Duckworth delusionally wrong on Afghan troop withdrawal

My senator Tammy Duckworth never met a criminal U.S. war she didn’t love. She extolls her participation in the monstrous Iraq war as regularly as Rudy Giuliani once touted his heroic response to the 911 attacks. As congresswoman and now senator, she’s a staunch proponent of U.S. exceptionalism to maintain our many perpetual wars.

So it’s no surprise she’s out front opposing even meager troop withdrawals from Afghanistan. Her reasoning is a trifecta of lunacy. First, the generals are against it. That ignores civilian control of war policy. When would a general ever support end to their means of power and career advancement? Second, Duckworth claims leaving Afghanistan will get our soldiers killed. How? On the flight home from a war they should never have been sent to fight? Invading Afghanistan twenty years ago got 2,382 U.S. troops killed for nothing. The Taliban didn’t do 911. They could no more have stopped Osama bin Laden than the U.S. government could have stopped the Oklahoma federal building bombing. Third, leaving Afghanistan will endanger our national security. The idea that the Taliban, once they inevitably retake the Afghan government, will set their sights on the homeland is preposterous.

But for war hawk Duckworth, whose war service is fueling a decades long career peddling more endless war, no war hysteria falsehood will go unsaid.