NEW YORK – The Iraq war has been replaced by the declining economy as the most important issue in America’s presidential election campaign, in part because Americans have come to believe that the tide has turned in Iraq: the troop “surge” has supposedly cowed the insurgents, bringing a decline in violence. The implications are clear: a show of power wins the day.
It is precisely this kind of macho reasoning that led America to war in Iraq in the first place. The war was meant to demonstrate the strategic power of military might. Instead, the war showed its limitations. Moreover, the war undermined America’s real source of power – its moral authority.
Recent events have reinforced the risks in the Bush administration’s approach. It was always clear that the timing of America’s departure from Iraq might not be its choice – unless it wanted to violate international law once again. Now, Iraq is demanding that American combat troops leave within twelve months, with all troops out in 2011.
To be sure, the reduction in violence is welcome, and the surge in troops may have played some role. Yet the level of violence, were it taking place anywhere else in the world, would make headlines; only in Iraq have we become so inured to violence that it is a good day if only 25 civilians get killed.
And the role of the troop surge in reducing violence in Iraq is not clear. Other factors were probably far more important, including buying off Sunni insurgents so that they fight with the United States against Al Qaeda. But that remains a dangerous strategy. The US should be working to create a strong, unified government, rather than strengthening sectarian militias. Now the Iraqi government has awakened to the dangers, and has begun arresting some of the leaders whom the American government has been supporting. The prospects of a stable future look increasingly dim.
That is the key point: the surge was supposed to provide space for a political settlement, which would provide the foundations of long-term stability. That political settlement has not occurred. So, as with the arguments used to justify the war, and the measures of its success, the rationale behind surge, too, keeps shifting.
Meanwhile, the military and economic opportunity costs of this misadventure become increasingly clear. Even if the US had achieved stability in Iraq, this would not have assured victory in the “war on terrorism,” let alone success in achieving broader strategic objectives. Things have not been going well in Afghanistan, to say the least, and Pakistan looks ever more unstable.
Moreover, most analysts agree that at least part of the rationale behind Russia’s invasion of Georgia, reigniting fears of a new Cold War, was its confidence that, with America’s armed forces pre-occupied with two failing wars (and badly depleted because of a policy of not replacing military resources as fast as they are used up), there was little America could do in response. Russia’s calculations proved correct.
Even the largest and richest country in the world has limited resources. The Iraq war has been financed entirely on credit; and partly because of that, the US national debt has increased by two-thirds in just eight years.
But things keep getting worse: the deficit for 2009 alone is expected to be more than a half-trillion dollars, excluding the costs of financial bail-outs and the second stimulus package that almost all economists now say is urgently needed. The war, and the way it has been conducted, has reduced America’s room for maneuver, and will almost surely deepen and prolong the economic downturn.
The belief that the surge was successful is especially dangerous because the Afghanistan war is going so poorly. America’s European allies are tiring of the endless battles and mounting casualties. Most European leaders are not as practiced in the art of deception as the Bush administration; they have greater difficulty hiding the numbers from their citizens.
The British, for example, are well aware of the problems that they repeatedly encountered in their imperial era in Afghanistan. America will, of course, continue to put pressure on its allies, but democracy has a way of limiting the effectiveness of such pressure. Popular opposition to the Iraq war made it impossible for Mexico and Chile to give into American pressure at the United Nations to endorse the invasion; the citizens of these countries were proven right.
But back in America, the belief that the surge “worked” is now leading many to argue that more troops are needed in Afghanistan. True, the war in Iraq distracted America’s attention from Afghanistan. But the failures in Iraq are a matter of strategy, not troop strength. It is time for America, and Europe, to learn the lessons of Iraq – or, rather, relearn the lessons of virtually every country that tries to occupy another and determine its future.
Joseph E. Stiglitz, professor of economics at Columbia University, and recipient of the 2001 Nobel Prize in Economics, is co-author, with Linda Bilmes, of The Three Trillion Dollar War: The True Costs of the Iraq Conflict.
quote:Originally posted by glassman: including buying off Sunni insurgents so that they fight with the United States against Al Qaeda
i'm still wondering when the Iraq Govt is going to take over paying them instead of US...
Is Afghanistan paying us with their poppy seed profits? Between the 2 maybe we could get the budget back on track but then again we would probably have to give some to Georgia and the other countries in that area that are allied with us plus we now might have to give some to Pakistan now that Mr 10% is President.
