We’ve tried to give due attention to the war in Afghanistan in recent months, as President Obama weighed the decision to send more troops. It’s been a roller coaster year, with a U.S. military push into the country’s south, Pakistan’s own Taliban fight getting deadly serious, high-profile resignations from American officials in the region, and prominent critics on all sides bringing the troop debate to a boil in America.
Now, President Obama is poised to deliever an historic speech at West Point, which we preview today and will unpack tomorrow.
For more context, it’s worth listening back to some of our recent coverage. We’ve heard notable voices such as Ambassador Peter Galbraith, Senator Russ Feingold, terrorism expert Peter Bergen, soldier-scholars Andrew Bacevich and Rory Stewart, and retired Col. Lawrence Wilkerson, among many others. Here are some highlights from the past six months:
Pakistan’s Fight, America’s Fear – May 6, 2009 (with Pakistan journalist Mosharraf Zaidi, the New York Times’s David Sanger, Harvard’s Rolf Mowatt-Larssen, and Brookings’ Stephen Cohen).
Andrew Bacevich: America and War – May 25, 2009 (a special pre-recorded Memorial Day show).
The New Fight in Afghanistan - July 22, 2009 (with the LA Times’s Laura King, the Washington Post’s Pamela Constable, writer Gretchen Peters, and the U.S. Naval Postgraduate School’s Kalev Sepp)
Rory Stewart: Reality Check on Afghanistan – August 19, 2009 (with Stewart, recently returned from Afghanistan).
Obama’s Choice in Afghanistan - September 8, 2009 (with the New York Times’s Carlotta Gall, Harvard’s Stephen Walt, Center for American Progress defense analyst Lawrence Korb, and Sen. Russ Feingold).
Candor and Afghanistan – September 21, 2009 (with defense analyst and Vietnam war critic Daniel Ellsberg, retired Army Col. Lawrence Wilkerson, and The New Yorker’s George Packer).
Peter Galbraith on Afghanistan - October 1, 2009 (with Ambassador Galbraith himself, right after his U.N. resignation).
Ground Realities in Afghanistan – October 13, 2009 (with the LA Times’s Laura King, the Washington Post’s Pamela Constable, and Martin Smith of PBS’ Frontline).
Assessing the Taliban - October 26, 2009 (with terrorism expert Peter Bergen and Harvard’s Michael Semple).
Tags: Afghanistan
horrible news coverage, all day yesterday npr including on-point majority of the time is cheer leading the war in afgan, and additional build up.
cheer-leading fear of the unknown as well,
I used to believe npr and on-point were the best news source to get information in the U.S. and used to tell my friends, family member and everyone i could to listen, but since the last 1.5 year it become nothing more than a cable new where balance and opinion supersede objectivity and facts.
have anyone on-point or npr actually talk to the Taliban or do you get the news feed to by our military? The BBC does this and gives it’s listeners and readers a deeper view on what is actually going on besides the lame military generated “people in afgan love us and hate the Taliban.
It’s been a disappointment watching NPR use Right-wing PAC such as AEI as objective.
Posted by Michael, on December 3rd, 2009 at 9:45 AMI disagree with Michael’s comment above… NPR has been bringing in the experts in the field to discuss this issue. Michael Semple and Rory Stewart are arguably the best in the field when it comes to understanding Afghanistan and its troubles (Semple was booted out of the country by the country for talking to the Taliban). Both do not advocate ‘the surge’. Peter Galbraith had his disagreements as well…
Thank you for the excellent analysis Tom! It is impossible to briefly summarize all of Afghanistan in one hour, let alone begin to discuss solutions. No wonder so many are misinformed given the 3 minute blurbs in the news or the 500 word articles on page 7.
Keep it up guys.
Posted by Jon, on December 7th, 2009 at 5:08 PMTom:
As a retired US Army officer and combat veteran, I have been very concerned for quite some time about our strategy in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Although NPR’s coverage has addressed many issues, the one I do not hear mentioned is to me the most critical. That is the rules of engagement that General McChrystal has in place. In my opinion they not only prolong the conflict but lead to many more deaths of our soldiers. Apparently the ROE require us to break engagement when a civilian is present or appears on the scene. Also, if civilians are present we are not allowed to use air power.
Tom, as you know, the enemy in these conflicts do not wear uniforms. Therefore if a person is not visibly carrying a weapon, they would appear to be civilian. This requires our troops to cease fire even though they are under fire. How can we allow our soldiers to be cannon fodder? Does the Commander-in-Chief know that this is the consequence of his military staff’s trying to have a “humane” or “politically acceptable” conflict?
Tom, it is time to bring them home. In the meantime we should establish a fortified zone to protect them and stop all forays outside our this zone.
I sincerely hope you will use your status to bring this issue into the open.
Thank you.
