BY TAYLOR MARSH
NATO’s role in Afghanistan has evolved into a disastrous conglomeration of countries that don’t want to send their own troops into harm’s way. Don’t want to spend the money. Will not fight where bullets are flying. In other words, useless. Everyone expects the U.S. to get it done. It this continues, NATO will be no more. This would be a catastrophic event for nations, but a boon to terrorists and world thugs and thieves. Gates lowered the boom, saying as much:
Defense Secretary Robert Gates said the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and the United Nations have failed to provide enough resources to Afghanistan. He told U.S. troops here that NATO members have resisted American entreaties for them to deploy more forces to Afghanistan, leaving the U.S. to “bear a disproportionate part of this burden.”
“NATO is a military alliance — it’s not a talk shop,” he said. [...]
Gates and Gen. Jones agree on this.
U.S. reinforcements arrive in Afghanistan in January. But we can’t do it alone, nor should we. NATO and the U.N. have got to pull more weight.
Preventing failed states is on Obama’s short list. Convincing others to feel the same won’t be easy, if it can be done at all, especially since Bush allowed Afghanistan to revert back to the Taliban controlling so much terrain yet again. It’s why many progressives don’t want to recommit there. But looking at Afghanistan, Pakistan and India together is the only way through. The only way out.
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