One Utah

The war in Afghanistan has been the third-longest longest conflict in American history, after the Revolutionary War and Vietnam. Yet there is no end in sight, the situation is deteriorating, and our allies have concluded that U.S. strategy cannot succeed.

Over-reliance on air strikes has caused civilian casualties disproportionate to any military goals, making these air raids war crimes by definition.

The top British commander in Afghanistan, Brigadier Mark Carleton-Smith, said yesterday that western forces could not defeat the Taliban. “If the Taliban were prepared to sit on the other side of the table and talk about a political settlement, then that’s precisely the sort of progress that concludes insurgencies like this,” Carleton-Smith was quoted as saying.

It’s about time that somebody important said this on the record.

As a matter of fact, CNN reports that talks with the Taliban have been in the works for two years, and took place in Saudi Arabia last month.

Taliban leaders are holding Saudi-brokered talks with the Afghan government to end the country’s bloody conflict — and are severing their ties with al Qaeda, sources close to the historic discussions have told CNN.

…The talks in Mecca took place between September 24 and 27 and involved 11 Taliban delegates, two Afghan government officials, a representative of former mujahadeen commander and U.S. foe Gulbadin Hekmatyar, and three others.

While Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin babbles nonsensically about what she thinks is going on “in our neighboring country of Afghanistan” (does anybody in the McCain campaign ever look at a map?), serious people are making serious efforts to bring peace to Afghanistan on terms favorable to U.S. national security.

We can hope President Obama will support this peace initiative. Looks like the real deal.

UPDATE: General David Petraeus, incoming CENTCOM commander, says he is open to negotiations with the Taliban.

UPDATE: The U.S. commander in Afghanistan, General David McKiernan, expressed support for talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban.

This entry was posted Monday, October 6th, 2008 at 9:47 am and is filed under 2008 Election, Afghanistan, Barack Obama, National Politics, Sarah Palin, This Blog, War. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.