Double Down

In light of Obama's speech today about Afghanistan, Sullivan has a bunch of interesting posts. I'm not entirely sure our strategy in Afghanistan can be considered a failure. We've lost less than a thousand troops and removed AQ's ability to operate training camps - thus far - the prerequisite for launching a big attack against the US. Further, it is not clear to me we aren't winning a war of attrition against Al Queda.

We did fail to dismantle the Taliban - but are the Taliban our target? If the Taliban exists without protecting Al Queda, isn't this something we can live with?

And a pretty spot on comment here.

The fact that Obama is instituting Iraq-honed practices in Afghanistan refutes the assertion that the Iraq War was a fatal distraction from the war in Afghanistan. Vindicated, on the other hand, is Christopher Hitchens, who has repeatedly made the case that the Iraq War would provide invaluable instruction in fighting jihadists going forward.