bobdina
12-02-2009, 12:01 PM
notable moments of the speech
Wednesday, December 2, 2009
"I have determined that it is in our vital national interest to send an additional 30,000 U.S. troops to Afghanistan. After 18 months, our troops will begin to come home."
This is likely to be the most controversial notion in the speech -- that the president can pledge to flood Afghanistan with troops and in the same breath talk about removing them from the country. In a superficial way, the plan resembles President George W. Bush's "surge" strategy in Iraq, but Bush was limited by troop availability, so even if he had wanted to keep those forces in Iraq longer it would have been difficult.
Obama was careful to offer a caveat -- "we will execute this transition responsibly, taking into account conditions on the ground" -- but the date of July 2011 is likely to linger in viewers' minds. This administration has had real trouble meeting deadlines -- witness the difficulty with closing the detention facility in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba -- so it will be interesting to see how much of an albatross this date becomes.
"There has never been an option before me that called for troop deployments before 2010, so there has been no delay or denial of resources necessary for the conduct of the war."
This is technically true, but McChrystal's August report insisted that reinforcements were needed as quickly as possible to arrest the decline in Afghanistan and shift the momentum away from the Taliban. McChrystal has since said that he supports the Obama administration's policy review.
"The 30,000 additional troops . . . will deploy in the first part of 2010 -- the fastest pace possible -- so that they can target the insurgency and secure key population centers."
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Getting all those troops -- and just as important, their supplies -- to Afghanistan by mid-2010 will be a huge challenge for the military.
Because the country is land-locked, everything has to arrive by air, or by ship and then be moved by truck through Pakistan. Shipping goods from the United States to forward-operating bases in Helmand province can take weeks.
Then there is the problem of housing the new troops. Unlike in Iraq, there are no unused military installations in Afghanistan into which the new forces can move. Combat engineers and contractors will have to construct new facilities and expand existing ones, which could take months.
"Our new approach in Afghanistan is likely to cost us roughly $30 billion for the military this year, and I will work closely with Congress to address these costs as we work to bring down our deficit."
Administration officials say that cost will be paid through a supplemental appropriation -- a practice Democrats heavily criticized during the Bush years and something Obama had said he would not do. Republicans are content to simply let it be paid through deficit spending, but some leading Democrats are talking about a tax or a surcharge that would fall heavily on the most wealthy. Expect a big fight on this question
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/12/01/AR2009120104976.html
Wednesday, December 2, 2009
"I have determined that it is in our vital national interest to send an additional 30,000 U.S. troops to Afghanistan. After 18 months, our troops will begin to come home."
This is likely to be the most controversial notion in the speech -- that the president can pledge to flood Afghanistan with troops and in the same breath talk about removing them from the country. In a superficial way, the plan resembles President George W. Bush's "surge" strategy in Iraq, but Bush was limited by troop availability, so even if he had wanted to keep those forces in Iraq longer it would have been difficult.
Obama was careful to offer a caveat -- "we will execute this transition responsibly, taking into account conditions on the ground" -- but the date of July 2011 is likely to linger in viewers' minds. This administration has had real trouble meeting deadlines -- witness the difficulty with closing the detention facility in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba -- so it will be interesting to see how much of an albatross this date becomes.
"There has never been an option before me that called for troop deployments before 2010, so there has been no delay or denial of resources necessary for the conduct of the war."
This is technically true, but McChrystal's August report insisted that reinforcements were needed as quickly as possible to arrest the decline in Afghanistan and shift the momentum away from the Taliban. McChrystal has since said that he supports the Obama administration's policy review.
"The 30,000 additional troops . . . will deploy in the first part of 2010 -- the fastest pace possible -- so that they can target the insurgency and secure key population centers."
ad_icon
Getting all those troops -- and just as important, their supplies -- to Afghanistan by mid-2010 will be a huge challenge for the military.
Because the country is land-locked, everything has to arrive by air, or by ship and then be moved by truck through Pakistan. Shipping goods from the United States to forward-operating bases in Helmand province can take weeks.
Then there is the problem of housing the new troops. Unlike in Iraq, there are no unused military installations in Afghanistan into which the new forces can move. Combat engineers and contractors will have to construct new facilities and expand existing ones, which could take months.
"Our new approach in Afghanistan is likely to cost us roughly $30 billion for the military this year, and I will work closely with Congress to address these costs as we work to bring down our deficit."
Administration officials say that cost will be paid through a supplemental appropriation -- a practice Democrats heavily criticized during the Bush years and something Obama had said he would not do. Republicans are content to simply let it be paid through deficit spending, but some leading Democrats are talking about a tax or a surcharge that would fall heavily on the most wealthy. Expect a big fight on this question
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/12/01/AR2009120104976.html