Akkam’s Razor

Wha-wha-what?  Frist says cut-and-run in Afghanistan?

Doesn't this run counter to the whole "finish the job", "stay the course", "fight them there so we don't fight them here", and "honor the memory of the fallen"  rhetoric that we've been hearing these last few years?

U.S. Senate majority leader calls for efforts to bring Taliban into Afghan government

The Associated Press

MONDAY, OCTOBER 2, 2006

QALAT, Afghanistan U.S. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist said Monday that the Afghan guerrilla war can never be won militarily and called for efforts to bring the Taliban and their supporters into the Afghan government.

The Tennessee Republican said he had learned from briefings that Taliban fighters were too numerous and had too much popular support to be defeated by military means.

"You need to bring them into a more transparent type of government," Frist said during a brief visit to a U.S. and Romanian military base in the southern Taliban stronghold of Qalat. "And if that's accomplished we'll be successful."

[…]

"We're going to need to stay here a long time," Frist said.

The senator said he had been warned to expect attacks in Afghanistan to increase. There appears to be an "unlimited flow" of Afghans and foreigners, he said, "willing to pick up arms and integrate themselves with the Taliban."

He said the only way to win in places like Qalat is to "assimilate people who call themselves Taliban into a larger, more representative government."

"Approaching counterinsurgency by winning hearts and minds will ultimately be the answer," Frist said. "Military versus insurgency one-to-one doesn't sound like it can be won. It sounds to me … that the Taliban is everywhere." 

Um, wasn't it the Taliban that gave Bin Laden a safe country to operate in?  Speaking of which -  where is that lanky fellow?  Maybe if Frist and company didn't follow along with George's Big Adventure, sending 2/7 of our forces to Iraq, leaving only 1/7th to Afghanistan.  I thought we "don't reward illegal behavior?"

Look kids, make a wish!  It's Bill Frists falling political star.  You can kiss any chances you have in 2008 buh-bye.  I hate to be agreeing with wingnuts here, but stanger things have happened.  I just can't find a circumstance where it is politically advantageous for Frist to say this crap.

Frist has subsequently come out with a mealy mouthed re-explanation:

"While touring Afghanistan, Senator Frist made the observation that Afghan tribesman should be brought into the government or risk losing them to the Taliban.  Giving the native tribes often targeted by Taliban recruitment a voice in the government will promote peace and prosperity in the region.  Senator Frist does not believe Taliban fighters - often foreign fighters who come to Afghanistan to further conflict - should be brought into the reconciliation process.

 

"In order to undermine the influence of the Taliban in Afghan society, Senator Frist believes there needs to be a multi-pronged approach to win the hearts and minds of the Afghan people.  Military efforts must continue in earnest to capture and kill the leadership of the Taliban and al-Qa'ida, who continue to pose a grave threat to Afghanistan and the world.

"The long-term peace and security of Afghanistan depends upon the ability of the government, lead by President Karzai, to establish a political order in which the radical totalitarian ideology of the Taliban is rejected in favor of liberty, democracy, and the rule of law."

Sounds like it's those same keen powers of observation that Frist has displayed in the past…

Bill Frist (R-Tenn.), a renowned heart surgeon before becoming Senate majority leader, went to the floor late Thursday night for the second time in 12 hours to argue that Florida doctors had erred in saying Terri Schiavo is in a "persistent vegetative state."

"I question it based on a review of the video footage which I spent an hour or so looking at last night in my office," he said in a lengthy speech in which he quoted medical texts and standards. "She certainly seems to respond to visual stimuli."

"While touring Afghanistan, Senator Frist made the observation that Afghan tribesman should be brought into the government or risk losing them to the Taliban.  Giving the native tribes often targeted by Taliban recruitment a voice in the government will promote peace and prosperity in the region.  Senator Frist does not believe Taliban fighters - often foreign fighters who come to Afghanistan to further conflict - should be brought into the reconciliation process.

 

"In order to undermine the influence of the Taliban in Afghan society, Senator Frist believes there needs to be a multi-pronged approach to win the hearts and minds of the Afghan people.  Military efforts must continue in earnest to capture and kill the leadership of the Taliban and al-Qa'ida, who continue to pose a grave threat to Afghanistan and the world.

"The long-term peace and security of Afghanistan depends upon the ability of the government, lead by President Karzai, to establish a political order in which the radical totalitarian ideology of the Taliban is rejected in favor of liberty, democracy, and the rule of law."

Bill Frist (R-Tenn.), a renowned heart surgeon before becoming Senate majority leader, went to the floor late Thursday night for the second time in 12 hours to argue that Florida doctors had erred in saying Terri Schiavo is in a "persistent vegetative state."

"I question it based on a review of the video footage which I spent an hour or so looking at last night in my office," he said in a lengthy speech in which he quoted medical texts and standards. "She certainly seems to respond to visual stimuli."