Political Quotes

“in the wake of the 9/11 attacks against the United States, I was sent on the ground for a short period of time to Afghanistan. As a Navy admiral, I saw what needed to be accomplished. Eighteen months later, I returned on the ground and saw what had not been done because we tragically changed the focus of our attention and our resources to Iraq. Now, Afghanistan has become once again prey to terrorists and the Taliban have moved back into the southern ungoverned regions and the provinces. Because of this failure to have our legal or political or security structures there that we were trying to support be established, we were unable to have economic activity, the education take root so that we would be able to harness the efforts to have livelihoods established and an infrastructure in place, to overcome what General Eikenberry, our U.S. commander who was the NATO commander earlier last year said, ``Where the road ends, the Taliban begin.'' Secretary of Defense Gates has recently said that we will place 3,000 troops into Afghanistan because of the possible spring offensive of the Taliban. That is too little and way too late. We have to be able to bring the infrastructure into those ungoverned regions so the Taliban once again cannot provide a safe haven for al Qaeda, that is presently in a safe haven because of this tragic misadventure in Iraq, within Pakistan.”