The Afghanistan Drawdown: The Outlook For Children

When the President acts against the advice of his Secretary of State and his Generals, he's not just being a vanguard, he is playing on a campaign promise made prior to his taking office, fulfilling an arbitrary drawdown date chosen in the early days of his presidency, and is shrewdly the dealer of a political game. He has chosen not to listen to people who have been on the ground. He has, instead, chosen to listen to a political force that for the most part has not only been shaped, but shapes the media and a texture that for a long time has only been focusing on the prospects of a drawdown. They have spun this war into a fruitless exercise by focusing exclusively on casualties as a means to promote it as a "lost war," or "Bush's war," which has led to mass acceptance of the worthlessness of this (or any) war:

".....the refusal of the media to spend much time on issues other than American casualties makes it all but impossible for political decision makers (even assuming that the will exists) to harness public sentiment to aid non-Americans." -Stephen L.A Carter, The Violence of Peace

The truth has been told by Sebastian Junger many times, who often quotes the Human Rights Watch figures.  The Soviet invasion cost an estimated 3 million lives lost or displaced. The Taliban killed 400,000 during their occupation. During the current war, an estimated 40,000 have died. While 40,000 is a horrible consequence of war, this is the lowest level of violence in a 30 year period in Afghanistan.
What Obama has done is fallen, even cultivated the trap of polarization:

"The far right would have us believe it’s unpatriotic to examine the rationale for the war, while the far left suggests you’re a coward if you don’t morally condemn the war. However, Afghanistan is perhaps the most complicated foreign policy problem the United States has ever faced and its solution defies partisan ideology and facile truths."  -Tim Hetherington, Guernica, September 2010

The FabLab project out of Jalalabad, started by MIT

In no way could I ever be called war hawk. In no way do I think the running of this war has been played to the best advantage all the time. I would never deny that a drawn down would be inevitable, or that eventually if the Afghan people want the freedom to breathe they would have to fight to uphold, and create the civil society they want.

However, the cloud of disparagement has made it lost on the general public the small victories that take place everyday as the result of our being there.

In ten years time, many Americans have given selflessly via small humanitarian relief projects such as the school created by the La Jolla Golden Triangle Rotary Club in Jalalabad, or the computer lab started by FabLab out of MIT.  And while Obama refuses to use the word victory, each one of these project is just that. Each time a kid picks up a book, listens to music, goes to school --it's a victory.

I have only this to ask: what's going to happen to all those little girls going to school? To the computer lab, to the wireless network bringing the world in to a generation of boys and girls, making it possible for them to study for careers in healthcare, and computer technology? Is the ANA going to keep them safe, is their government going to retain the gains they've made?  A rapid drawdown is a chilling prospect, which like it or not, we must now accept. It's a crapshoot, which is the texture of things right now.

American giving care to Afghan child. 

You rarely see this stuff in the news.