Is It Time to Give Obama A Break? Posted by Michael Cohen

Over the past couple of weeks there has been a great deal of sturm and drang from the left about President Obama for failing to fulfill the promise of his 2008 campaign. Bob Kuttner's claim in the Huffington Post that Obama isn't really a progressive was perhaps the most prominent recent example; but there was also Eric Alterman's cri de couer in the pages of Nation and Glenn Greenwald's regular fulminations at Salon. Today, Politico weighs in. Yet, so many of these criticisms seem deeply misplaced and divorced from the very real constraints on Obama's ability to follow through on his agenda.

What so many of these criticisms ignore is the unprecedented level of GOP obstructionism and collusion from centrist Democrats. What stopped a bigger stimulus from being enacted in 2009? Filibustering Republicans and centrist Democrats. What stopped the public option? Joe Lieberman, centrist Dems and the GOP. What is stopping an extension of unemployment benefits from being passed? The GOP and Ben Nelson. What is stopping climate change legislation from becoming law? Republicans who don't believe in the science of global warming and Democratic Senators from coal and gas producing states. I could go on. 

Those who argue that Obama should have "fought harder" for these unattainable goals are making arguments that lack a very basic understanding of presidential power, particularly in an era when political parties are nowhere near as powerful as they once were.  This is the very nature of domestic legislating. It's not pretty, but it's the system we've got. 

And in fact, what is most aggravating about these assertions is that they tend to ignore the President's shining progressive success - health care reform. Indeed, in an entire op-ed criticizing Obama's progressive credentials, Kuttner mentions health care reform once but offers the back-handed compliment that Obama showed "rare hands-on leadership." You'd think that passing the most important piece of social policy legislation in more than 40 years - and guaranteeing health care coverage for 30 million Americans - would rate a bit higher. Think again.

And the constraints on domestic policy also exist in foreign policy even though on these issues the president has far more latitude. For example, on Afghanistan I think the President made a huge mistake in supporting escalation last December. I continue to believe that he could have resisted the generals, but it would have taken almost all of his political capital to do so . . . at the same time that he was trying to pass health care reform. It's one of the reasons I don't necessarily begrudge his decision to escalate vs. the far worse decision to not demand his generals come up with a better, more realistic strategy for achieving US goals in Afghanistan.

And it wasn't as if liberals gave him a lot of ammunition back in the spring of 2009 or even the summer and fall in resisting the military's COIN fetish. To a large extent, on Afghanistan, the president's hands were tied - tied by his own rhetoric, tied by his own supporters who cheered lustily when he said he would devote more attention to the war in Afghanistan (myself included), tied by a military that organized a crackerjack PR campaign to force his hand, tied by his liberal supporters for failing to push back on the military and tied by an opposition party that cares more about the politics of national security than they do national security policy.

And while it's much harder to defend Obama on his civil liberties and rule of law positions, I hark back to something I wrote in March when word was leaked that KSM would not get a civilian trial after all:

The depressing conclusion to all this is that a good part of our political class isn't really that interested in promoting the rule of law when it comes to dealing with the threat of terrorism.  That so many Americans are willing to go along with this; and that so many politicians are either willing to use the fear of terrorism to abrogate the rule of law (or are unwilling to stand up for it) is not all on Barack Obama. It's on America.

Of course, Obama is not blameless here. He has at times needlessly upset the left; he's failed to make critical appointments to the judiciary and other federal positions; his rhetoric on terrorism has dangerously aped the Bush-era "war on terrorism" narrative; he has failed to take bolder steps on dealing with torture and rule of law issues and in some cases has taken a step back; he perhaps took too long to jettison the post-partisan rhetoric and take on the GOP's know-nothingness and mindless, naked obstructionism. But these critiques only tell a small part of the story.

Instead when you consider how often depraved that opposition is, for example, in opposing economic stimulus for political gain or lying about the impact of proposed legislation or branding any effort to moderate US foreign policy as "weakness" or "surrender" . . . well Obama looks pretty good by comparison.After all American politics is not a zero sum game; it's a competition between two competing forces in which sometimes the lesser of two evils is the better choice.

