Obama’s national security adviser skipped his Sunday bike ride to do interviews on CBS and CNN, where he assured viewers that contrary to the assessment of General Stanley McChrystal, Jones doesn’t “foresee the return of the Taliban and I want to be clear that Afghanistan is not in imminent danger of falling.” This comes just as an ISAF outpost in the eastern province of Nuristan was overrun by Taliban with eight U.S. troops killed in action. Meanwhile, UK General David Richards, the head of the British Army, seems to share McChrystal’s grim view:
But even as U.S. outposts are being overrun by the Taliban, as the U.S. commander in Afghanistan has requested 45,000 additional troops in order to regain the initiative, as the head of the British Army is warning of worst case scenarios and a Taliban victory over the West, Obama’s national security adviser is out telling the American people that there’s nothing to worry about, the Taliban can’t come back, Afghanistan can’t fail apart. And this was supposed to be the “reality-based” presidency that would end the war in Iraq in order to focus on the “real threat” from al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan.