Posts: 3255 | From: Los Angeles California | Registered: Jan 2006
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Bush number one the old man had a brain it was in cheap victory and out this mess is why he would not stay.
Looks like he was right most people said he was wrong for not finishing off sadam.
Posts: 6008 | From: phoenix az | Registered: Mar 2005
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-------------------- It isn't so much that liberals are ignorant. It's just that they know so many things that aren't so. Posts: 6949 | Registered: Apr 2004
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The war is bad like all wars are I can't think of a good one.
We had no reason to start it we were lied to it was and still is criminal.
I can't believe we as a people are not outraged and demanding justice. I hope one day we don't have to pay for what we have done. Mark my words when people like Bush decide they don't need us anymore take a look at the Iraqies and see what hapens to people that are not needed.
Posts: 6008 | From: phoenix az | Registered: Mar 2005
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quote:Mark my words when people like Bush decide they don't need us anymore take a look at the Iraqies and see what hapens to people that are not needed.
Yes, it's terrible! We got rid of Saddam Hussein who thumbed his nose at a multitude of U.N. resolutions and killed his own people with chemical weapons. It absolutely shameful that we have brought freedom and democracy to Iraq. It's certainly terrible that we have killed thousands of terrorists! Geesh!
Posts: 1577 | From: Ohio | Registered: Oct 2007
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We didn't NEED to get rid of Hussain, you ignorant jackass. He was keeping al qaeda out of Iraq and, thereby, helping us to retaliate for 9/11 and helping to slow the spread of it and its like through the Moslem world. Its completely loose now, and gaining power with every day we stay in Iraq, thanks to your heros and their lies and blunders.
Are you actually still riding on that lie that Saddam "thumbed his nose at a multitude of U.N. resolutions"? Those resolutions all were about Iraq destroying WMDs and as we have so completely and publicly proved, he had destroyed ALL OF THEM, including the poison gases he was supplied with by us and used on the Kurds (who were waging war on Iraq at the time).
We have brought no freedom or democracy to Iraq, as you claim. Neither freedom nor democracy can exists in a land that has a religion's dictatorial oversight of law as a basic requirement of its law, as is the case with the "new" Iraqi constitution. Freedom and democracy, if they ever come to those peoples, will be decades away, after enough time has passed, allowing those people to overcome the complete destruction of their infrastructure and culture by the U. S. invasion and occupation.
You are a hopeless jerk and fool that passes on the idiotic and destructive lies of the republican propaganda machine without so much as wiping the excess bovine fecal matter off the page it is printed on.
Posts: 11304 | From: Fort Worth, Texas | Registered: Mar 2005
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quote:You are a hopeless jerk and fool that passes on the idiotic and destructive lies of the republican propaganda machine without so much as wiping the excess bovine fecal matter off the page it is printed on.
More 3rd grade insults and gibberish!
Posts: 1577 | From: Ohio | Registered: Oct 2007
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as for having the terrorists on the run?..I think with 4000 plus americans killed and countless more wounded,our economy,etc..one could argue that things are going exactly as the terrorists wanted. we played right into their game plan..
-------------------- jordan Posts: 5812 | From: st paul,mn | Registered: Feb 2004
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I know you like to think that I would prefer you simply would go away, but that is anything but the truth.
Indeed, I wish you all the freedom to preach the selfish and narrow minded BS that you could possibly use and only wish it carried farther and louder than it does, so it could reach a far wider portion of the population.
Why, you may ask would I want loads of crap that I cannot accept as even remotely acceptable to reach far and wide across the land?
Well, let me try and explain.
I think you may be the most egotistical, arrogant, disgusting, insulting, tactless, vulgar, hateful, and sick person that has ever posted here, not to even bother mentioning the fact that your post are routinely filled with and based on vulgar false rumor and lies you seem too ignorant to recognize for what they are.
In case it somehow sneaks passed your closed bigoted mind, rational and normal folks really can't stand you. I mean, you really make people sick to their stomach. With your way of attacking people and everything they hold dear and your complete lack of concern for others, even if you were advocating smiling at cute little babies when they giggled gleefully might be looked on with suspicion and disapproval.
