Militant Islam Monitor > Articles > Karzai Echoes Marine Commandant Conway's Criticism of Obama's Afghan Pullout Date
Karzai Echoes Marine Commandant Conway's Criticism of Obama's Afghan Pullout Date
August 29, 2010
August 27, 2010 - San Francisco, CA - PipeLineNews.org - On August 24, David T. Conway, Commandant of the Marine Corp. employed unusually blunt language in his criticism of team Obama's artificially set Afghan pullout date of July 2011.
Conway suggested that the policy constitutes giving aid and comfort to the enemy.
"… it's probably giving our enemy sustenance. We think that he may be saying to himself - in fact, we've intercepted communications that say, hey, you know, we only have to hold out for so long."
[source, New York Times, http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/25/world/asia/25military.html?src=me]
Following in short order, today Afghan president Karzai, said much the same thing, claiming that the deadline date served to boost the morale of the Taliban, confident that it can wait out the clock until U.S. troops are withdrawn next year. [see, UK Guardian, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/7967883/Barack-Obama-US-troop-withdrawal-deadline-a-boost-to-Taliban.html]
During the previous week, on the August 15 edition of Meet the Press, Afghan theatre commander David Petraeus set the same tone, unequivocally stating that, "I Didn't Come Out Here to Carry Out a Graceful Exit." [source, Meet the Press, http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/38686033/ns/meet_the_press-transcripts]
That these three key players in the Afghan war are of like mind, opposing Obama's intention of arbitrarily ending the American role in Afghanistan by next summer, adds materially to the president's mounting problems as the mid-term elections loom barely 60 days out.
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