President Obama rejected comparisons on Monday between the war in Afghanistan and the conflict in Vietnam a generation ago, but he expressed concern about "the dangers of overreach" and pledged a full debate before making further decisions on strategy. The president's comments, in an interview at the White House with The New York Times and CNBC, appeared to be a response to rising unease within his own party in Congress about the possibility of the United States becoming bogged down in Afghanistan.
Asked whether he worried about repeating the fate of President Lyndon B. Johnson, who declined to seek re-election in 1968 as a result of the turmoil over Vietnam, Mr. Obama replied: "You have to learn lessons from history. On the other hand, each historical moment is different. You never step into the same river twice. And so Afghanistan is not Vietnam." But, he added, "The dangers of overreach and not having clear goals and not having strong support from the American people, those are all issues that I think about all the time."
The president promised to weigh the recommendation of the top commander in Afghanistan, Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, on whether the United States should commit more troops. But he took issue with assertions that the job of dismantling terrorism networks can be handled by drones and other alternatives to soldiers on the ground...
More at The New York Times.
Comments
I agree with CPT Wilcox, the President has it right in rejecting comparisons between the war in Afghanistan and the Vietnam conflict. The dangers of overreach are diminished by an historical sensitivity to the lessons learned in Vietnam. A full debate before making further decisions on strategy and maintaining strong support for our efforts in Afghanistan from the American people suggest that there is little comparison between the war in Afghanistan and the conflict in Vietnam.
President Obama is right. The conflict of Afghanistan and that of Vietnam are mutually exclusive. Trying to extrapolate applicable strategies/methodologies from Vietnam to further advances in Afghanistan is overreaching. This does not undercut the lessons learned from Vietnam, however. The basic fundamentals of leadership, the impact of honor and bravery exacted by the soldiers of the Vietnam era serve as important examples for soldiers fighting in both Iraq and Afghanistan. But as Mr. Obama so eloquently conveys, "You have to learn lessons from history. On the other hand, each historical moment is different. You never step into the same river twice. And so Afghanistan is not Vietnam."