Posted by Tom, on December 9th, 2009 at 1:47 PMI still hold to my first comment even with onpoint presenting Michael Semple on the show, how many other guest has been on since that? There was almost a blitz on people who hold the opposite view and cheer leading the war afterwards?
Last Friday show was a example of this, and even yesterday show and the monday show was included in views to stay in Afghanistan.
Along with a media blitz on NPR about how surge is good withdrawal bad.
Jon please list since After Mr Semple was on on-point or NPR has had on people who wished to get out of Afghanistan? I heard 2 so far out of how many? one on here and now and the other on TOLN, and each had either people before or after stating otherwise.
the quality of NPR has sunk and the corporate interest will do what was done to CNN, MSNBC and of course FOX News.
Also Jon how many times were Rush L quoted this week and last week? How many times were stories taken by fox news, or sound bites?
“excellent analysis” get real what from the folks of AIE? Jon Bolton? Jonna Goldberg? FOX news?David Gelernter,Partnering with the weekly standard,
All are deeply Parisian and distort information but is still used as objective.
Yea with reporting like this who needs objective journalism i see how some could be falsely believe NPR reporting is “excellent analysis” much like people watching fox believe the same. Misinformation and being ill informed does that.
Posted by Michael, on December 10th, 2009 at 10:03 AMT%OM -
I would like to know why NPR approves the use of the word WAR in describing the Afghanistan conflict. NPR refuses to call water boarding TORTURE, because some do not agree that it is torture. NPR should refuse to call the conflict in Afghanistan a WAR because some people do not argee that it is a war.
In fact, the general use of the word war by the media to describe the use of military force against persons and organizations that are engaged in criminal activity is a sad comment on our society. To hear generals and the President use this word is chilling, as it is nothing more than expedient propaganda.
You see, from both a legal and a moral perspective it is very hard to “win a war” when it is waged against an enemy incapable of capitulating and signing an enforceable peace treaty. When the goal of military force is not an enforceable treaty, the criteria for “winning” are vague at best, leaving our military involved in a police action that is a war in name only.
The rules of engagement under a police action are quite different than in a war, because under a police action there is a realization that there will be continuous intervention against criminals and that the rule of law itself is an ongoing activity that is not “won” but perpetuated. American politicians have a long history of requiring our military to accomplish the impossible, and in most cases these disastrous decisions are sold as wars that can be won.
The entire legal institutional basis for our war powers continues to deteriorate, as evidenced by the fact that in 2001 the President was authorized by congress to use military force agaist “nations, persons or organizations HE determines” were complicit in the events of 9/11.
The president gets to NAME and enemy and then INITIATES acts of war? Congress, BY STATUTE, changes Article 1, Section 8 of the Constitution? Suppose the President was Dick Cheney…still feel good about the new presidential war powers?
Posted by ned studholme, on December 11th, 2009 at 8:26 AMMichael: Well, first of all: I didn’t listen this week. I’ll have to listen this weekend (Rush, eh?…). I’ll continue to back Tom up though (I don’t listen to NPR on the regular, just Tom). I’d be very interested to see some more credible sources advocating a complete pullout if you want to post them. Tom isn’t exactly bringing in the Sarah Palin’s of the world to defend our continued presence in AFG. In my mind, there should most definitely be debate about staying in AFG (the debate now is generally about which strategy will or won’t work). Spending as much as we are in blood and money should not be done lightly. That being said, if there is nobody credible willing to advocate a pullout, who should Tom bring on the show? I’d like to listen to the fellows from moveon.org as much as I’d like Glenn Beck on the show (ie not very much).
Notable On Point AFG guests I grabbed off the first 2 search bar pages (search: Afghanistan): Mearsheimer(con)/Kaplan, Galbraith(con-ish), Stewart, Daniel Ellsberg/Wilkerson. I don’t see how these guys aren’t credible heavyweights.
The lack of complete withdrawl debate seems to be that nobody at present is willing to deny the threat posed by Al-Qaeda (they shouldn’t). The only semi-credible argument for withdrawl (giving the Taliban southern Afghanistan) is that the capabilities gained are insignifigant compared to their areas of operation in Yemen/Somalia/Pakistan (the intelligence community would disagree-take that as you will).
WRT Tom/ROE’s: this is the big problem in my mind: getting the US military to accept the COIN doctrine which means more risk for soldiers on the ground in the short run (counter-intuitive to everything they have learned) and assumes that things will get better long term. The Taliban are increasingly using children and women to help them given our reluctance to engage them… That being said, very few coalition casualties are coming from firefights, they are coming from IED attacks (the ones reported in the news are the firefights though).
Do the ROE’s suck: yes. But they are there to ensure mission success, not the safety of the soldiers. The last 8 years have proven the failure of kinetic operations by themselves. We are fighting an unconventional war. We must find an unconventional response.
cheers
Posted by Jon, on December 11th, 2009 at 7:51 PM