IS OUR PUBLIC SUPPORT FOR AFGHAN WAR WANING?

50 percent of Americans polled in an ABC Washington post poll said the now 8 year war in Afghanistan is one not worth fighting. The chairman of Joint Chiefs of Staff says in an CBS news article that the President is "still formulating his plans on how to deal with Afghanistan." Yet the goal, defeating the Taliban and Al Qaeda in a country whose terrain is brutally hard to navigate, has been a losing proposition for many who have tried to win wars there before. Ask the Russians who first supported the ruling Democaratic party in 1979 with security form the Muhajideen resistance. 10 years later when they left, the Russian's were staring at their own "Vietnam," a war that starting as a security matter, then escalated into a conflict, ending up in a quagmire.

By adding 17,000 troops as Obama has done in his version of the troop surge, we'll have tripled our forces from 20,000 to 60,000 in the past three years. Reports say the new policy is intended to destroy an Al Qaeda presence that has strengthened in Pakistan. What if it doesn't? Will this then be Obama's Vietnam, if a modest troop increase yields only modest results? Should history be any indicator, maybe we can expect the increase to continue. In 1965 our military presence rose to 180,000 from a mere 16,000 soldiers and advisors in 1964.

From 1965-1968 anti war sentiment was at it's peak. It was during that four year span that yearly marches in Washington helped grow the national attention to the fight taking place over in Hanoi. In 2009 protests will not come in the form of shouts and signs put rather postings on blogs. The strength in numbers of discontent will rear their ugly heads not on streets surrounding the White House, but on twitter and in voter polls taken.

The bigger question will be whether the Obama approach to achieving goals in Afghanistan will be compromised by domestic opinions of the war here in the U.S. If War room strategists should take anything from the Johnson and Nixon administration's experiences during the Vietnam war, they should realize the level of importance an unpopular war can push a party to save themselves from getting buried politically in it's own quagmire. A quagmire of partisan politics and dissent at home.

Fallout from the Afghan elections this past Thursday may affect the strategy as well. If the Taliban is found to have been more than simply an intimidating disruptive presence in the process (they've reportedly chopped off a few voters fingers) more media attention will be directed back towards whether our current strategy over there has been effective in defeating the enemy.

It's too soon to call Afghanistan "Obama's war." He's inherited a war that once kickstarted the War on Terror and has since continued for seven years. Nonetheless, what Obama MUST do, what he has failed to do with regard to health care, is to get in front of the message. The Feeling out process is wearing thin. He needs to stop dancing around the ring and start throwing punches. Both in the Afghanistan policy and in through his comments about it to the American people. Sooner not later. He should use not only the lessons we learned form policy mistakes in 'Nam, but also from communication mistakes he's made by not being clear and direct on the Health care front. He can't afford to be bogged down for the second time in his first year. Being out in front with a solid plan will lend Obama the additional public support he'll be happy to have gained back after a rough August that has hardly resembled the fun of a summer sleep away camp.