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You have to hand it to President Obama. He delivered a great speechfrom Bagram Air Base last night one that sounded tough yetreasonable, even while skillfully eliding all the tough questionsabout his Afghan policy. In fact, he won even before he opened his mouth: the image of thepresident, standing in front of two hulking MRAP armored vehicles,at a military base in a war zone, was a powerful visual reminder ofthe stature and power of the commander-in-chief. President Bushcertainly made good use of the prerogatives of the office toestablish himself in the public's eye as a strong leader, andObama showed he was a worthy successor in that regard. The substance of the speech somber and serious and largely free ofelection-year politicking was of a piece with its setting. Theheadline event was the signing of a U.S.-Afghan SecurityPartnership Agreement earlier in the day. Obama announced that"the agreement we signed today sends a clear message to theAfghan people: as you stand up, you will not stand alone." Hethen made an argument for why it is important to stay the course inAfghanistan "to make sure that al-Qaeda could never againuse this country to launch attacks against us." He also spokeof the progress that U.S. and allied troops are making towardachieving that objective. It could just as easily have been George W. Bush rather than BarackObama making those statements. In fact, Obama borrowed the"as you stand up" phrasing from his predecessor. But the speech was finely balanced so it gave hope to doves as wellas hawks. Obama once again iterated that his objectives arerelatively narrow "our goal is not to build a country inAmerica s image, or to eradicate every vestige of theTaliban" and that he has a clear timeline for bringingtroops home: "Last year, we removed 10,000 U.S. troops fromAfghanistan. Another 23,000 will leave by the end of the summer.After that, reductions will continue at a steady pace, with more ofour troops coming home. And as our coalition agreed, by the end of2014 the Afghans will be fully responsible for the security oftheir country." All of that sounds eminently reasonable until you start toquestion whether the two halves of his policy add up. Is itactually possible to bring the troops home on the timeline heenvisions, while also cutting funding for the Afghan securityforces, and still achieve his goal of an Afghanistan secure enoughto never again become a haven for al-Qaeda? I hope so, but I havegrave doubts. I fear that President Obama may have put hisobjective of troop withdrawal ahead of his competing objective ofstabilizing Afghanistan and "delivering justice toal-Qaeda." But Obama remains the master of projecting an air of serious,cerebral centrism at least when he is not in fullRepublican-bashing campaign mode. And he was not at Bagram. He wasat his best, making a deeply ambivalent policy a policy at warwith itself seem like the only way to go. I am an expert from softenerflakes.com, while we provides the quality product, such as China Silicone Thickening Agent , China Textile Enzyme, Cationic Softener Flakes,and more.
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