President Obama approves 13,000 more troops to Afghanistan !

by Agence France-Presse

Obama approves 13,000 more troops to Afghanistan
October 13, 2009


WASHINGTON - In an unannounced move, President Barack Obama is dispatching an additional 13,000 US troops to Afghanistan beyond the 21,000 he announced publicly in March, The Washington Post reported.

The additional forces are primarily support forces -- such as engineers, medical personnel, intelligence experts and military police -- the Post said, bringing the total buildup Obama has approved for the war-torn nation to 34,000.

"Obama authorized the whole thing. The only thing you saw announced in a press release was the 21,000," a defense official familiar with the troop-approval process told the daily.

The report, posted on the newspaper's website late Monday, came as Obama weighs a request from the top US and NATO commander in Afghanistan, General Stanley McChrystal, for more combat, training and support troops, with several options including one for 40,000 more forces.

But the newspaper noted that the maximum number of US service members expected in Afghanistan by year's end -- 68,000 -- would remain the same.

Major deployments of support troops have not been publicized by the Pentagon and the White House in the past. When former president George W. Bush announced a US troop increase in Iraq, he only mentioned 20,000 combat troops and not the accompanying 8,000 support troops.

Please read the complete article at:

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2009/10/13-1

The Indiana Guard has had units in Afghanistan for years now, and things are not getting better, even though our Guardsmen are proud of what they have accomplished.

Also, I've heard on various news outlets this morning that this was just a rotation that has been done for the last 8 years. This is nothing new.

but . . . .who's counting

I know i read it somewhere that it was in the 70,000 figure..

of course our guy now has the peace prize..it must be for something..how about sending more troops to war..yeah..thats the ticket!

First, kudos to Obama for not getting sucked in too far, but....13K? There is NOTHING he can do there with 13K additional troops that he cannot do now with 13K less troops. Its an abritrary number. Essentially, he is trying to not appear to be escalating the war, yet trying to appear to be listening to the military advisers. In the end, we have a worthless number that probably appeals to no one, and has no additional effectiveness. At the end of the day, at least it wasn't 60K. But also, why bother (other than politics)?

Wait, that was McCain's unofficial campaign slogan. Why is Obama appropriating it?

and it is right here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x4101066

Turn hard right at the Peace Corpse, and drive on forever...

Refresh me, folks: what is the object? Is it full occupation of the country? Is it neutralization of all insurgents, including those in Pakistan? It's always easier to accomplish something when it can actually be expressed.

The very flavor of all this is the same vagueness and abstract, pastel wistfulness of hope and butterflies and Jesus, with the fully consensual embrace of corporatist profiteering for the cheery betterment of all.

Reality is often less of an acceptable benchmark for this regime than it was for the Bushies; from a bystander's point of view, the ambient feel is that it's almost more of a ministry than an administration.

Support Troops Swelling U.S. Force in Afghanistan
Additional Deployments Not Announced and Rarely Noted
By Ann Scott Tyson
Washington Post Staff Writer
October 13, 2009


President Obama announced in March that he would be sending 21,000 additional troops to Afghanistan. But in an unannounced move, the White House has also authorized -- and the Pentagon is deploying -- at least 13,000 troops beyond that number, according to defense officials.

The additional troops are primarily support forces, including engineers, medical personnel, intelligence experts and military police. Their deployment has received little mention by officials at the Pentagon and the White House, who have spoken more publicly about the combat troops who have been sent to Afghanistan.

The deployment of the support troops to Afghanistan brings the total increase approved by Obama to 34,000. The buildup has raised the number of U.S. troops deployed to the war zones of Iraq and Afghanistan above the peak during the Iraq "surge" that President George W. Bush ordered, officials said.

Pentagon and White House officials have not publicized significant deployments of support troops. For example, when Bush announced the Iraq surge, he spoke only of 20,000 combat troops and did not mention the approximately 8,000 support troops that would accompany them. When Gen. David H. Petraeus announced that the surge would end, he spoke only of the withdrawal of the combat units because he needed to retain many of the support troops in Iraq.

"Obama authorized the whole thing. The only thing you saw announced in a press release was the 21,000," said another defense official familiar with the troop-approval process.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10/12/AR2009101203142.html?hpid=topnews