From Iraq to Afghanistan: Changing the War Strategy

The United States armed forces have shown the world how and what a superpower really is. Imagine participating in two major wars (Afghanistan and Iraq) and is now threatened to have another war with Iran and North Korea. They also have conflicts in the Middle East where they impose absolute security for their ally, Israel. The mindset and decisions made by Pres. Obama is not only limited to internal affairs such as the economy but also a large part of it goes to the security and defense.

We can still remember the day former President George W. Bush accused the Iraqi regime in possessing weapons of mass destruction and immediately called for an invasion. It was part of the United States Anti-terrorism policy which aims to disable terrorist networks and destroy as much as possible, their weapons of terror. After 8 grueling and bloody years, Iraqi regime has been completely overthrown though there are still several insurgencies at present.

Just recently, Pres. Obama announced a major shift in the Iraqi war strategy. He emphasized his promise of withdrawing over 200,000 troops in Iraq. He reiterated though that there will still be approximately 50,000 troops which will be left to serve as a transitional force and train the Iraqi armed forces. The target deadline for the troop withdrawals will be by the end of next year. The shift in policy will promote Iraq capability and independence. This will also empower the newly-established Iraqi government to act on its own in governing its people.

The troop withdrawals in Iraq will compliment the troop surge in Afghanistan. The US will basically put more focus and attention to Afghanistan as it is the breeding ground for most terrorist networks and organizations. Pres. Obama ordered over 30,000 fresh troops to be deployed in Afghanistan. The administration also reiterated that though the new mission will be quite hard and complicated, it is certainly winnable and achievable.

Both the Iraq and Afghanistan wars have taken the lives of thousands of Americans and other NATO nationalities. Also do take note that the US government has been rapidly spending billions of dollars for these military operations and for foreign aid. Let us just hope that the US government does not get too much preoccupied with security issues and forget about internal affairs of the nation. Let us also hope that the progress that the government has been constantly reporting is factual and real. Despite numerous issues faced by the government, I still have faith that the Obama administration will be able to resolve this very long war.