The green on blue attacks in Afghanistan led to the collapse of the exit strategy in Afghanistan. Joint operations with Afghan forces on the most important lower level are halted. This and the recent audacious Taliban attack on the joined British U.S. Camp Bastion have changed the mind of even the most hawkish U.S. politicians
“I think all options ought to be considered, including whether we have to just withdraw early, rather than have a continued bloodletting that won’t succeed,” [Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.)] said Wednesday.
Mc Cain was joined by on of the leading warmongers in the House:
[Rep. C.W. Bill Young, R-Fla., who chairs the House Defense Appropriations Subcommittee, ] is the longest-serving Republican member of Congress, and he has continuously voted against troop drawbacks from Afghanistan, or even for setting a timetable for troop withdrawal. But after Sitton’s death, Young noted a change of heart.
“I think we should remove ourselves from Afghanistan as quickly as we can,” Young told the Tampa Bay Times this week. “I just think we’re killing kids that don’t need to die.”
With even the hawks calling for an early withdrawal I expect the Obama administration to reveal its plan for an accelerated retreat from Afghanistan immediately after the November election. The implementation of such a plan will face some difficulties.
The administration has burned the bridges to a negotiated solution in Afghanistan by listing the Haqqani network, part of the Taliban, as a foreign terrorist organization. A ceasefire to facilitate the western retreat from Afghanistan is therefore unlikely to happen. While most the soldiers can be flown out of the country huge mountain the materials will have to go over land.
Who will cover those routes while the western forces are reduced and the Afghan army, as is very likely to happen, breaks apart?
The last iconic pictures we will get from this war of Afghanistan will likely show huge columns of burning trucks.