Afghanistan, an Unfunny Joke

In 2001 the United States took a small force into Afghanistan and chased Al Qaeda and their sponsors the Taliban out of power. A success gained at a stunningly small cost in casualties and treasure. Today things have gone stunningly wrong. Robert Blackwell, in charge of policy for both Afghanistan and Iraq at the National Security Council asserts, "where we find ourselves now may have been close to inevitable, whether the U.S. went into Iraq or not." That inevitibility might be real questionable if you consider his following caveate, "We were going to face this long war in Afghanistan as long as we and the Afghan government couldn’t bring serious economic reconstruction to the countryside, and eliminate the Taliban’s safe havens in Pakistan.”

The NYT article notes: "When it came to reconstruction, big goals were announced, big projects identified. Yet in the year Mr. Bush promised a “Marshall Plan” for Afghanistan, the country received less assistance per capita than did postconflict Bosnia and Kosovo, or even desperately poor Haiti, according to a RAND Corporation study." It might pay to remember GWB's ridicule of "nation building" in the 2000 election. Maybe it sounds even more ludicrous in the wake of Iraq.

I'd add something, but it would just be piling on...