Defending the Truth

About that "War on Terror"...
While we're busy not catching Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan, spending billions liberating Iraq from stability, and watching as all hell breaks loose throughout the entire Middle East, we also just happen to be losing Africa.

The Bush administration and Congress have slashed millions of dollars of military aid to African nations in recent years, moves that Pentagon officials and senior military commanders say have undermined American efforts to combat terrorist threats in Africa and to counter expanding Chinese influence there.

Since 2003, Washington has shut down Pentagon programs to train and equip militaries in a handful of African nations because they have declined to sign agreements exempting American troops from the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court in The Hague.

But the policy, which was designed to protect American troops, has instead angered senior military officials, who say the cuts in military aid are shortsighted and have weakened counterterrorism efforts in places where the threat of international terrorism is said to be most acute.

Some cite this as a case where the unintended consequences of the go-it-alone approach to foreign policy that Washington took after the Sept. 11 attacks affected the larger American efforts to combat terrorism.

Fantastic. So al Qaeda, which we know has been active in Kenya for the last decade (remember the embassy bombings in 1998?) and associated organizations in states like Mali are left relatively unchecked. What's more, China is stepping into the breach, providing funding for military and infrastructure building programs. This in and of itself isn't a military threat to the U.S., but it does mean that China then has a lock on government contracts for natural resources.

Oh, and many Latin American countries have also had their funding cut off. But they were only using it for things like fighting drug cartels.

Is there any place in the world that this administration's disastrous policies haven't reached?

Damned if you do and damned if you don't. You can't please everyone.

I think that is an over simplification...

Okay. I think we will have to prioritize our troops and money to the areas that are clearly the most threatening to the USA.

I agree with that. The first step there is a draw down of forces in Iraq and a removal of forces from Afghanistan.

I agree with that, at the appropriate time. There has to be stability and the military of Iraq and Afghanistan have to be strong enough to protect the people.

I can tell you that we are ready to leave Afhanistan, in fact we are in the process of handing it over to the Coalition forces. And I agree that we can not just up and leave Iraq at this point, but I do think we need to have a viable exit strategy.

I agree. Everything in due time.

We might be almost ready to hand over Afghanistan, but I say we stay there and push efforts in finding Osama Bin Laden and eradicating Al-Qaeda.

Al-Qaeda is almost non-existant here. And Osama is not even in this country anymore. No reason to stay. We are just spending a fortune on beggars.