There is with every president and every leader both good and bad - but in the face of unprecedented political opposition Obama's track record is one that is far more glass full, than glass empty. Indeed I would argue it's about three-quarters full.

Maybe it's about time that the left (myself included) gave Obama a break . . . and aim their broadsides at the real enemy of progressivism and good governance in this country. Or perhaps we can continue to dump all over Obama and then sit around and wonder in 2013 how Mitt Romney got elected President.

America's Bizarre Budget Priorities: Money For Wars Not Education Posted by Michael Cohen

Loyal DA reader; see if you can figure out what's wrong with this few sentences from this Christian Science Monitor article on Dave Obey's efforts to increase funding for the nation's teachers:

There's broad, bipartisan support for the $58.8 billion the Senate approved on May 27 to fund the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan ($37.1 billion), Vietnam veterans exposed to Agent Orange ($13.4 billion), Haiti earthquake relief ($2.9 billion), the Gulf oil spill ($162 million), and other disaster relief. 

At issue is the $22 billion in additional spending that the House added to the Senate bill on July 1, including $10 billion to hire teachers or prevent widespread teacher layoffs this fall, $5 billion to cover an expected shortfall in Pell grants for college students, and $700 million for border security. 

Rep. David Obey (D) of Wisconsin, who chairs the House Appropriations Committee, initially proposed $23 billion for teachers. But he had to pare it back to $10 billion after protests from fiscal conservatives in the House Democratic caucus. 

Ok, I guess I made that too easy. 

There are times when you really start to wonder about what kind of screwed up place Washington has become when $37 billion for a war in Afghanistan to combat an enemy of approximately 400-500 terrorists (50-100 of which are actually in Afghanistan) is uncontroversial . . . but $23 billion for teachers has to be pared back because it will blow up the deficit. 

To make matters even worse Obey is trying to offset the $10 billion for teachers by making significant cuts in the Obama Administration's effective "Race to the Top" program, which is supporting education reform efforts around the country. So to hire more teachers, Obey is willing to undercut efforts to improve education reform. Brilliant.

It's also worth mentioning here that the same US Senate where there is broad, bipartisan support for funding the war effort in Afghanistan has been tied up in knots for eight weeks over extending unemployment insurance for those Americans who can't find work in the midst of an economic downturn - as well as funding that will keep state government from making draconian budget cuts. This comes even after the Senate found spending offsets for the approximately $30 billion spending bill. (As near I can tell the supplemental contains only offsets for increased funding for teachers - and no offsets for the more than $37 billion in war spending).

So again, money for fighting wars - uncontroversial and unpaid for. Money for helping the unemployed and preventing teacher layoffs - meh.

This is not to say that funding the troops while they are in harm's way is unimportant; considering the mission we've asked them to fulfill, it certainly is. But it speaks volumes about the priorities in Washington that we have now spent more than a trillion dollars on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan (all on a Chinese credit card) and that raises few hackles on Capitol Hill; but relatively small expenditures for our own citizens in the midst of an economic downturn produces partisan gridlock and solemn declarations that we are imperiling future generations by growing the budget deficit. 

Imagine what a different world we would live in if every time the US government decided to engage in an overseas adventure - they actually had to pay for it.

The "We Care About Afghan Civilians Myth" Posted by Michael Cohen

Spencer Ackerman responds to my post about civilian casualties with the following observation:

Here’s where those who base their opposition to the war its promotion of human suffering have to meet halfway as well. If the U.S. stops prosecuting its end of the war, civilian casualties will not end. What will end is the civilian casualties we directly cause. The Taliban-led coalition will continue its insurgency until victory or negotiation, with all the acceleration of civilian casualties that will entail. (I would think it’s likely that the Taliban would greet an abrupt U.S. withdrawal, in the absence of a capable Afghan security apparatus, as a disincentive to negotiate, since its coalition will perceive itself to be winning. Negotiations would become a venue for the Karzai government to capitulate.)

Now, you can argue that such a circumstance ultimately benefits the U.S. national interest better than an indefinite, bloody and expensive war. Or you can argue that the counterinsurgents are wrong, and while civilian casualties are to be avoided in general, they don’t have strategic implications. But you can’t simply argue that a U.S. withdrawal comes with a pony for every Afghan citizen since that overlooks the United Nations' documented increase in the proportion of civilian casualties for which the Taliban are responsible.

