Eikenberry assures Afghans U.S. will stay beyond 2011

[Winehole23]

Eikenberry assures Afghans U.S. will stay beyond 2011

By Thomas L. Day | McClatchy Newspapers

KABUL, Afghanistan — U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan Karl Eikenberry Thursday further signaled that a strong American military presence will remain in Afghanistan long after July 2011, when President Obama plans to end his troop surge.

Speaking at the Afghan Ministry of Foreign Relations before a group of diplomats, non-governmental organizations and Afghan citizens, Eikenberry drove home the Obama administration's sometimes contradictory message. To the Afghan government: act with urgency. To the Afghan people: We will not abandon you.

"After eight years of assistance to Afghanistan, many Americans and many members of Congress are impatient to see results," he said, while assuring that "our military commitment will not end or decline even as our combat forces [withdraw]."

Eikenberry suggested that the July 2011 date for beginning a U.S. troop drawdown is flexible.

"This is not a deadline despite what some people in the United States and Afghanistan have said," Eikenberry said. He added that American withdraw in 18 months is "entirely based on the conditions that exist at that time."

Eikenberry's remarks come two days before Afghan President Hamid Karzai is likely to submit his second-term cabinet officials to his legislature — an event that will be watched closely by U.S. officials in the country to see how serious Karzai is about stopping corruption.

Earlier this week at an anti-corruption conference in Kabul, Karzai defended Kabul Mayor Abdul Ahad Sayebi, who was convicted last week and sentenced to four years in prison for corruption-related charges.

"I know the mayor," Karzai said. "He is a clean person."

Sayebi, after posting bail, attended the anti-corruption conference. Karzai appointed Sayebi as mayor of Kabul. Eikenberry declined to comment on Sayebi's conviction and Karzai's response to it, saying only that he would "let the justice system proceed and determine the results."

[Marcus Bryant]

Ten years for the Pentagon to test all kinds of cool expensive in the mountains.

[EmptyMan]

Like the drones with no encryption on the video transmissions

[Winehole23]

Ten years for the Pentagon to test all kinds of cool expensive in the mountains.

I think of that number as being on the low end of possibilities. The high end staggers.

My own mind was blown by John McCain's comment on the high end of the scale, and also, by implication, how long he thinks we are obliged to carry the burden there. 50-100 years did he say? I think McCain compared Afghanistan to Korea.

(Do you recall this, MB? My own recollection may be a bit hazy.)

[doobs]

I think of that number as being on the low end of possibilities. The high end staggers.

My own mind was blown by John McCain's comment on the high end of the scale, and also, by implication, how long he thinks we are obliged to carry the burden there. 50-100 years did he say? I think McCain compared Afghanistan to Korea.

(Do you recall this, MB? My own recollection may be a bit hazy.)

On January 3, 2008 at a campaign stop in Derry, New Hampshire, when a questioner said, "President Bush has talked about our staying in Iraq for 50 years," McCain responded:

"Make it a hundred. We've been in Japan for 60 years, we've been in South Korea for 50 years or so. That'd be fine with me as long as Americans are not being injured or harmed or wounded or killed. That's fine with me. I hope it will be fine with you if we maintain a presence in a very volatile part of the world where Al Qaeda is training, recruiting, equipping, and motivating people every single day."

[Winehole23]

Thanks for the refresher, doobs.

[Marcus Bryant]

"Wealth conquered Rome after Rome had conquered the world.”