Obama and Afghanistan

Obama famously remarked that he was running for President not just to end the war in Iraq but to change the mind-set that got the nation mired in that conflict in the first place.
That goal will be severely impaired by a significant increase in troop levels for Afghanistan, which Obama seems all but certain to announce tomorrow.
Sending from 30,000 to 40,000 troops to that tumultuous nation will likely wreak havoc on Obama.

In August, National Intelligence Council, Chairman John Brennan, declared that under Obama, "the fight against terrorists and violent extremists has been returned to its right and proper place: no longer defining - indeed, distorting - our entire national security and foreign policy, but rather serving as a vital part of those larger policies."
But the military commitment endorsed by President Obama would have the reverse effect - officially making stabilization in Afghanistan and the war against Al Qaedaa and the Taliban the President's top priority.


And if the administration requests $100 billion a year for the war in Afghanistan, in the face of looming budget deficits, what are the chances Congress will loosen its purse strings further for that.

Finally, Obama and his advisers will be pressed in devoting their attention and political capital to other foreign policy matters, whether it's pushing for a solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict, organizing an international coalition to confront the Iranian nuclear program.
It's never easy for Presidents and their advisers to proverbially "walk and chew gum at the same time," and having 100,000 troops in Afghanistan will make it that much harder.
But above all, Obama's goal of changing America's mind-set from the belief that there is a military solution to every national security challenge will be dealt a defining and perhaps fatal blow - and in the end, that is probably the most important reason why troop levels in Afghanistan matter and why the President should think twice.
The opportunity costs will be profound, and Obama will risk becoming the one thing he likely did not want to be: a war President.
As he prepares to announce a decision that will define his presidency, Obama would be wise to consider the words of one of his predecessors in the Oval Office, Lyndon Johnson who after leaving office told a biographer, "History provided too many cases where the sound of the bugle put an immediate end to the hopes and dreams of the best reformers." No doubt Obama knows what ultimately happened to Johnson's policy agenda - and his presidency.