I have a few quibbles with this argument. One, as our friend Andrew Exum recently pointed out, withdrawal from Afghanistan isn't really on the table as an alternative to the current policy so this argument just isn't really relevant to this debate. (Although to those who are urging immediate withdrawal Spencer's point is one that pokes a hole in the notion that Afghanistan will be better off if we just leave.)

Second, Taliban atrocities will certainly continue if say, we depart southern and eastern Afghanistan, but I would imagine that they would not continue at the same pace. As the UN report I flagged the other day mentions violence in eastern and southern Afghanistan has jumped because of our presence there. If there is a reduced US and ANSF footprint in these areas it only stands to reason that you will see fewer assassinations, fewer reprisal killings, fewer roadside bombs etc. Proponents of the current COIN strategy have to come to grips with the fact that just as in Iraq, our destabilizing presence leads to more, not less violence even if the number of civilians being killed by US arms decreases (which it isn't!). Spencer is right that the Taliban are responsible for an increase in civilian casualties . . . but NATO has something to do with that.

Of course, the rejoinder to this argument is that if we leave, the people living in southern and eastern Afghanistan will be even worse off since they are going to suffer under Taliban rule. This brings us to the last point.

All of this is true, but ultimately this isn't the concern of the United States. I don't mean that to sound flippant or to argue that US shouldn't care - I say it, because in the end if the US can get out of Afghanistan with its interests protected and with a reasonably stable government in Kabul that is in little danger of falling we'll quite easily sell out those civilians in eastern and southern Afghanistan (and it's not as if staying will necessarily make their situation any better). 

The inherent problem with our stated focus on Afghans civilians is that this is simply a means to an end - namely weakening the Taliban and protecting US interests. If we can meet those goals without protecting civilians we will and ultimately we're simply not going to stay in Afghanistan to ensure that Afghan civilians have their rights protected from the Taliban. Our focus on Afghan civilians only goes so far as it dovetails with US interests. Beyond that . . . not so much.

This whole focus on what we can "provide" for the Afghan people is a giant shell game and one gets the sense that the Afghan people are smart enough to realize it themselves. Ultimately, we are fighting this war for reasons that narrowly have to do with protecting US interests - and we should be honest about it. And if we really want to help Afghan civilians we should perhaps shift our focus to those parts of the country where we can really do some good and where our efforts will likely be sustainable.

About Those Restrictive Rules of Engagement Posted by Michael Cohen

As has become his wont Rajiv Chandrasekaren has another must read in the Washington Post today about the issue of rules of engagement in Afghanistan and its impact on civilian casualties. I won't try to summarize the entire piece here, but as Rajiv argues the focus on protecting civilians at all costs is lowering morale, limiting the ability to go after insurgents and is being utilized by Taliban fighters as a weapon against US troops.  

Reacting to Rajiv's article, Spencer Ackerman makes the argument that "care to prevent civilian casualties won't be enough to protect US interests in Afghanistan against al-Qaeda and the Taliban; but lack of care will ensure that the population decisively turns against the U.S.-led coalition, and that pretty much forecloses U.S. options here."

I would quibble with this slightly. The problem here is that it is our presence - not necessarily our actions - that is putting Afghan lives in peril.  As this recent UN report show, roadside bombings, assassinations and suicide attacks are all up significantly from last year - as are the number of Afghans killed by NATO forces. So it's not as if lack of care by the United States is improving the lives of Afghans. Indeed, if our overriding goal was truly to protect civilians . . . well then we wouldn't be in southern and eastern Afghanistan in the first place.

As I noted today at World Politics Review, "U.S. military operations have created the worst of both worlds: continued violence against Afghan civilians and no significant rollback of Taliban momentum. Paradoxically, if Petraeus relaxes U.S. rule of engagement in Afghanistan, civilians may find themselves at greater risk of being harmed by U.S. soldiers, but still safer overall."

Moreover, continued failure to blunt the momentum of the Taliban militarily will almost certainly foreclose US options in Afghanistan - and that may come from both the Afghan government or perhaps more likely US public opinion.

