Troops, Lt. Generals, Libertarians, Goat Carcasses: We Got it All

Some good stuff to stuff your brains with!

• Troops, Troops, and Less Troops – To supplement the 30,000 American soldiers headed to Afghanistan this year in President Obama’s Afghan plan, it was expected approximately 10,000 other NATO troops would also follow suit. Unsurprisingly, this is turning out to be difficult to accomplish. Germany has ponied up around 850 more, but France is not budging from the number 80 as the grand total is now stuck at 9,000 pledged. On the bright side, Georgia is sending 750 more warm bodies on top of the 350 already in the ISAF. Envoy Richard Holbrooke will be visiting the Eastern European country soon to help organize their deployment. And if Jonesing for some more Holbrooke, here’s the transcript from his last press conference on Af-Pak.
• CATO’s Take – I wanted to go over this a while back, but our bloated government kept me from reaching my potential and finishing the job (happy libertarian-loving CATO members?!). Naw, I was just lazy. CATO takes a ‘let’s take care of our own problems instead of finding intractable one’s far far away’ approach and therefore favor a much smaller military and political commitment in Afghanistan. Here is their full report on the topic, ‘Graveyard of Empires‘ and a shorter piece by one of their members. I actually watched a CATO event on CSPAN this weekend that featured Peter Galbraith, the former UN envoy in Afghanistan. Though I disagree with CATO on this and many other issues, they make a compelling argument for a lighter footprint.
• FPA’s Pakistan and India Blogs – Make sure to read what these excellent sources have to say about how Afghanistan impacts their countries of interest. Needless to say, Pakistan and India will have a lot of say in the future of Afghanistan. In fact, both South Asian states believe the other has too much influence!
• Lt. Gen. David Rodriquez Interview – He’s the man running a lot of McChrystal’s COIN/Special Ops strategy in Afghanistan and was interviewed by Stars and Stripes. Check it out! While were at, Thomas Ricks sums up the latest writings on Afghanistan by Mr. COIN, David Kilcullen, on his blog. Take a look!
• A Sport’s a Sport – And a ball’s a ball, even if it’s a goat carcass. Here is a fantastic pictorial of Afghanistan’s most popular sport, Buzkashi. 2 puns here: A. I wonder who’s the GOAT (Greatest of All Time) in the sport? B. ‘Hamid Ghani was the team’s best player, but his crucial mistake at the end of the game turned him into a goat.’