Obama’s West Point speech on Afghanistan

Last night, President Obama spoke from the hallowed halls of West Point; the place where General Douglas MacArthur spoke eloquently of Duty, Honor, and Country; in a hall named after the great American General and President, Dwight D. Eisenhower.

Both MacArthur and Eisenhower faithfully served the United States driven by the fact that there is no substitute for victory. Unfortunately, President Obama does not share that same drive. Not once in tonight’s speech did the word victory cross the President’s lips; Generals MacArthur and Eisenhower were each leaders that gathered face to face with the men they would lead into battle, and spoke of nothing but victory.

President Obama told young, future soldiers that he was not going to provide the requested minimum number of soldiers requested by General McChrystal to win the war in Afghanistan, and that we would start withdrawing in 18 months.

Let’s get this straight. President Obama is going to commit thirty-thousand troops into harms way when General McChrystal has already made the case that at least forty-thousand troops would be necessary for any hope of victory. This means that thirty-thousand young men and women will be going into battle with a less-than-likely chance of victory.

We also learned that in 18 months we would start withdrawing; no mention given as to what we would do if the situation was worse in 18 months. This implies that we will be withdrawing regardless of victory or defeat.

Like Nixon, Obama tried to sell his strategy by telling us that we would be handing off the responsibility of securing Afghanistan to the Afghanistan government; I was waiting for Obama to utter the words “peace with honor”; the same loosing rhetoric used as we withdrew from Vietnam with our tails between our legs.

Generals MacArthur and Eisenhower would tell President Obama that victory cannot be achieved by telling the enemy when you plan to withdraw from the battlefield.

President Obama does not, and has not supported our military since he was in the Senate and voted against the troop surge in Iraq, which proved to be successful. As President, Obama continues to not support our military I am reminded of the words my grandfather (a decorated World War II veteran) spoke regarding the Vietnam War; he said: “if we are not going to let our boys fight to win, then stop sending them to their graves in vain.” Those words apply to Afghanistan today. If Obama does not have the will, or the drive to win this war, then he should bring home our troops and stop sending them to their graves in vain.

Let me make this clear, I am not saying we should give up the war on Islamic extremists, and let them have Afghanistan; to do so will send the wrong message to the Islamic terrorists. We need to let our troops engage the enemy with the intent of victory; nothing less. Do not tie one arm behind our soldiers back and ask them to fight nicely with the enemy. This is war, and as General Sherman said: “War is all hell.” We need to make Afghanistan hell for the terrorists.

The American people must stand up for our soldiers by flooding our congressmen and senators with our disgust over our president’s weakness. For those congressmen and senators that will not listen, we need to vote them out of office next November and replace them with men and women that will listen, and pressure President Obama to stand up, not bow down, as our nation’s leader.