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Obama Justifies Military Build-Up In Afghanistan
The greatly expanded U.S. military effort in Afghanistan is necessary to root out Al Qaeda but is not open-ended and will be monitored carefully for signs of progress, President Obama said in television interview this morning.
Obama said “we needed to ramp up from the greatly under-resourced level” in the region, but that doesn’t mean “that if this strategy doesn’t work that what’s needed is even more troops. There may be a point of diminishing returns in terms of troop levels. We also have to make sure that our civilian efforts, our diplomatic efforts and our development efforts are just as robustly encouraged.”
The White House last week announced substantial increases of troops bound for Afghanistan and plans to increase training and foreign aid both in that country and in neighboring Pakistan.
Obama said Al Qaeda and its allies would be pursued aggressively but that did not mean that ground troops would enter Pakistan.
The president spoke with Bob Schieffer on CBS’ “Face the Nation.”
Obama rejected Schieffer’s characterization of the Afghan conflict as “Obama’s war now.”
“I think it’s America’s war,” the president said.
Obama said he hoped to gain closer cooperation from the Pakistani government by persuading it that Al Qaeda and its Taliban supporters were a threat to the country’s own stability.
Closer to home, Obama left open the possibility of putting National Guard troops on the Mexican border to prevent that country’s drug violence from spilling further into the U.S. but wanted to see if an infusion of aid to the Mexican government reduced the mayhem.
He echoed Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton’s statement last week that the U.S. needed to do more to curb behavior that contributes to violence in Mexico.
“We have to reduce the demand for drugs,” Obama said. “We’ve got to do our part in reducing the flow of cash and guns south.”
On the domestic front, Obama, who is slated to announce details of an assistance package to Detroit automakers on Monday, said they still need to do more cost-cutting. “They’re not quite there yet,” Obama said.
Obama also said that though public outrage over bonuses paid to Wall Street bankers is justified, it won’t distract him from focusing on the larger picture of improving the economy. “We’re all in this together,” Obama said. “And it’s my job to help keep that focus as we move forward.”
Click the link below for further information at the L.A. Times.com
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Article by Andrew Zajac for the Los Angeles Times
Military buildup in Afghanistan warranted, Obama says – Los Angeles Times.
