Soccer Dad: Why and where we fight

March 30, 2007

Why and where we fight

In Which is the Real War? (and here) Charles Krauthammer critiques the war on terror's critics who claim to be mostly interested in the Afghanistan instead of Iraq,

The Democratic insistence on the primacy of Afghanistan makes no strategic sense. Instead, it reflects a sensibility. They would rather support the Afghan War because its origins are cleaner, the casus belli clearer, the moral texture of the enterprise more comfortable. Afghanistan is a war of righteous revenge and restitution, law enforcement on the grandest of scales. As senator and presidential candidate Joe Biden put it, "If there was a totally just war since World War II, it is the war in Afghanistan.''

but this isn't serious because Krauthammer points out that

Al-Qaeda has provided the answer many times. Osama bin Laden, the one whose presence in Afghanistan presumably makes it the central front in the war on terror, has been explicit that "the most serious issue today for the whole world is this Third World War that is raging in Iraq." Al-Qaeda's No. 2, Ayman al-Zawahiri, has declared that Iraq "is now the place for the greatest battle of Islam in this era.''

In short, pre-emption is making the Democrats uncomfortable.

UPDATE: (via memeorandum) Red State writes

Not only will Afghanistan take infinitely longer to stabilize and develop it is really unclear what a stable and developed Afghanistan, in isolation, buys us in any meaningful geostrategic sense. Iraq, on the other hand, is a keystone in this war.

QandO observes

Why, pray tell, is the war in Afghanistan the "real" war on terror, and does or doesn't Speaker Pelosi understand that in the big scheme of things, Afghanistan is really only one battle in that war?

It's statements like that which make me doubt that Pelosi has an understanding of what the GWoT entails. And the actions of Democrats recently as it pertains to Iraq and funding that war make me doubt their understanding of the stakes even more.

Also commenting The Moderate Voice and Gateway Pundit

Blogdigger tags: War on Terror, Iraq, Afghanistan.