Ring a bell
?
April 1985 – January 1987: Exit strategy
The first step of the Soviet Union's exit strategy was to transfer the burden of fighting the mujahideen to the Afghan armed forces, with the aim of preparing them to operate without Soviet help. During this phase, the Soviet contingent was restricted to supporting the DRA forces by providing artillery, air support and technical assistance, though some large-scale operations were still carried out by Soviet troops.
Under Soviet guidance, the DRA armed forces were built up to an official strength of 302,000 in 1986. To minimize the risk of a coup d'état, they were divided into different branches, each modeled on its Soviet counterpart. The ministry of defence forces numbered 132,000, the ministry of interior 70,000 and the ministry of state security (KHAD) 80,000. However, these were theoretical figures: in reality each service was plagued with desertions, the army alone suffering 32,000 per year.
so, the US strategy is to build up the Afghan forces, training them to take over when they leave .... I don't know if the US target is for 302,000 as was the Soviet target, perhaps the US target is 303,000 and that will make it all better.
The difficulty for the US is an effort to diminish the ability of an area to serve as safe harbor, versus the desire of the same area to have no outside influence.
The fact is the Taliban offered up Osama et al., and promised (whatever that may or may not be worth) to not allow their turf to be a safe area going forward.
I do not know if such a path would have been politically tenable in the US ... and certainly not desirable in a Cheney's government. But, it is the case, the Taliban offered to corral, arrest, and deport all of those guys into US hands.
It is difficult to separate criminal behavior from the behavior of "illegal" states.
While the UK has, for example, Air craft carriers and cruise missiles, it is my understanding that shock and awe was not conducted against the entirety of Ireland and Norther Ireland in the face of criminal activity from the IRA.
Certainly the desire for vengeance was great. Fortunately a Republican was in office, cause as stated earlier ... at least on this Republicans have choices ... unfortunately on this nobody would ever accuse Mr Cheney (and his surrogate Pres Bush) of being particularly clever.
So we got decades of war, little progress, and perhaps some security I do not know, but as far as the security goes, certainly more could have been achieved with the 6000 US soldier lives and trillion dollars than has been.
But actual accomplishing of goals on such matters is not something that should ever be left in the hands of neocons.
There are perfectly capable folks left and right on these matters, they unfortunately do not include neocons.
So,would Americans have settled for simply the handing over of al Qeuda by the Taliban? Every thing else re Taliban is just a Soviet re-run.
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