Pro/Con on War in Afghanistan

Here is some very recent point – counterpoint about the US war in Afghanistan.

Pro Operation Enduro Freedom:  NY Times 10/20/2010

American and Afghan forces have been routing the Taliban in much of Kandahar Province in recent weeks, forcing many hardened fighters, faced with the buildup of American forces, to flee strongholds they have held for years, NATO commanders, local Afghan officials and residents of the region said.

A series of civilian and military operations around the strategic southern province, made possible after a force of 12,000 American and NATO troops reached full strength here in the late summer, has persuaded Afghan and Western officials that the Taliban will have a hard time returning to areas they had controlled in the province that was their base.

and slightly Con:  Stephen M. Walt @ Foreign Policy Mag 10/22/2010:

So let me tell you what I think is going to happen. The United States is going to spend thenext few months trying to clear out or kill as many Taliban as we can find,accompanied by a lot of optimistic reports about how well we are doing. Thiswon’t be about a “hearts and minds” approach or even a long-term strategy of nation-building;it will be about creating the appearance of momentum and success. At the same time, we’re going to try to shepherd a politicalprocess that can be sold as “peace deal” between the Karzai government and somemoderate Taliban. If we’re reallylucky and offer big enough bribes (oops, I mean foreign aid), we might getPakistan to pretend to be on board too.And then Obama will claim “the Afghan surge worked” sometime in thelatter half of 2011, and begin withdrawing U.S. troops