So you just keep up the work and tell us over and over and over and over and over and over and over ........ the indigestible tripe you eat up from Fox and Rush and Ann and Sean and etc. and then regurgitate here so profusely in our faces. It has the splendid effect of forcing even those not normally attuned to political things to have to hear an see what a sick agenda you profess.
Posts: 11304 | From: Fort Worth, Texas | Registered: Mar 2005
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-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- We didn't NEED to get rid of Hussain, you ignorant jackass. He was keeping al qaeda out of Iraq and, thereby, helping us to retaliate for 9/11 and helping to slow the spread of it and its like through the Moslem world. Its completely loose now, and gaining power with every day we stay in Iraq, thanks to your heros and their lies and blunders.
Are you actually still riding on that lie that Saddam "thumbed his nose at a multitude of U.N. resolutions"? Those resolutions all were about Iraq destroying WMDs and as we have so completely and publicly proved, he had destroyed ALL OF THEM, including the poison gases he was supplied with by us and used on the Kurds (who were waging war on Iraq at the time).
We have brought no freedom or democracy to Iraq, as you claim. Neither freedom nor democracy can exists in a land that has a religion's dictatorial oversight of law as a basic requirement of its law, as is the case with the "new" Iraqi constitution. Freedom and democracy, if they ever come to those peoples, will be decades away, after enough time has passed, allowing those people to overcome the complete destruction of their infrastructure and culture by the U. S. invasion and occupation.
You are a hopeless jerk and fool that passes on the idiotic and destructive lies of the republican propaganda machine without so much as wiping the excess bovine fecal matter off the page it is printed on. -------------------------------------------------
Bdgee what a great piece of work I add a secound pricless
Posts: 6008 | From: phoenix az | Registered: Mar 2005
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Well I say I wish because there is just so much B.S. involved with the war. I guess....well, previous wars were industrial. This was a very big corporate war.
There was good in the war, and there was bad. We did a lot of good things over there, and the sad part is that I believe the troops were and are exploited by Bush for some unspoken agenda he had for going in there in the first place. No other person in the world wanted to go into Iraq and get Saddam more than Bush jr
Bush has a trophy mount of Saddams .45 cal pistol in his office I believe I heard if that says anything about how much he wanted this even before he became pres.
-------------------- It isn't so much that liberals are ignorant. It's just that they know so many things that aren't so. Posts: 6949 | Registered: Apr 2004
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Bush has a trophy mount of Saddams .45 cal pistol in his office I believe I heard if that says anything about how much he wanted this even before he became pres.
i hadn't heard that.
that's not a good thing IMO
-------------------- Don't envy the happiness of those who live in a fool's paradise. Posts: 36378 | From: USA | Registered: Sep 2003
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posted
dubya is, absolutely, without any pretenders to the throne, the King of the worst things that ever happened to the United States of America. As negatives for this Nation go there is no one and no thing comparable.
Posts: 11304 | From: Fort Worth, Texas | Registered: Mar 2005
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posted
You know its bad when you dont even show up at your own party's convention as the President of the US because you are hated so much. You know its bad when being affiliated in any way to the current President is going to hurt your image.
That hurricane was a godsend for Bush. nobody wanted him there at the convention, and he found a good excuse to not go. Well, not a good excuse to me.
Of course you dont want Cheney around much either that guy is just evil.
You should be proud and eager to go to your own party's convention if you are the President! Thats how it SHOULD be, and the really messed up thing is....Bush thinks he is doing a great job! He thinks we just havent grasped it yet! McCain thinks you are rich if you have over 5 million in an interview. not 1 or 2 or 3 mil....5!
As a Republican my advice to the party is this: Take your loss this election, use the time to rebuild the party because it is so jacked up right now.
-------------------- It isn't so much that liberals are ignorant. It's just that they know so many things that aren't so. Posts: 6949 | Registered: Apr 2004
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posted
King George must be the worst president in the history of America.
If we financialy survive this what a credit to the American people.
Not only that we have serious military problems brewing all over the world great military just don't think we have the economic strenght anymore to fight a good war
Posts: 6008 | From: phoenix az | Registered: Mar 2005
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quote:McCain thinks you are rich if you have over 5 million in an interview. not 1 or 2 or 3 mil....5!
How much do you think is rich?
McCain went on to say that he thought that was irrelevant because he didn't want to raise taxes on ANYONE!
