Coffins of US military personnel are prepared to be offloaded at Dover Air Force Base in Dover, Delaware in this undated photo. The US Air Force, in response to a Freedom of Information Act request, released to the web site www.thememoryhold.org more than 300 photographs showing the remains of US service members returning home. The Pentagon tightly restricts publication of photographs of coffins with the remains of US troops and has forbidden journalists from taking pictures at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware, the first stop for the bodies of troops being sent homeFrom Yahoo News/AP:
BERLIN – Rising casualties in Afghanistan are raising doubts among U.S. allies about the conduct of the war, forcing some governments to defend publicly their commitments and foreshadowing possible long-term trouble for the U.S. effort to bring in more resources to defeat the Taliban.
Pressure from the public and opposition politicians is growing as soldiers' bodies return home, and a poll released Thursday shows majorities in Britain, Germany and Canada oppose increasing their own troop levels in Afghanistan.
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My Comment: Doubts about the war .... we are way pass that in some countries right now. Members of NATO are going to be the first to bail out, with Canada leaving Afghanistan in two years unless the Canadian Parliament extends the mandate. My contacts in both the Liberal and Conservative party (I am a Canadian with some politics in my resume) have told me that Canada will be out when the mandate expires .... and there is no interest to extend it. We are not the only ones with a firm commitment to get out .... the Dutch have also indicated that they will soon leave.
The fighting is not going to stop in Afghanistan as long as the safe havens are permitted to operate in Pakistan. This is how the Afghans were able to defeat the Soviet occupation. After 10 years of continual war .... the Russians bailed out.
What happened to the Russians will also happen to us. The European and Canadian press are reporting accurately the difficulties and long term commitment necessary to win in Afghanistan. When the public is informed of this information .... there is then a strong movement to get out of Afghanistan. We see it already in German public opinion. Britain is drifting also to that of leaving, and the Canadian public has no stomach to still be there after two more years.
Once the American media starts to report on what are the long term commitments necessary for Afghanistan .... the loss in treasure and blood .... the same sentiment will start to then be felt in the American public. My prediction .... there will be a movement to get out by 2012.