Quote Originally Posted by carl View Post

Firn: I don't agree that Afghan cooperation wasn't forthcoming. We never used the power we had to demand things from the gov. We paid all the bills. All of them. If we want something, like less stealing, we should be able to throw our weight around and get it. We never really did. Instead we just hoped that our man Karzai would do the right thing. But we never forced him to.

We got bluffed by Karzai as badly as we got bluffed by the Pak Army/ISI. In both cases we proclaimed our confidence in them and in both cases we just refused to admit we made a mistake. It is like the hallmark of our big gov/military culture is an absolute belief that we can predict the correct course of action right off the bat. All that ensues is predicated on preserving that belief so we won't change and pretend that things are just swell.
I just wanted to point out that it is far easier to achieve a limited political goal depending mostly on your own ressources then doing so with a far more bigger political goal where you depend to a large degree on the 'hearts and minds' of others...

Overall I agree with you.