Official: Obama to Announce Afghan War Strategy Decision on Dec. 1
28 replies, posted
[QUOTE]WASHINGTON -- President Obama will address the nation next Tuesday on his vision of the way forward in Afghanistan, a White House official told Fox News.
The news comes as Obama held a "rigorous final meeting" Monday with his Afghanistan war council and was expected to announce his revised strategy for the eight-year-old conflict just after his Thanksgiving break.
Military officials and others expect Obama to settle on a middle-ground option that would deploy an eventual 32,000 to 35,000 U.S. forces. That rough figure has stood as the most likely option since before Obama's last large war council meeting earlier this month, when he tasked military planners with rearranging the timing and makeup of some of the deployments.
The president has said with increasing frequency in recent days that a big piece of the rethinking of options that he ordered had to do with building an exit strategy into the announcement -- in other words, revising the options presented to him to clarify when U.S. troops would turn over responsibility to the Afghan government and under what conditions.
As White House press secretary Robert Gibbs put it to reporters on Monday, it's "not just how we get people there, but what's the strategy for getting them out."
Obama held the 10th meeting of his Afghanistan strategy review since mid-September on Monday night, with a large cast of foreign policy and military advisers, to go over that revised information from war planners. The two-hour Situation Room session was aimed at discussing "some of the questions that the president had, some additional answers to what he'd asked for," Gibbs said.
The spokesman said the president left the war council meeting without announcing a decision to the group, but added it would become public soon.
"After completing a rigorous final meeting, President Obama has the information he wants and needs to make his decision and he will announce that decision within days," Gibbs said late Monday.
The White House is aiming for an announcement by Obama next week, either Tuesday or Wednesday, after Congress returns from its Thanksgiving break. Military officials, congressional aides and European diplomats said they expect Obama to deliver a national address laying out the revamped strategy.
Congressional hearings would immediately follow that address, including testimony from the U.S. commander in Afghanistan, Gen. Stanley McChrystal. Others likely to take part in hearings would be Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, Defense Secretary Robert Gates and U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan Karl Eikenberry. All four were among the approximately 20 top administration officials and Obama advisers participating in the talks Monday night -- one of the biggest groups gathered for these sessions in some time.
The force infusion expected by the military would represent most but not all the troops requested by Obama's war commander, for a retailored war plan that blends elements of McChrystal's counterterror strategy with tactics more closely associated with the CIA's unacknowledged war to hunt down terrorists across the border in Pakistan.
McChrystal presented options ranging from about 10,000 to about 80,000 forces, and told Obama he preferred an addition of about 40,000 atop the record 68,000 in the country now, officials have said.
Obama has already ordered a significant expansion of 21,000 troops since taking office. The war has worsened on his watch, and public support has dropped as U.S. combat deaths have climbed.
The additional troops would be concentrated in the south and east of Afghanistan, the areas where the U.S. already has most of its forces, military officials said. The new troops that already went this year were directed to help relieve Marines stretched to the limit by far-flung postings in Helmand province and that would continue, while the U.S. effort would expand somewhat in Kandahar.
The increase would include at least three Army brigades and a single, larger Marine Corps contingent, officials said.
All officials spoke on condition of anonymity because the decision is not final.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.[/QUOTE]
Source: [url]http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/11/23/obama-lock-afghanistan-decision/[/url]
Just one more week and we get to see how Obama will handle the war.
Woah, can't wait!
So are we expecting numerous troops to die in the process?
he is conjuring up all the obese people he can find as we speak
This decision will probably be one of the defining moments of this term. The wars are the worst of the problems he inherited from Bush, and what he decides to do about it is a pretty big deal.
We should just leave Afghanistan, problem solved.
[QUOTE=Amez;18545109]We should just leave Afghanistan, problem solved.[/QUOTE]
What about Al-Qaeda and Bin Laden?
[QUOTE=Emperor Scorpious II;18545132]What about Al-Qaeda and Bin Laden?[/QUOTE]
They're long gone and relaxing in Pakistan. The majority of the fighting in Afghanistan is against the Taliban.
You remember them, right? The leading party of the country that we kicked out in order to install a ludicrously corrupt puppet government?
[QUOTE=Amez;18545109]We should just leave Afghanistan, problem solved.[/QUOTE]
That's right. This war is about revenge anyway.
[QUOTE=Bullzeye421;18545159]That's right. This war is about revenge anyway.[/QUOTE]
No it's not :ninja:
[QUOTE=Emperor Scorpious II;18545252]No it's not :ninja:[/QUOTE]
Then what is it about? Oil? Sand? It's about retaliation for the towers. War on Terror my ass. How's that war on drugs going? We won yet?
