Gates: Defeating Taliban Will Take ‘A Few Years’

[tekisui]

Source: MSNBC

WASHINGTON - The Pentagon presented a grim portrait of the Afghanistan war Thursday, offering no assurances about how long Americans will be fighting there or how many U.S. combat troops it will take to win.

Defeating the Taliban and al-Qaida will take "a few years," Defense Secretary Robert Gates said, with success on a larger scale in the desperately poor country a much longer proposition. He acknowledged that the Taliban has a firm hold on parts of the country President Barack Obama has called vital to U.S. security.

Congress wants answers to what lawmakers described as basic questions to soothe a war-weary American public.

"In the intelligence business, we always used to categorize information in two ways, secrets and mysteries," Gates, a former CIA director, told a Pentagon news conference.

He added: "Mysteries were those where there were too many variables to predict. And I think that how long U.S. forces will be in Afghanistan is in that area."

more: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32413461/ns/world_news-south_and_central_asia/

[spanone]

1. bullshit, it will take a lifetime, then never happen.....get. out. now.

[TheCowsCameHome]

2. Try centuries Robert, and that's being extremely optimistic.

What a joke.

[hobbit709]

3. Everybody from Alexander on tried it

Negative outcome 100%

[indepat]

4. Is Gates' headquarters where his hindquarters should be: isn't the twelfth of never more

realistic considering the history of this area? :P