal by July 2011.

[burnsei sensei]

1. Jeez Mr Corker,

Quote:
The most skeptical were the Republicans, who also happen to be the most anxious to keep fighting there, indefinitely. Senator Bob Corker said that despite more than an hour of testimony by Holbrooke, "I have heard nothing, nothing" about how progress will be measured. "I have no earthly idea what our objectives are on the civilian front." end quote.

Why don't you thank your great messiah GW Bush for starting the war in the first place?
We have been attempting conquest and occupation. Those have been, are, and will be the objectives for the foreseeable future.
And those two words-- Conquest and Occupation, are the two no one will say.
Another grand fantasy of the neocons is that we will create a hegemonic relationship with Iraq and Afghanistan.
Not going to happen.

[pscot]

2. Insanity is when you keep doin

the same thing over and over and expect a different result.

[KharmaTrain]

3. It's All About "Metrics"...

Yes this is insanity...even moreso considering the history of the region. This "mission" lost focus the moment georgie booosh expanded his much coveted wars for profit to Iraq and the focus went from going after the "terrorists" and against some abstract word "terrorism" that could be manipulated (and was) to suit the need. Unfortunately this game continues under the current administration and appears a new lexicon is in play with a new set of metrics and words to define "victory". It's total madness as the concept of "eliminating" terrorism doesn't exist...you can't eliminate a verb. We're stuck in a civil war that our leaders fail to understand as they're so wrapped up in a geo-political game of whack-a-mole that has cost this country billions, not to mention the thousands of needless deaths. It's turned into a war to prove something/anything...to find a way to spin a quamire into a victory...Vietnam revisited.

The only objectives is to maintain the flow of billions to the defense contractors and others who have made billions off these wars and throw money at the politicians inside the beltway to perpetuate these adventures. It's only when the "cost analysis" says the war is no longer profitable that we'll see a serious withdrawl.