So the choice we face in Afghanistan isn't between protecting civilians and not protecting civilians or blowing things up and not blowing things up.  As Spencer seems to be implicitly suggesting the issue is finding the middle ground between these two options.

And that means being clear about the fact - that if we are intent on fighting a war in southern and eastern Afghanistan -civilians are going to die in the process. While great care must be given to minimizing the loss of human life, it's not possible to square the circle and believe that such deaths can be avoided or even that the number of Afghans killed by American arms tells us much at all about how our presence there is perceived and ramifications of the war we are choosing to fight. 

If we're not willing to accept the fact that civilians are going to be killed in war - and that lives will be upturned by the determination that our perceived interests in southern and eastern Afghanistan trump those of local civilians - then we have no business fighting this war in the first place. This isn't intended as a dig on Spencer (who I'm sure understands this) but there is something frustrating about the way we seem to talk about civilian casualties in Afghanistan as if our very presence and our very decision to go to war is not a fundamental part of civilian suffering in Afghanistan.

The Pragmatic “Pacific President” Posted by Jacob Stokes

Newsweek has a story up by Joshua Kurlantzick entitled, “How Obama Lost His Asian Friends.” The piece brings some much-needed focus back on America’s relationship with East Asia and away from the immediate crises in the Middle East and South Asia. Aside from that shift though, the article has some significant flaws. Kurlantzick argues that, after some early successes and sweeping rhetoric about being the first “Pacific President,” Obama has allowed America’s allies in the region to languish.

As evidence of this, Kurlantzick offers the Administration’s about-face on the South Korea free trade deal, which, he admits, “would create the most important American trade deal since the North American Free Trade Agreement.” At no point does Kurlantzick mention the fact that the trade deal represents an important gesture on the part of the Administration to show solidarity with South Korea in the wake of the Cheonan sinking by the North. There’s not much else America can do (except for maybe a highly misguided use of force) to show support for our allies in the region as they face real threats, especially when China refuses to call out Pyongyang.

The piece also suggests that Obama made a mistake in cancelling his trip to Indonesia three times, two of which were used to make a final push on the healthcare bill and to deal with the BP oil spill, respectively. While it’s certainly unfortunate that these trips had to be cancelled, if you hold even a modicum of support for Barack Obama—which, I don’t know, maybe Kurlantzick doesn’t, and that’s fine—it’s easy to see why those two actions were essential to maintaining his strength at home.

Healthcare needed a final push and the optics of Obama cavorting abroad  (with whomever, allies or not) would have allowed the president’s domestic opponents to wipe the floor with him. America’s allies in Asia are much better served with Obama having strong support at home than they are feeling individually satisfied while Obama’s domestic support flounders. (All this despite whatever completely objective observer Walter Lohman at Heritage, who the piece quotes, thinks.)

What’s more, as Liz Economy points out over at Asia Unbound, Kurlantzick’s sense of how damaging these trip cancellations are to public opinion in Asia is skewed at best:

Josh’s handwringing over the negative perceptions of the United States throughout the region seems misplaced. The 2010 Pew Research Center polling data reports the United States garnering a 66 percent favorability rating in India, 66 percent in Japan, and a whopping 79 percent in South Korea, reflecting, perhaps, the close relationship between Presidents Obama and Lee. Even Indonesia, where as Josh rightly points out the President has squandered significant good will by cancelling his state visit three times, offers up a 59 percent approval rating.

The whole piece is really summed up by two quotes Kurlantzick uses as examples of the region’s opinion of Obama. Early in the piece, he quotes Lee Kuan Yew saying, “If you [the U.S.] do not hold your ground in the Pacific, you cannot be a world leader.” Kurlantzick then goes on to whine about how Obama didn’t let a vacillating, anti-American Democratic Party of Japan roll him on marine bases. Later Kurlantzick quotes Japanese lawmaker Kuniko Tanoika as saying, “the very stubborn attitude of no compromise of the U.S. government… is clearly pushing Japan away, towards China.”  As Economy notes in her post, this is a highly flawed proposition. Japan may increase its ties with China, but it’s not likely to turn away from the U.S. anytime soon. The basing issue was an attempt at that, and it failed miserably.

