Now, Mr. President, With Respect, Cut the Crap and Get Out of Afghanistan

Mr. President: For those of your supporters who genuinely believe in the non-interventionist segment of an America First policy, there could be no better news than your sacking of John Bolton. He and his like – Crystal, Boot, Romney, and the rest of the Neocons and disloyal Israel-Firsters – are hip-deep in the blood and limbs of U.S. military personnel who became casualties in multiple unnecessary wars, none of which had anything to do with protecting American liberties and freedom. Indeed, the presidents who orchestrated and prolonged the wars constricted both, and also waged war against the Bill of Rights. On booting Bolton, Mr. President, well done.

Now for Afghanistan. Sir, for a guy like me, from Buffalo, New York, it is an odd but true fact that I have spent most of the past four decades working, from one angle or another, on wars in Afghanistan. I cannot say that I loved this work all the time – the best of times were when we helped drive the Red Army out of Afghanistan – but it has been pretty consistently fascinating. Moreover, it is the easiest to understand and solve foreign-policy problem that has ever confronted the United States.

The Camp of the Saints Jean Raspail Best Price: $69.24 Buy New $52.65 (as of 01:10 UTC - Details) Mr. President you must accept that, on the Afghan issue, you are surrounded by civilian advisors who are morons, liars, money-grubbers, mineral-chasers, war-lovers, and democracy crusaders, as well as generals who cannot tell the difference between winning and losing. The latter, I suppose, is to be expected as no U.S. general has participated in a winning war since September, 1945. Fortunately, none of the unnecessary wars they have lost even remotely put American freedom or liberty at risk, except from domestic enemies. Taking advice from any of this lot, is like taking advice on particle physics from Ilhan Omar.

Now, Sir, when you were elected you were presented with a lost war. Obama, Hillary Clinton, George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, and Donald Rumsfeld had presided over – and even directed — numerous half-ass military campaigns that were shrugged off by the Afghan Taleban and its allies, no matter what their casualties. The Afghan leaders knew that the U.S. military was not there to win. They do have ears, you know, and they heard all U.S. generals publicly proclaim, ad nauseam, something like “There is no military solution to the Afghan conflict.” These be-starred knuckleheads might as well have said publicly that the Taleban had won, game, set, and match.

The Taleban’s leaders also knew the U.S. did not intend to win in Afghanistan because they had watched Bill Clinton refuse to even attempt one of the ten chances CIA gave him to kill or capture Osama bin Laden. Always recall, Mr. President, there would have been no Afghan War or Iraq War if Clinton had removed bin Laden from the scene in 1998 or 1999.

You are fighting, Mr. President, an enemy in the Taleban, as well as the other Islamist Afghan insurgent groups, a foe that is far tougher, much more patient, more zero-sum minded, stupendously less casualty-adverse, and more religiously devout than any of your advisors, civil or military. The current crop of Afghan Islamist insurgents and their predecessors, taken together, have chalked up nearly 40 continuous years on the battlefield since the Soviet invasion occurred in December 1979. The score after four decades shows the Afghans have knocked off two superpowers – the USSR and the hodge-podge of U.S.-NATO forces. This, after having knocked off the British superpower in the 19th century. Can you, Sir, name another country that has defeated three superpowers?

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