Posts: 1577 | From: Ohio | Registered: Oct 2007
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quote:McCain thinks you are rich if you have over 5 million in an interview. not 1 or 2 or 3 mil....5!
How much do you think is rich?
McCain went on to say that he thought that was irrelevant because he didn't want to raise taxes on ANYONE!
Once the government decides to over tax those they decide are rich it becomes a never ending slide into taxation without representation. Who decides what RICH is? Who decides when you've made enough? The whole thing stinks of SOCIALISM and I for one want no part in it.
-------------------- Let's Go METS!!! Posts: 3317 | From: CT | Registered: Dec 2006
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I dont want my paycheck having 50% taken away from me against my will!!!!!!!!
-------------------- It isn't so much that liberals are ignorant. It's just that they know so many things that aren't so. Posts: 6949 | Registered: Apr 2004
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The whole thing stinks of SOCIALISM and I for one want no part in it.
who is going to pay to "liberate" Iraq?
who is going to pay to get rid of AlQueda and the Taliban?
who is going to pay to keep the damn Russkies out of Georgia and the Ukraine?
US taxpayers that's who....
there was time when conservative meant you mind your own busyness... today it seems to mean you have to "liberate" the whole world, and pay for their "liberation" too...
you can't GIVE people freedom, they have to want it bad enough to fight for it themselves...and if they really wanted it? they would never have LOST it to begin with...
this crapola about Iraq being free is just an excuse.. they don't even want freedom...they want their Mullahs to lead them, and Bush made that possible... maybe that is freedom, but it isn't the kinda freedom we have, or want.
fact is? a family of four has NOTHING left over to pay taxes with if they make less than 50,000 a year, and that is IF they have health care mostly provided by an employer...
the median family income in the US is only 48,000 per year.
now please explain to me how those people are going to pay taxes?
-------------------- Don't envy the happiness of those who live in a fool's paradise. Posts: 36378 | From: USA | Registered: Sep 2003
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here's how to fix about 1/4 of the problem: U.S. slaps tariffs on Chinese imports Commerce Department reverses long-standing trade policy and will begin to impose tariffs on some subsidized goods from China; stocks head lower on the news. By Parija B. Kavilanz, CNNMoney.com senior writer March 30 2007: 12:39 PM EDT
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- The U.S. Commerce Department announced Friday that it will reverse its decades-long policy and begin to impose trade tariffs on some subsidized imports from China.
The first duties will be applied to imported "coated-free" paper from China, U.S. Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez announced during a press conference in Washington.
Gutierrez said the trigger for the major policy shift was a petition from a U.S. paper manufacturer, Dayton, Ohio, based NewPage (Charts) Corp., that has been asking for tariffs to be imposed on paper imports from China. Those imports are valued at $224 million. Meanwhile, the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM), the nation's largest industrial trade association, applauded the Commerce Department's decision.
"Many manufacturers tell me that Chinese products sell for less than the cost of the raw materials in the product, meaning that they are likely being subsidized," NAM president John Engler said in a statement. "Until today there was no remedy. Now we are beginning to level that playing field."
However, some experts believe the the latest move by the DOC is more symbolic and politically motivated rather than a genuine effort to address the record $232.5 billion trade deficit with America's second largest trading partner China. http://money.cnn.com/2007/03/30/news/economy/china_trade/index.htm
do it for real... not symbolically...
i can't even pay the electric bill to melt glass for what the Chinese can ship the finished products here and sell them...
i am not complaining about the glass business, i'm just saying that the US cannot continue to allow the Chinese to replace all of our workers cuz the workers jobs are NOT being replaced, and our household income is dropping not going up...
more education only means we will have educated pizzamakers and garbage collectors... (those are jobs that don't go away)
-------------------- Don't envy the happiness of those who live in a fool's paradise. Posts: 36378 | From: USA | Registered: Sep 2003
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Slap on tarrifs no more nafta and tax breaks for investment here.
That would be for a start thoes that took there money overseas can come back and we could give them financial aast. with in a short time span. Anytime over the time limit to bad sell to the locals where you are at.
Don't like it to bad go fish
Posts: 6008 | From: phoenix az | Registered: Mar 2005
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Despite that criticism, a new book by U.S. journalist Bob Woodward shows President George W. Bush again went against the advice of top military officers in 2007 by ordering a “surge” of extra troops when violence in Iraq was at its worst.
