Notes of Concern…
…Jackson Blair
A DECADE TOO LONG
We have now experienced the longest war in American History.
The Afghanistan mess!
Is it a war?
Did Congress declare it a war?
Do Americans think of it as a “real war?”
Will the world be changed in broad positive ways as was the case at the end of WWI and WWII?
What in the world are we doing in that poppy growing, bribe taking, historically corruptible part of the world?
Osama bin Laden wasn’t there. He was in Pakistan. Our allies and friends, the Pakistanis clearly knew he was in their country. So surely our costly intelligence gathering community must have known we would not find him in Afghanistan.
The question remains: exactly what are we doing in Afghanistan?
More importantly, should we be sacrificing American treasure, the lives of young men and women, tax dollars needed urgently here at home, in Afghanistan?
Where is the national interest? What about Afghanistan warrants the horrific expenditure in dollars and lives?
There is no “winning” in Afghanistan. For those of you who remember that we did not “win” in Vietnam, surely you understand that even the vaunted Russians could not defeat the Afghan enemy.
Afghanistan has problems. The largest seems to be the Taliban. Americans do not like the Taliban. It appears lots of people in Afghanistan continue to like the Taliban. If that were not the case, we would not be in year ten of trying to defeat the Taliban.
Personally, I do not like Texas. I tried to like Texas. I went to Austin, Houston, Dallas and San Antonio. I just do not like it down there. To me it is just a group of people with big hats and no cows.
I didn’t like the way Lyndon Johnson of the Texas State Teacher’s College looked down at his cabinet because they had been educated, mostly, in New England.
I didn’t like George W. Bush’s swagger, the one he explained as “the way we walk in Texas.”
I don’t like the climate, the lay of the land, or the braggadocio that I find there.
So did I declare war on Texas? Did I want to fight Texans without declaring war? Did I think for one minute I would ally myself with some Texans who actually owned cows and ranches to rid the state of those who did not?
Nope.
I just don’t go there. My decision rid me of the problem and did not cost me one dime. It was simply common sense.
So I want to suggest to the President of The United States and all those who work for him and all those who sit in Congress that we just declare victory in Afghanistan and bring all our troops home.
And then we should have the Secretary of State declare that no one can get a visa to visit Pakistan. That should solve the problem. It stops the loss of American life and the expenditure of American dollars.
It is not my intention to be simplistic or trite. I understand the responsibilities of world power. I identify with the plight of the downtrodden. It hurts me deeply to consider the American lives that have been lost on Afghan soil or to contemplate those that will be lost in the future of this mad adventure.
It is time to put an end to the American involvement in Afghanistan.
Does anybody currently holding important office in Washington, DC understand world history?
Not since the times of Attila the Hun and Genghis Kahn has anyone even come close to winning an engagement like the one in which we are currently involved.
The distance is too far, the historical record too clear, the cost too dear, the payoff too little and the goal too hazy for us to go one more mile down this road.
For further information: jacksonblair@gmail.com
