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Letter: A very long time

Posted on December 16, 2010 by Staff

One hundred and ten months is a very long time! That’s how long it has been since the U.S. invaded Afghanistan in order, we were told, to arrest our archenemy (or one of them) Osama bin Laden. 

Almost 10 years on, that objective has been abandoned in favor of a counterinsurgency strategy to bring democracy to Afghanistan. We are “seeing some encouraging signs,” said NATO spokeswoman Army Maj. Sunset Belinsky (quoted in the Daily News, 10/24/10), since in six months Afghan and U.S. special operations inflicted “body blows” in 1,500 raids that killed 332 Taliban leaders and 929 fighters, while capturing 2,317 insurgents. She did not mention the concomitant civilian casualties. Although she added, “We know we cannot capture or kill our way out of Afghanistan.”

The war costs about $7 billion a month, a sum that is still being borrowed, and adds nearly $100 billion a year to the national debt (see costofwar.com for details). Yet few of the candidates who voiced their anguish about the dangers of the federal budget deficit talked about the war as economically unsustainable

The midterm election circus in the U.S. all but banished news of the Afghan War conflict from the consciousness of our residents: Witches in Delaware seemed a lot more interesting, and sell better. 

But the tragedy of the treasure spent in lives and money, our standing in the world and our ability to ameliorate the lives of our citizens, must not be forgotten. 

Elders for Peace
Chapel Hill

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