[QUOTE=Emperor Scorpious II;18545252]No it's not :ninja:[/QUOTE]
Yeah, it is
[QUOTE=Bullzeye421;18545355]Then what is it about? Oil? Sand? It's about retaliation for the towers. War on Terror my ass. How's that war on drugs going? We won yet?[/QUOTE]
We want Afghanistan's sand. Yes.
[QUOTE=Bullzeye421;18545355]Then what is it about? Oil? Sand? It's about retaliation for the towers. War on Terror my ass. How's that war on drugs going? We won yet?[/QUOTE]
Afghanistan has no important natural resources, and isn't even that strategic. We wanted to bomb the living shit out of some poor 3rd world country as revenge for 9/11, and we didn't even get the guy responsible.
Iraq, now that's the oil grab.
[QUOTE=Emperor Scorpious II;18545367]We want Afghanistan's sand. Yes.[/QUOTE]
I heard that Afghanistan's Sand cures heart failure,
And America wants it, [B]Badly[/B].
We're probably going to have to go into Pakistan in a couple of years unless they sort out the Taliban.
Why the fuck do we need to even contemplate installing more troops into Afghanistan? It seems completely idiotic to me. It's not like there was even a 'war' there in the first place. Unless I'm missing something that would justify sending more troops.
Still fighting Israel's enemies I see.
My cousin in the state department told me they've given up on Afghanistan almost entirely and that Obama wants to keep troops there to demoralize the public in the USA.
[QUOTE=Emperor Scorpious II;18545132]What about Al-Qaeda and Bin Laden?[/QUOTE]
nuke
It's painfully ironic that only 8 years after 9/11, the world has pretty much forgotten about it and the people responsible. Remember when they were storming Afghanistan looking for bin Laden? The fuck happened to that enthusiasm?
[QUOTE=Bullzeye421;18545355]\How's that war on drugs going? We won yet?[/QUOTE]
We lost a Drug lord is going to be our president next week.
Also drugs are still illegal; it turns out you make more money that way seeing as they don't tax it.
[QUOTE=CivilProtection;18559416]Still fighting Israel's enemies I see.[/QUOTE]
No, Israel should stay the FUCK away from any other country
Don't bring Israel into this
[QUOTE=KaIibos;18560025]It's painfully ironic that only 8 years after 9/11, the world has pretty much forgotten about it and the people responsible. Remember when they were storming Afghanistan looking for bin Laden? The fuck happened to that enthusiasm?[/QUOTE]
You have no idea what irony means, do you?
[QUOTE=KaIibos;18560025]It's painfully ironic that only 8 years after 9/11, the world has pretty much forgotten about it and the people responsible. Remember when they were storming Afghanistan looking for bin Laden? The fuck happened to that enthusiasm?[/QUOTE]
Eight years and 5,130 soldier’s lives. How’s that for enthusiasm?
[url]http://projects.washingtonpost.com/fallen/[/url]
For what? What have we gained from all of this? Certainly not respect. You think these fuckers are scared now? Unlikely?
We have spent over 9 hundred billion dollars on these two wars. I’m not very enthusiastic about that.
[url]http://costofwar.com/[/url]
For what? Is that the cost of freedom? Are we fightin em over there so we don’t have to fight em over here? And didn’t we capture the guy that masterminded the whole thing?
[url]http://www.globalsecurity.org/security/profiles/khalid_shaikh_mohammed.htm[/url]
So what the fuck are we doing?
[QUOTE=Bullzeye421;18562476]Eight years and 5,130 soldier’s lives. How’s that for enthusiasm?
[url]http://projects.washingtonpost.com/fallen/[/url]
For what? What have we gained from all of this? Certainly not respect. You think these fuckers are scared now? Unlikely?
We have spent over 9 hundred billion dollars on these two wars. I’m not very enthusiastic about that.
[url]http://costofwar.com/[/url]
For what? Is that the cost of freedom? Are we fightin em over there so we don’t have to fight em over here? And didn’t we capture the guy that masterminded the whole thing?
[url]http://www.globalsecurity.org/security/profiles/khalid_shaikh_mohammed.htm[/url]
So what the fuck are we doing?[/QUOTE]
Obama said he'd pull us out, lets hope it all sorts out on the 1st.
[QUOTE=Amez;18545109]We should just leave Afghanistan, problem solved.[/QUOTE]
We can't let them terrists win! :rolleyes:
[QUOTE=Fetret;18562340]You have no idea what irony means, do you?[/QUOTE]
Actually, I do
It's ironic because the original reason for going to the middle east in the first place was to bring bin Laden to justice. Years later, nobody gives a shit about him anymore and the cause is basically forgotten. They went in to capture a guy, and as of 2009 (almost 2010), they seem to have done everything but.
[QUOTE=smurfy;18547869]We're probably going to have to go into Pakistan in a couple of years unless they sort out the Taliban.[/QUOTE]
We are already in Pakistan.
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