Moreover, the book says Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney circumvented the military chain of command by using retired general Jack Keane to communicate with Gen. David Petraeus, the top commander in Iraq.
Bush’s supporters say the dramatic reduction in violence since then has fully justified the president’s actions.
posted
Bush's troop cuts in Iraq: larger questions His announcement raises concerns about the ability and loyalty of the ‘Sons of Iraq’ neighborhood-watch program. By Gordon Lubold | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor from the September 10, 2008 edition
But larger questions remain over how soon the Iraqi government will begin to absorb as many as 100,000 Iraqis known as the Sons of Iraq, a loosely organized Sunni-dominated group essentially paid by the US military to form a neighborhood watch program.
"I think this is a potentially huge problem with the Sons of Iraq," says one active duty military officer. "They are still the mortal enemy of the government of Iraq that we're there to support, and we've essentially rearmed and refitted them. That is the big question mark."
President Bush announced that he would begin to withdraw up to 8,000 American troops from Iraq by February, including a contingent of about 1,100 Marines from Iraq's once-deadly Anbar province in the next couple of months.
The deal represents a compromise between Gen. David Petraeus, the top commander in Iraq, who recommended leaving all 15 brigades on the ground until next June, and the Joint Chiefs of Staff at the Pentagon, who have been pushing to draw down in Iraq, in part to send a larger force to Afghanistan. Nonetheless, it was a "consensus view," says one senior Pentagon official, and each level in the chain of command agreed to the plan. "We're entering the most critical period for long-term success in Iraq," says Fred Kagan, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute who was instrumental during the planning of the surge. The US runs the risk of getting out of Iraq too fast to "rescue" Afghanistan – repeating the original mistake of exiting Afghanistan too quickly in 2002, says Mr. Kagan. "If you don't have enough to win everywhere at once, you make sure you keep enough of a force to win in the most important theater," he says.
posted
"the question really is whether we can leave without having violence "blow-up" again..."
No, we can't, because the surge was not successful in what it was supposedly for.
It was said that it would allow the Iraqis to get organized to take over in Iraq and allow us to leave it to them, without our military controlling things. It hasn't even come close, because the Iraqis don't want what we will let them have, simply because they don't want what we recognize to be democracy or freedom. They want what to them is culturally familiar, not what is culturally familiar to us. (And they naturally are a bit ticked off that we want to dictate to them what culture they can have, particularly since we haven't even shown them the courtesy o asking their opinions on such matters......you know, we haven't offered to be diplomatic.)
In other word, the surge failed simply because it was an attempt to solve cultural problem without diplomacy and purely militarily. (In actuality, the lowered violence was not a result of the surge, but to agreements between Iraqi factions and had almost nothing to to with how many, if any, American troops were there.)
Posts: 11304 | From: Fort Worth, Texas | Registered: Mar 2005
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quote:Originally posted by glassman: Bush's troop cuts in Iraq: larger questions His announcement raises concerns about the ability and loyalty of the ‘Sons of Iraq’ neighborhood-watch program. By Gordon Lubold | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor from the September 10, 2008 edition
But larger questions remain over how soon the Iraqi government will begin to absorb as many as 100,000 Iraqis known as the Sons of Iraq, a loosely organized Sunni-dominated group essentially paid by the US military to form a neighborhood watch program.
"I think this is a potentially huge problem with the Sons of Iraq," says one active duty military officer. "They are still the mortal enemy of the government of Iraq that we're there to support, and we've essentially rearmed and refitted them. That is the big question mark."
President Bush announced that he would begin to withdraw up to 8,000 American troops from Iraq by February, including a contingent of about 1,100 Marines from Iraq's once-deadly Anbar province in the next couple of months.
The deal represents a compromise between Gen. David Petraeus, the top commander in Iraq, who recommended leaving all 15 brigades on the ground until next June, and the Joint Chiefs of Staff at the Pentagon, who have been pushing to draw down in Iraq, in part to send a larger force to Afghanistan. Nonetheless, it was a "consensus view," says one senior Pentagon official, and each level in the chain of command agreed to the plan. "We're entering the most critical period for long-term success in Iraq," says Fred Kagan, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute who was instrumental during the planning of the surge. The US runs the risk of getting out of Iraq too fast to "rescue" Afghanistan – repeating the original mistake of exiting Afghanistan too quickly in 2002, says Mr. Kagan. "If you don't have enough to win everywhere at once, you make sure you keep enough of a force to win in the most important theater," he says.
the surge has been succesful at the military/tactical level... violence is down...
the question really is whether we can leave without having violence "blow-up" again...
it seems that Bush is saying no, we cannot.
glassman,
Have you seen this new story. casts a bit of doubt on the troop surge.
