Obama: 35,000 troops heading to Afghanistan

An additional 35,000 U.S. troops will be deployed to Afghanistan in early 2010.

President Barack Obama declared his decision Tuesday at the U.S. Military Academy in West Point, N.Y.

The troop increase is intended to strengthen a counterinsurgency strategy to eliminate al Qaeda influence, fight the Taliban and establish diplomacy and economic stability in Afghanistan.

“Gen. (Stanley) McChrystal said the security situation is more serious than he anticipated. In short, the status quo is not sustainable,” Obama said, defending his decision to deploy more troops. “The situation in Afghanistan has deteriorated.”

Obama said not increasing troops would prove more costly and prolong the nation’s stay in Afghanistan. That is because the U.S. would be unable to properly train Afghan security forces and give them the space to take over.

When NATO forces convene at their Brussels, Belgium, headquarters Dec. 7, the issue of supplementing additional U.S. troops is expected to be brought up.

“Taken together these added American and international troops will allow us to accelerate handing over responsibility to Afghan forces and will allow us to begin the transfer of our forces out of Afghanistan in the July of 2011,” Obama said.

The only way

Lt. Col. Aaron Kalloch, the military science department chairman, said a troop increase is the only feasible option at the time because of the security situation.

“The men and women of the military will do everything they can to accomplish whatever strategic objective the president and his team puts forth,” he said. “If you raise the number of troops to a certain level … we can accomplish the security situation.”

War critics argue a counterinsurgency plan will be ineffective because of corruption in the Afghanistan government.

Cost may be another concern.

Moataz Fattah, political science associate professor, said Afghanistan lacks a strong government.

“Sending more troops there would mean … spending more money during a time when the U.S. economy and public debt is soaring (but), if we withdrawal now or not send more troops, we’re practically losing the war on terror and Osama bin Laden and his associates can declare victory,” he said.

Fattah said the best strategy is securing the country’s capital, Kabul, and the other major cities.

He said this would create a model of stability for other areas.

Fattah said the alternative, securing all of Afghanistan’s 30 million people, would be a “recipe for failure.”

“It’s a top priority to create a stable part of Afghanistan that would be good enough for Afghans to live peacefully and to prosper. Otherwise, we’re going to end up fighting everywhere without a clear aim of what to achieve,” Fattah said.

The next step

It is up to Congress to appropriate the necessary funds for Obama’s strategy.

McChrystal is expected to testify Tuesday to the Senate and House Armed Services Committees in support of Obama’s initiative.

Democrats in the House propose paying for the troop increase by imposing higher income taxes on all Americans excluding military families.

U.S. Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., the Senate Armed Services chairman, proposed to only tax wealthy Americans.

“In the middle of this recession, I don’t think you’re going to be able successfully or fairly to add a tax burden to middle-income people,” he said Sunday on CBS’s “Face the Nation.”