McGovern: get out of Afghanistan
George McGovern has some advice for President Barack Obama: Get U.S. troops out of Afghanistan.
“I’m convinced that war is going to turn sour. I’m convinced we’re not going to prevail there,” McGovern, the 1972 Democratic presidential nominee, said Sunday at a Truthdig event in West Los Angeles.
The former U.S. senator from South Dakota noted that “some of the best reporters over there are telling us that the Taliban are getting stronger and we’re getting weaker in the minds of the people, and that you have a corrupt government involved in drugs, involved in just plain old-fashioned stealing and corruption. It’s a lousy government, and it’s very difficult, even for a great country like [the U.S.], to make them look good. So I think we have every reason to withdraw.” [continued…]
Afghan police officer kills five British soldiers
A rogue Afghan policeman shot and killed five British soldiers in southern Helmand Province on Tuesday and escaped, the British military said Wednesday. It was one of the highest British tolls from a single attack since the Afghanistan invasion eight years ago.
About the same time, militants attacked on the other side of the checkpoint, and during subsequent fighting a fire broke out. As residents tried to put out the blaze, warplanes attacked the militants and killed five civilians. It was not clear whether the two attacks had been coordinated.
The British prime minister, Gordon Brown, told the House of Commons that the Taliban had claimed responsibility for the attack on the soldiers, which brought the British death toll in the Afghanistan war this year to 92, the highest single-year loss sustained by British forces since the Falklands conflict in 1982. Mr. Brown said insurgents may have infiltrated the rogue officer’s unit. [continued…]