Secret killing program is key in Iraq, Woodward says Program likened to WWII-era Manhattan Project that developed the atomic bomb Author discloses the existence of secret operational capabilities in latest book National security advisor disputes Woodward's conclusion about the Iraq surge
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The dramatic drop in violence in Iraq is due in large part to a secret program the U.S. military has used to kill terrorists, according to a new book by Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Bob Woodward.
The program -- which Woodward compares to the World War II era Manhattan Project that developed the atomic bomb -- must remain secret for now or it would "get people killed," Woodward said Monday on CNN's Larry King Live.
"It is a wonderful example of American ingenuity solving a problem in war, as we often have," Woodward said.
In "The War Within: Secret White House History 2006-2008," Woodward disclosed the existence of secret operational capabilities developed by the military to locate, target and kill leaders of al Qaeda in Iraq and other insurgent leaders.
National security adviser Stephen Hadley, in a written statement reacting to Woodward's book, acknowledged the new strategy. Yet he disputed Woodward's conclusion that the "surge" of 30,000 U.S. troops into Iraq was not the primary reason for the decline in violent attacks.
"It was the surge that provided more resources and a security context to support newly developed techniques and operations," Hadley wrote.
Woodward, associate editor of the Washington Post, wrote that along with the surge and the new covert tactics, two other factors helped reduce the violence.Watch Bob Woodward explain the strategy »
One was the decision of militant cleric Muqtada al-Sadr to order a cease-fire by his Mehdi Army. The other was the "Anbar Awakening" movement that saw Sunni tribes aligning with U.S. troops to battle al Qaeda in Iraq.
Woodward told Larry King that while there is a debate over how much credit the new secret operations should get for the drop in violence, he concluded it "accounts for a good portion."
"I would somewhat compare it to the Manhattan Project in World War II," he said "It's a ski slope right down in a matter of months, cutting the violence in half. This isn't going to happen with the bunch of joint security stations or the surge."
The top secret operations, he said, will "some day in history ... be described to people's amazement."
While he would not reveal the details, Woodward said the terrorists who have been targeted were already aware of the capabilities.
"The enemy has a heads up because they've been getting wiped out and a lot of them have been killed," he said. "It's not news to them.
"If you were a member of al Qaeda or the resistance or some extremist militia, you would be wise to get your rear end out of town," Woodward said. "It is very dangerous."
-------------------- It is impossible to make anything foolproof because fools are so ingenious. Posts: 3311 | From: St. Louis | Registered: Feb 2005
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i have to say that"the existence of secret operational capabilities developed by the military to locate, target and kill leaders of al Qaeda in Iraq and other insurgent leaders."
sounds like psy-ops to me, but if psy-ops works? i'm all for it...
and i hadn't heard of the program before, i'll see if i can find out what it is....
it's probably a cell-phone monitoring system or something like that..
-------------------- Don't envy the happiness of those who live in a fool's paradise. Posts: 36378 | From: USA | Registered: Sep 2003
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The Bush Administration has authorized a major escalation of the Special Forces covert war in Iraq. In interviews over the past month, American officials and former officials said that the main target was a hard-core group of Baathists who are believed to be behind much of the underground insurgency against the soldiers of the United States and its allies. A new Special Forces group, designated Task Force 121, has been assembled from Army Delta Force members, Navy seals, and C.I.A. paramilitary operatives, with many additional personnel ordered to report by January. Its highest priority is the neutralization of the Baathist insurgents, by capture or assassination.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. military conceded it was not winning the fight against an increasingly deadly insurgency in Afghanistan and said on Wednesday it would revise its strategy to combat militant safe havens in Pakistan.
U.S. Defence Secretary Robert Gates and Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told the House of Representatives Armed Services Committee success in Afghanistan would require more civilian effort beyond the military fight.
"Frankly, we're running out of time," Mullen said.
"I'm not convinced we are winning it in Afghanistan. I am convinced we can," he said, offering a sober assessment nearly seven years since U.S.-led forces toppled the Taliban after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
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