What Will Obama Do About Afghanistan?

Is it about Osama bin Laden?Obama is deciding what to do about Afghanistan. And it’s a big decision- let’s see:

1)    He just got the Nobel Peace Prize- can you send 40,000 more troops into a country with a war that is expanding? 2)    Some advisors say al Qaeda is the threat, not the Taliban, and the war doesn’t need to expand. (This sounds similar to what I was writing about last week- there is no need to pour an endless number of troops, a rising endless number of troops, into a war to support a democracy. We cannot continue to be a nation-building state with the economic and environmental issues that we need to keep building for our own nation).3)    Britain is sending 500 more troops right now. Wait, is that a compelling reason for us to also escalate? They send 500 and we send 40,000? England has just over 50 million people living there- we have 300 million or so. That ratio is a little off. 4)    Our commanding General in Afghanistan asked specifically for the troops from Obama. 5)    Obama made ending the war in Iraq such a big part of his campaign that people expect him to be reducing troop numbers around the world. While Iraq and Afghanistan are farm from similar situations, they are often lumped together as far as foreign wars go.  6)    Casualties are going way up in Afghanistan, making it more and more unpopular as time goes by. I can’t see Obama’s positive ratings going very high if he were to escalate a war right now.

Theory time: Is Obama buying time? If he sends even a fraction of the troops that have been requested, American citizens are going to be angry. You’ll have Limbaugh on one side yelling about how his legislation is turning the country socialist, and you’ll have liberals on the other side screaming about how he is a heartless bastard for sending more troops to a war that he should be ending.

And then there’s health care. Is Obama delaying his decision about Afghanistan to keep the healthcare reform bill alive? Is he secretly ready to send troops there but waiting until the bill is in a finalized form and has votes in Congress all wrapped up? That way, if he sends troops and the liberal base explodes, it will just be some anger that will have time to die down before the mid-term elections and not be the outcry that derails his hopes for the cornerstone of his liberal agenda.

A few sound bites (from Reuters) on the issue that isn’t making front-page headlines. yet:

"My concern is that this continuing public debate is going to raise doubts around the world about the staying power of the United States and about our willingness to continue commitments that we make," said Senator John Kyl (R)."I am compelled to ask: Does it really, really take 100,000 U.S. troops to find Osama bin Laden?" said Senator Robert Byrd (D).

So, Obama, what are you going to do? Could be the kind of defining moment in his presidency that he wasn’t expecting or wanting.