Kurlantzick is basically saying that America should do whatever its allies in the region ask, no matter how ridiculous it is, while pushing back against anything China tries to do in order to stand our ground in the region. The Obama administration is practicing a much more nuanced diplomacy than what Kurlantzick suggests, one that’s obviously willing to support allies and stand up to China and North Korea. We’ve seen this with the South Korea trade agreement, a series of trade disputes with China and threats to label China a currency manipulator. But Obama’s strategy is also one that realizes compromise is necessary sometimes.

The Administration’s Asia policy is not perfect, but Obama is hardly ignoring the region and hanging America’s friends out to dry – no matter how good of a Newsweek headline that idea makes.

Finding the Exit From Afghanistan Posted by Michael Cohen

Over at World Politics Review I have a new piece arguing that in the wake of the command change in Afghanistan US strategy must switch from trying to "win" in Afghanistan (whatever that means) to finding an exit strategy:

In the two weeks since Gen. David Petraeus was nominated to be the new commander for U.S. and NATO operations in Afghanistan, continuity has been the dominant theme in describing what his replacement of ousted Gen. Stanley McChrystal represents. After all, Petraeus literally wrote the book on U.S. counterinsurgency (COIN) doctrine, which McChrystal tried to apply in Afghanistan over the past year. It only seems natural to expect that Petraeus will maintain the same approach.

But continuity is the worst possible option for U.S. efforts in Afghanistan, because it would mean maintaining a strategy that appears increasingly unlikely to succeed.  Instead, President Barack Obama should use the change in command to modify his goal, from "winning" the war in Afghanistan to laying the  political and military groundwork for withdrawal.

Failure to clearly identify which of these two paths would define the U.S. mission has been perhaps the Obama administration's greatest strategic failing in Afghanistan.  

In March 2009, Obama declared that his goal in Afghanistan was to defeat, dismantle and disrupt al-Qaida, and pointedly noted that "dictating" Afghanistan's future was not in the cards. But McChrystal's strategy, laid out only months later, was predicated not only on protecting the Afghan people, but also on providing "a secure environment allowing good government and economic development to undercut the causes and advocates of insurgency."  

Even after the administration's lengthy Afghanistan review last fall, the gap between Obama's stated goal and McChrystal's ambitious strategy remained unresolved.  The president's 18-month timeline to begin drawing down U.S. troops and his order to McChrystal not to occupy territory that couldn't be turned over to Afghan security forces by June 2011 suggested a more minimal goal of stabilizing Afghanistan and speeding the path toward withdrawal. But McChrystal's military forays into Taliban-controlled and Pashtun-dominated southern and eastern Afghanistan and his emphasis on U.S.-led nation-building spoke to a different aspiration. 

Indeed, under McChrystal, the U.S. and NATO mission was to both out-fight and out-govern the Taliban -- in short, to "win" in Afghanistan. But victory has not been in the cards in Afghanistan for a very long time. With polling indicating that Americans are souring on both the war and Obama's stewardship of it, the focus must shift to protecting U.S. interests while leaving Afghanistan as stable as possible after our withdrawal.  

Read the whole thing here

Obama's Foreign Policy: It Sure Beats the Alternative Posted by Michael Cohen

As any regular reader of DA is well-aware I have not been a huge fan of President Obama's foreign policy to date. I like the START treaty, the effort to repair relations with key allies, the creation of the G-20 etc; but in general Obama has shown a bit too much timidity and too little follow through on issues like democracy promotion, reconfiguring the foreign policy bureaucracy and weaning the country away from the 'war on terror' narrative. But it's early, the political constraints on Obama are significant and so my general inclination is to withhold judgment for the time being. 

Unfortunately, however, what really makes me appreciate Obama's approach to foreign policy is America's opposition party and its apparent belief that American needs a foreign policy that looks not like George Bush's . . . but John Bolton's.

