Gee, so much for Obama's diplomacy. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/article6032342.ece "Just two other allies made firm offers of troops. Belgium offered to send 35 military trainers and Spain offered 12. Mr Obamaâs host, Nicolas Sarkozy, refused his request. "
What Obama needs to learn is that it is not the attitude of the US that needs to change it is the attitude of the Europeans. Again Bush was right....Europe doesn't like us because Europe doesn't want to be tough, they only want to talk. BTW nice dinner hall in that picture
Yeah as if Europe was overjoyed at going to afganistan during w years. Afghanistan is what romans called a cloaca a single dollar spent there is a crime. You do what you have to do to GET OUT OF IT whether it is bribing taliban "declaring victory" or whatever else but it is worthless.
That is true. Somehow, the destruction of a Spanish train and depth of hundreds is lost in Europe. A similar thing happened when they decided to appease Hitler and let him start annexing parts of small countries. And look what happened. Either you bloody your enemy who desires your end, or you leave all the doors unlocked at night in your home.
They know that Obama lives in a math free zone. If they won't spend the money to fight their enemies he'll find a way do it for them. What a pushover the guy is... you go to europeans and tell them to pony up or you will engineer the economic and social disaster of their lifetimes on them... not that we haven't already done that...
Well, you see, to the far Left, the deaths of those hundreds in Spain (and 9/11) must have been the result of American and/or Western imperialism coming home to roost. Just ask Ward Churchill...Al Qaeda and co. are just a bunch of noble freedom-fighters trying to undo the wrongs of hundreds of years of western/American tyranny and oppression. Leave Al Qaeda alone and they'll leave Europe alone. Bin Laden's calls for jihad and the establishment of a global caliphate? He was just joking....
Easier said than done in Afghanistan. Just ask the Russians. They were there for 9 years and lost nearly 15,000 soldiers. That's why "counter-insurgency" is most likely the answer in Afghanistan. It is ranked as the 176th ( out of 180 ) most corrupt nations on the globe. A strictly military solution is NOT the answer. You get rid of the Taliban (and al-Qaeda ) by building infrastructure . . . water, electricity, sanitation, roads, hospitals, economic trade/commerce, etc. When you start seeing farmers showing up with vegetables at the local farmer's market ( as opposed to growing opium poppies ) that's a small, but important sign that is a significant metric.
Under Bush, Europe didn't like "us" because they saw the invasion/occupation of Iraq as an unnecessary war. Let's face it, Bush jammed the Iraq War down everyone's throats. He was arrogant, and dictated to Europe what he wanted to see happen even though it was well known that 16 of the 19 hijackers from 9/11 were Saudi nationals and had absolutely NOTHING to do with 9/11. You seem to conveniently forget how arrogant Bush was. To the Europeans, Obama is the "anti-Bush". Because of that, he has an overwhelming amount of goodwill from the Europeans. While the typical Bush "neo-con" on ET wants to see Obama ram everything down the Euros throats after only 2.5 months in office, I'm sure that Obama and his foreign policy team will use this new found goodwill in a most wise fashion. It's only the first inning of a nine inning ball game. As for what you believe Obama needs to learn, you obviously haven't been listening . . . He's well aware that Europe's attitude towards America needs to change. He even said so during his speech the other day.
There are two foreign policy mindsets. There is the constitutional non-interventionist foreign policy that is meant to defend the country and then there is the wrong foreign policy. First of all Afghanistan is not a threat. It is NOT a threat. Considering Afghanistan a threat is about as logical as considering a primitive tribe in Africa a threat. Second of all the comments about Europe being weak. Europe is perceived as weak because they have learned in the last couple decades that America is willing to police the world. They are therefore dependent upon us. Whether it is nations or individuals a psychological dependency will hinder self-sufficiency. Do you think the present military spending of European nations would be as low as it is right now if America was not interested in policing the world? Hell no. A military staying in Afghanistan sounds like a bad idea. A military staying in Afghanistan under president Obama sounds completely hopeless. It is hopeless because the only yet still very unlikely chance of a successful mission in Afghanistan would be to undergo a massive troop surge. Unless Obama is truly a neocon he would not be willing to sacrifice double digit political points for success in Afghanistan. My prediction is that Obama will in the next year to couple years run into a brick wall, have an epiphany and then make a tough yet totally predictable decision when it comes to those who know what type of man Obama is. He will most likely keep adding a couple thousand troops every couple months for a couple years and sooner or later the vast majority of his own base will turn totally against troop increases mainly because of the increase in casualties and will call for troop withdrawals. That is the brick wall. Obama will soon discover that the only way to succeed in Afghanistan would be to enact a troop surge or at the very least increase the dangers of individual missions hence creating larger amounts of casualties. The final decision will be to leave Afghanistan a wasteland just like it was before with most likely an even stronger Taliban presence or to follow through with the mission no matter the casualties and therefore follow the foot steps of Bush. Military intervention among other countries is a bad idea (search CIA Blowback.) Military intervention among other countries where the leader is unwilling to do what it takes to succeed is the definition of hopeless.