Afghanistan: Obama Meddles in their Government and Elections

It is, once again, an attempt by the Obama administration, to meddle in the internal affairs of another country - in their election process - calling the election a fraud when he says they need a credible government.  if you supported the government they would be credible - by your failure to support Karzai, you have undercut him.

You are so inexperienced and naive - your campaign promises to not do what Bush did and now you do it, only you do it to promote your world view, not America's world view. 

Your statements that the US would not meddle in the affairs of other governments and then undermining Honduras and now Afghanistan. 

You are pathetic.



Emanuel Says Afghans Need Credible Government, Then More Troops



By Vincent Del Giudice


Oct. 19 (Bloomberg) -- White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel signaled the U.S. may refrain from deciding to send more troops to Afghanistan until a “legitimate and credible government” is in place.

“The president will not be rushed to making a decision” on Afghanistan, Emanuel said on CNN’s “State of the Union” program. It would be “reckless to make a decision on U.S. troop levels” without a through analysis of the country’s ability to govern itself, Emanuel said. 

[Rahm - you know that analysis of these questions has already been done and provided ... you are not telling the truth.]

The Obama administration maintains that Afghanistan needs a legitimate, stable government to harness the support of the country’s people and security forces to marginalize extremists. Uncertainty surrounding the results of the Aug. 20 presidential election, which has been plagued by allegations of fraud, was among the elements that prompted Obama to reconsider U.S. strategy and troop levels in the country.

“The review is going to continue to go on,” Emanuel said on CNN yesterday. President Barack Obama met Oct. 17 with his national security advisers on the war in Afghanistan, Emanuel said on the CBS “Face The Nation” program. More meetings are scheduled for this week and the following week, he said on CNN.

“We’re getting closer and closer to where the president wants to be,” Emanuel said on CBS. The question isn’t “how many troops you send, but do you have a credible Afghan partner,” he said on CNN.

Runoff Election

Emanuel said Afghan leaders can either call a “runoff election” or convene “negotiations between the candidates.”

A probe by Afghan and United Nations officials into the fraud allegations in the presidential election has trimmed President Hamid Karzai’s share of the vote. A runoff election is likely, Afghan envoy Said Jawad said this week.

Ultimately, “it’s the Afghans making a decision about what type of government they’re going to have and what road they’re going to take to that point,” Emanuel said.

Speaking from Afghanistan, Senator John Kerry, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, echoed the White House position on adding to the U.S. force.

“It would be entirely irresponsible for the president of the United States to commit more troops to this country when we don’t even have an election finished,” Kerry, a Massachusetts Democrat, said on the CNN program.

Urging a Decision

Some Republicans, such as Arizona senator and former presidential candidate John McCain, are pushing for a decision to send the troops General Stanley McChrystal, commander of U.S. and NATO-led forces in Afghanistan, has said he needs.

McChrystal commands 103,000 troops from the 28 North Atlantic Treaty Organization members and 14 other allies. The U.S. is by far the biggest contributor, with a contingent that will reach 68,000 by the end of this year. That includes the increase of 21,000 that Obama authorized earlier this year.

McChrystal also said good governance is a key to success in the South Asian nation, according to Kerry.

“When our own commanding general tells us that a critical component of achieving our mission here is, in fact, good governance, and we’re living with a government that we know has to change and provide it, how could the president responsibly say, ‘Oh, they asked for more, sure, here they are?’” Kerry said on CNN.

McChrystal said that even if Obama decided to send more troops to Afghanistan now, many of those troops wouldn’t begin to go there until next year, according to Kerry.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates is scheduled to visit Tokyo this week. Japanese Prime Yukio Hatoyama has said he will stop sending Japanese naval refueling vessels to the Indian Ocean to aid the war in Afghanistan.

The U.S. is urging Japan to maintain its support of Afghanistan in some other way should refueling stop, according to a defense official who briefed reporters.

From Asia, Gates will travel on to Bratislava, Slovakia, for an Oct. 23 meeting with his counterparts in NATO, which is leading the military force in Afghanistan.


[I could only guess who Obama will want to have in the government ... maybe, say ... the taliban!]






Afghanistan