Case in point, Mitt Romney's factually inaccurate, insidious and generally stupid op-ed in the Washington Post yesterday about the START treaty. Fred Kaplan demolishes Romney's absurd arguments here, but I think Barron YoungSmith over at TNR gets to the heart of the issue:

The responsible Republican foreign policy establishment is not coming back. Mandarins like George Schultz, Henry Kissinger, and James Baker, who have all testified or written on behalf of the START treaty - calling it an integral, uncontroversial way of repairing the bipartisan arms-control legacy that sustained American foreign policy all the way up until the George W. Bush - are going to be dead soon (or they've drifted into the service of Democrats). The people who will take their place will be from a generation of superhawks, like John Bolton, Liz Cheney, and Robert Joseph, who are virulently opposed to the practice of negotiated arms control. 

As YoungSmith points out, Romney is not only running to the right of John McCain's rather conservative 2008 foreign policy platform it suggests that Republican presidential candidates are going to return to the Reagansque "peace through strength" mantra from the late 1970s. But it's actually even worse than that. Mitt Romney is a frontrunner for the 2012 GOP nomination and he seems to believe that the best way to win that nod is to stake out foreign policy positions that are basically Cheneyesque in nature - namely rejecting international diplomacy, viewing American power solely through the lens of our military might and calling for a foreign policy of American unilateralism. This is foreign policy for people who hark back to those halcyon days of 2001-2003 in US diplomatic relations. And for those who might be inclined to argue that this is just politics . . . well I say hark back to US diplomatic relations in 2001-2003. It WAS alive back then. 

The very fact that one of the GOP frontrunners for his party's presidential nomination believes that the START treaty is one of Obama's "worst foreign policy mistakes" and then runs to the op-ed page of the Washington Post to argue that pretty much every single prominent Republican and conservative thinker on national security is wrong on this issue. Well to me it's the best possible evidence that the Republican Party has become a political party of children with no serious interest in running the country's foreign affairs competently or effectively. 

Think of it in these terms; the Bush Administration's foreign policy was a complete disaster. But at least you had someone like Colin Powell in the first term and Bob Gates and Condi Rice (ish) in the second to keep the crazies in check. Who would play the role of Powell or Gates in a Romney, Huckabee or, god forbid, Palin Administration? Part of me wants to believe that this is just politics run amok (and I think some of that is at play here) but increasingly it should be apparent that GOP foreign policy thinking is dominated by a small group of extremist national security thinkers whose only lesson learned from the Bush Administration is that it wasn't conservative enough.

And while I sort of hate these types of political arguments . . . this all makes Obama look pretty good doesn't it?

Some Imagination About Afghanistan Strategy Posted by Michael Cohen

Over at Politico, Robert Blackwell who was deputy national security advisor in the Bush Administration lays out a possible alternative to our present strategy in Afghanistan.

After years of faulty U.S. policy toward Afghanistan, there are no quick, easy and cost-free  ways to escape the current deadly quagmire. But with all its problems, a de facto partition offers the best available U.S. alternative to strategic defeat. Announcing that we will retain an active combat role in Afghanistan for years to come and that we do not accept permanent Taliban control of the south, the United States and its allies could withdraw combat forces from most of Pashtun Afghanistan (about half the country), including Kandahar, over several months. 

. . . We would then focus on defending the north and west regions -- roughly 60 percent of the population. These areas, including Kabul, are not Pashtun-dominated and locals are largely sympathetic to U.S. efforts. 

. . . We would then make it clear that we would rely heavily on U.S. air power and special forces to target any Al Qaida base in Afghanistan, as well as Afghan Taliban leaders who aided them. We would also target Afghan Taliban encroachments across the de facto partition lines and terrorist sanctuaries along the Pakistan border. 

We would continue accelerating our Afghan army training. We would devote nation-building efforts to the north and west region where, unlike the Pashtun, people are not conflicted about accepting U.S. help and not systematically coerced by the Taliban. 

This approach is similar to what Gilles Dorronsorro has been saying for a while and what I argued for last spring in the pages of Dissent. Now Blackwell's strategy isn't perfect and he highlights some of the problems with this strategy - reluctance by the Karzai government to go along; the potential for jihadist safe havens to pop up in Taliban areas; Pakistani resistance (although on this point I'm a bit skeptical that the Pakistanis would be that upset, especially if they their interests in Afghanistan were protected); and of course human rights in Taliban-dominated areas would be "abysmal."

