The War on Terror

During his Middle East/European tour, democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama stated that Afghanistan, and not Iraq was the central front for the war on terror. Sen. John McCain has said as much, but has either one taken the time to consider what that means? In 1980 the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan, and for the next ten years fought a war to try and bring that nation into compliance. During that conflict the Taliban would continually cross the northern border into Pakistan to rearm, and regroup. Equipped with American made weapons, primarily the Stinger anti-aircraft missile, the Taliban would again cross the border into southern Afghanistan and engage in guerrilla attacks on Soviet units. Eventually the attrition rate became such that, like American forces in Vietnam, the Soviet Union was forced to withdraw its troops. So why didn't Soviet military units pursue the Taliban into the tribal regions of northern Pakistan? Quite possibly for fear of escalating the war. At that time the Soviet Unions' prestige was at an all time low because of the invasion. At the United Nations General Assembly world leaders denounced the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. Fear of drawing other nations in and widening the conflict is what kept the Soviet Union from invading across the northern border of Pakistan. Now almost thirty years later we have another conflict in Afghanistan, and just as with the Soviets, after American forces routed out the Taliban in Kandahar, and Kabul, the Taliban simply crossed into northern Pakistan to regroup. Armed now with Iranian weapons funneled through Pakistan, the Taliban continue to cross into southern Afghanistan to conduct hit-and-run attacks on N.A.T.O. troops now. If senators McCain and Obama view Afghanistan as the central front for the war on terror, then the question must be asked; Will either one in their role as commander-in-chief order U.S. troops into the northern tribal areas of Pakistan to engage and destroy the Taliban, or will they be content to try and keep the Taliban out of Afghanistan, while the casualty count continues to climb? Anti-war protesters called the war in Iraq illegal, or refer to it as a quagmire. The legality of the war in Iraq I'll touch on later, but to call it a quagmire in light of how combat operations in Afghanistan are conducted is a gross distortion of the facts. Although the Iraqi government is far from laudable, at least it's making progress towards stabilizing their country. Iran supplies weapons to Iraqi insurgents, but the surge has worked to quell the violence. In Afghanistan the government is still having difficulty unifying the different tribal groups in their country. The Afghan government has done very little to stop the growing and harvest of opium, something the Taliban never allowed under their rule. With Pakistan's statement by their foreign minister last month that no U.S. forces are operating in northern Pakistan, and that none would be allowed even though that particular region of Pakistan is where the Taliban go to find sanctuary, to that is the very definition of a quagmire. Again, I don't believe either presidential candidate has thought this through.