How are we doing re. Afghanistan? SNAFU!

As the Economist's Style Guide points out, snafu is an acronym--not an abbreviation!  It stands for "situation normal, all f*&$ed up."

Snafu is the acronym/word we might want to use to explain where the US is when it comes to Afghanistan.

John Dickerson has a great point here:

Obama's insistence on slow deliberations on Afghanistan contrasts with the policy tempo on other fronts. Obama has been a president of action. Economic collapse? Here's a government program to address it. Car companies failing? Here's a program to help them. Want the Olympics to come to your town? Obama can help—tonight in Copenhagen he plays his role of chairman of the Chicago Chamber of Commerce as he pitches that city to the International Olympic Committee.

Let us face it: candidate Obama talked loudly and often about Afghanistan.  So, this is not as if he is being asked to decide thanks to some 3:00 a.m. phone call!  And it is not just Afghanistan where President Obama continues to dilly-dally.  I am all the more ticked off that he spent precious time talking up Chicago to the IOC.

And in another piece, Dickerson zooms into where the differences might lie when it comes to the different perspectives on Afghanistan: if the Taliban gains enough in the near future to even form a government, will that mean that al-Qaeda will make a return as well?  Is there a strong link between the Taliban and al-Qaeda?  On the one hand, I am glad they are seriously thinking about this, as opposed to the previous administration that blatantly lied about the Iraq-al Qaeda connection.
But, the reality is that this, too, is not a new question and we have had enough time to think through that.  Karzai's government being inefficient and corrupt is not news either.  So, what gives?
Dickerson writes:

several administration sources expressed skepticism about McChrystal's thinking. "A lot of assumptions—and I don't want to say myths, but a lot of assumptions—were exposed to the light of day," one senior administration official told the Post. One of the key assumptions exposed, according to the Post, was the contention that the return to power of the Taliban would mean a new sanctuary for al-Qaida.
Any kind of thorough review tests even the most basic assumptions. The link between Taliban insurgents and al-Qaida is long-standing, so it is perhaps a sign of how rigorous the Obama process is that even this premise is now open to question. On Sunday, National Security Adviser Jim Jones was so wary of making the al-Qaida/Taliban connection that when asked on Face the Nation whether a return of the Taliban would mean a return of al-Qaida, he ducked the question.

Why is everybody waffling on this question?  Yes, there is a nexus between these two groups.  But, our goal was to remove al-Qaeda from Afghanistan--not to completely sanitize the place.  We can always keep watch from outside, as we did with Saddam in Iraq, and ensure that the al-Qaeda aspect is under check, if not eliminated.  So, what does President Obama think?  Again, Dickerson:

Two months ago, Obama said, "If left unchecked, the Taliban insurgency will mean an even larger safe haven from which al-Qaida would plot to kill more Americans."
Where does Obama stand on this issue today? Tuesday he spoke to the employees of the National Counterterrorism Center. "We know that al-Qaida and its extremist allies threaten us from different corners of the globe—from Pakistan, but also from East Africa and Southeast Asia; from Europe and the Gulf." What country is missing? Afghanistan, the country where, for months, Obama has talked about "al-Qaida and its extremist allies," which previously had meant the Taliban.

What the hell is going on?  David Axe, et al, write that:

After nearly a decade at war in Afghanistan, the United States still has not defined the terms of the conflict. Seven months after President Barack Obama's administration released its wide-ranging strategic review of the war, basic questions remain. Who is the enemy? What are the objectives? Is counterinsurgency meant to achieve the goal of counterterrorism (beating al Qaeda), state-building (bringing stability and democracy to Afghanistan), or both? What would "victory" in Afghanistan even look like? And how will the war stay won, after the United States leaves?

How can we not know why we are in Afghanistan after seven years of engagement there?  WTF?