But these problems notwithstanding, defacto partition is almost certainly where things are heading in Afghanistan; we can't defeat the Taliban and the Taliban likely can't take over the country. But the key to make such a strategy work is, as Blackwell suggests, to make clear that the US will not leave the country until the Karzai government and its military is strong enough to maintain its rule. Blackwell talks about maintaining US troop levels of between 40 and 50,000, which seems very high to me. But whatever the number the US should make clear its long-term commitment to Afghanistan's security and stability . . . just not to nation-building. At the same time, US policymakers must make clear that its most important and non-negotiable redline is no al Qaeda presence of any kind in Taliban-controlled areas.

Whether you agree or disagree with Blackwell's strategy - or any of the alternatives that have been floated - it's becoming increasingly clear that the change in course will have to come. The current strategy isn't working and it unlikely to be any more successful in the future - not without a significant and unjustifiable outlay of US blood and treasure.

To be sure, we should have been talking about some of these alternatives a year ago . . . but better late than never.

What Happens When GOPers Say Something Reasonably Correct about Afghanistan Posted by Michael Cohen

Let me start off by saying that GOP Party Chairman Michael Steele is not exactly the sharpest butter knife in the drawer. He's not the brightest bulb on the tree. And it's not exactly clear the elevator goes all the way up to the top floor. In short, a rocket scientist he is not. And over the weekend we saw yet another example of Steele putting his foot deep in his mouth and down his throat when he said this about the war in Afghanistan:

"This is not something the United States has actively prosecuted or wanted to engage in." Mr Steele said. "It was the president who was trying to be cute by half by flipping a script demonizing Iraq while saying the battle really should be Afghanistan. Well, if he's such a student of history, has he not understood that you know that's the one thing you don't do, is engage in a land war in Afghanistan."

Now to be sure, these comments are borderline incomprehensible, but what's really fascinating is the response from Steele's fellow Republicans. And it's important to keep in mind the incredibly stupid things that Steele has done and said since becoming head of the RNC. 

He indicated a willingness to support Republicans in primary campaigns against sitting Senators who voted for last year's stimulus package. He called abortion an "individual choice." He used his position at RNC chair to personally profit by charging up to $20,000 for speeches and other appearances. He said Republicans were not going to win the midterm elections. He has a blog on the RNC website called "What's Up?" and he posed for these pictures. In short, he's a buffoon.

But it wasn't until he criticized the war in Afghanistan that the long knives really came out  . . . even though on some very basic level his pointing out the folly of the current war in Afghanistan is kind of, sort of correct. Apparently in the GOP speaking clearly about the problems with foreign military engagement is the last straw. Consider the comments of his fellow Republicans. 

Here's John McCain, "I think those statements are wildly inaccurate and there's no excuse for them. I believe we have to win here. I believe in freedom." So questioning the war in Afghanistan means you don't believe in freedom? Well it should be noted that I personally hate freedom - and its insidious buddy liberty - so perhaps McCain is on to something.

Here's Liz Cheney: "The chairman of the Republican party must be unwavering in his support for American victory in the war on terror - a victory that cannot be accomplished if we do not prevail in Afghanistan." Speaking of someone who hates freedom . . . unwavering support appears to mean unquestioning in the Cheney household.

Bill Kristol, "It's an affront. Both to the honor of the Republican party and to the commitment of the soldiers fighting to accomplish the mission they've been asked to take on by our elected leaders." Michael Steele, why do you hate America's fighting men and women?

And my favorite, Erick Erickson, blogger at redstate.com, "He has lost all moral authority to lead the GOP." This from a man who once referred to Supreme Court Justice David Souter as a "goatfucking, child molester." 

Even the DNC got into the flagwaving contest, declaring that Steele was "betting against our troops and rooting for failure in Afghanistan." These are words that would make Dick Cheney shed a tear (if of course he was capable of showing emotion and hadn't had his tear ducts removed).

What is perhaps most fascinating about all this is that only when Steele questions a war in which the United States has sent 100,000 troops to Afghanistan to stop 400 al Qaeda terrorists (only 50-100 of which are actually IN Afghanistan) does he run into a buzzsaw of complaint from both Democrats and Republicans. 

