First, some credit to President Obama. The AP reports:
As far as I can tell this is the first tangible diplomatic success for the Obama administration. It only took 100 days. The Australian troops will be used to train the Afghan National Army and provide security for upcoming elections. Meanwhile, the New York Times reports that American troops will be pushing into the country’s most hostile provinces (Helmand, Kandahar and Zabul) with the aim of eradicating the country’s poppy crop — the primary source of funding for the Taliban insurgency.
Tom Donnelly questioned the wisdom of the Obama administration’s counternarcotics strategy here when it was first reported. As he noted at the time, the most vocal critic of the Bush administration’s counternarcotics efforts in Afghanistan was Richard Holbrooke, who now has oversight of Afghanistan as Special Envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan. Holbrooke said it was the “most wasteful and ineffective program I have seen in 40 years,” and that “It hasn’t hurt the Taliban one iota because whatever money they’re getting from the drugs trade, they get whatever they need whether we reduce the acreage or not.” If the media can stop fawning over Holbrooke long enough, they might want to ask him what he thinks of this strategy. HT: FPI Overnight Brief
