AFGHANISTAN BAD INVESTMENT--GET OUT

Today (August 18, 2017) we learn that President Trump has decamped from seamy, humid and festering DC to the cool air of the Catoctin mountains and Camp David where he will be ensconced with his military team to plan a "new" phase for the war in the long losing war in Afghanistan.  His military advisors are --true to form--pushing him toward---guess what?---more troops to turn the "tide".  They have no other ideas--keeep pushing more men, money and materiel in a losing battle.  These military have not progressed beyond the  the trench warfare practices of WWI.   They can not envision  leaving that harsh mountainous  nation with our tails between our legs.  And the dumbest reason of all...to prevent those military who sacrificed their lives in the past to have done so for a losing cause.  Wasting lives and money for no conceivable gain does not seem averse to the military mind.

We have been fighting in Afghanistan since 2001--now for sixteen years.  This longest war began when the Taliban refused to give up Osama Bin Laden--the mastermind of the 9-11 attacks.  But after Bin Laden eluded US troops and escaped across the border into Pakistan--- we stayed on.  Why have we stayed on for sixteen years?  There is no answer for that query and no one can or will give a good answer today. .  

Today Afghanistan is "celebrated" as as  "America's longest war.".  Some might add our longest lost and losing war, and perhaps our dumbest one too.   The Congressional Budget office has tallied up a $1.1trillion dollar price tag for the direct costs of Afghanistan in 2014--and counting.  But when economists tally in the additional years to the present and the long term costs (military death and family benefits, medical costs, disability, replacement social costs) these Bush era (stirred up and supported by Neo-cons Kristol, Kagan, Nuland, Wolfowitz and other) exercises in stupidity will cost us somewhere between $4 and $6 trillion dollars.    Think of what we could have done had we spent those funds here in the USA.  We could have had a world class educational, medical, transportation systems and a real functioning wall to control illegal immigration.

We sacrificed (and continue to sacrifice ) the lives of two US Army battalions or a whole Regiment of soldiers-----the "dead regiment of Afghanistan" (We lost about 2300 troops in that nation) and we suffered more than 20 thousand wounded.  Many of these brave military wounded continue to live lives of pain and suffering, and mental anguish and will need perpetual care for the rest of their lives.

After all our trillions of tax dollars spent,  heroic efforts, lost lives,  nothing has  changed in Afghanistan. The Taliban still control more than half of that nation.  Where we have weakened and killed them off in parts of the northeastern region--another threat--ISIS has gained a foothold.  Nothing much has changed since President George Bush gave the Taliban the ultimatum--to "give up Bin Laden".  Innocent civilians still die in counterproductive drone strikes which kill more civilians, women and children (as they work in the fields, attend celebrations, or funerals) than terrorists and insurgents. These drone deaths only act as a super effective recruitment tool for ISIS and Taliban insurgents.  They love our drone attacks.  The "drone strategy" is one "sanitary" way to fight and lose a war.

So what now?  Will President Trump go along with the generals all around him and make this a Trump War?  Or will he use his business acumen and realize that Afghanistan is only a hole in earth  to throw away American lives and tax dollars.  Afghanistan is the epitome of a bad investment from the beginning. A wise businessman would see this and end the waste.    Will Mr. Trump  remember his campaign promises in which he claimed to focus his efforts on tax reform, ending uncontrolled immigration, trade reforms, building the wall, and making America Great Again?

Or is he like Obama going to take his pants down for the generals and sacrifice more companies and battalions into the "Afghan Dead Regiment?