It's almost as if we live in a country where it's really difficult to question US military engagements and have your concerns fairly heard . . .

What Obama and Netanyahu Should Discuss Posted by Joel Rubin

This piece was co-written with Center for American Progress Senior Fellow Brian Katulis and originally appeared on Foreign Policy Magazine's MidEast Channel.

This week's meeting between President Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu comes at a sensitive juncture -- Middle East peace efforts remain largely stuck, Iran continues to move forward with its nuclear program, and the United States and Israel are looking to patch up their bilateral ties after one of the rockiest years in recent memory between the two countries. The fundamental goal of the meeting is to bring the two countries towards closer strategic alignment on these issues. Doing so will require both Obama and Netanyahu to learn lessons from the events of the past few months.

First, the latest round of United Nations, American, and European sanctions mark a new and sensitive phase on Iran policy, and there is deep uncertainty about what comes next. Yet while the United States and its allies cannot afford any surprises or miscalculations, the recent experience during the Gaza flotilla incident should provide reason for concern. The strategic blowback from that incident demonstrated the downsides of how Israel's current government seeks to safeguard its security. One pressing question is what lessons Israel takes from the flotilla incident as both it and the U.S. consider their options on Iran. Regrettably, if Israel's raid on the flotilla is an indicator of what can go wrong when Israel tries to secure its southern border, then the international community should be doubly concerned by any military action Israel might take against Iran.

Second, the Gaza flotilla raid demonstrated that Israel does not always effectively game out the strategic and political consequences of its military operations -- something that also witnessed in the 2006 war against Hezbollah in southern Lebanon, a finding affirmed by Israeli government inquiry. At times, the Israeli political and security leadership have made decisions that lacked sound military strategy without thinking through the likely international reaction. This ultimately undermines Israel's own security by undercutting its support around the world. Neither Israel nor the United States can afford to see a replay in Iran of what happened in Lebanon four years ago or off the shores of Gaza five weeks ago.

Third, there is a clear risk that Israel might move ahead with a military strike against Iran that would not likely succeed in improving either its security or strategic position -- similar to the results it achieved from the flotilla incident. From an operational, tactical, and strategic standpoint, Israel's handling of the flotilla incident did not improve its overall security -- it only maintained an unsustainable and fragile status quo. In turn, it is not clear that it would obtain better results through a strike on Iran, especially as few analysts think that military action against Iran's nuclear infrastructure would stop Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. The most obvious nuclear targets -- above ground nuclear facilities -- are only one part of a vast and growing network of facilities, many of which are underground. The hidden facilities would remain and a preemptive strike would probably both motivate the regime to redouble its efforts to seek the bomb and bestow Tehran with more room to maneuver from the international community than it deserves.

Given these realities, the Obama administration should place a higher premium on enhancing its political and military coordination with all key allies in the region, particularly Israel. President Obama and Prime Minister Netanyahu need to make sure that their teams have honest, frank, and proactive strategic discussions about the benefits and costs of all options in dealing with Iran. A more thorough preparation for all contingencies -- ranging from military action and regime change to unconditional diplomatic engagement with offers of security guarantees -- should be quietly discussed.  But the two leaders should also have their teams discuss the costs and benefits of an eventual containment strategy should Iran acquire a nuclear weapon. Such discussions should set clear red lines to avoid surprises, and ultimately should also include the perspectives and likely reactions of other key American allies in the region.

For too long, U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East has been stuck in a tactical mode, reactive to events like the flotilla incident. This has not enhanced American or Israeli security, despite the urgency of the threats our countries face. Last month's raid on the Gaza flotilla was a wakeup call. The United States cannot afford any additional surprises on the multiple fronts of its Middle East strategy -- it has come to expect the unexpected from countries like Iran and Syria -- but it is not helpful when our closest allies offer their own surprises.

The Obama-Netanyahu meeting should therefore seek to establish a new bilateral strategic coordination group consisting of senior members of both security teams -- and the first issue this new group should discuss is next steps on Iran. Our two countries cannot afford to surprise each other in this dangerous part of the world.

Brian Katulis is a Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress. Joel Rubin is Deputy Director and Chief Operating Officer of the National Security Network.