Word: talibanic
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...sentence for assaulting a bank teller. Shortly after arriving in Afghanistan, Sam's plane is shot down and crashes; he and his men are believed dead, and Grace soon gets the awful news. In fact, he and another Marine have been captured by a Taliban group. They are tortured, forced to spill secrets and, at riflepoint, pushed into a life-or-death dilemma. Back home, Tommy has ingratiated himself into the Cahill home. The girls adore him, and Grace starts to see his sweet side. When, to the family's shock, Sam comes back alive, he can feel different emotional...
...downsizing also has its costs. The first is moral. Obama may be right that the U.S. can't vanquish movements like Hizballah and the Taliban or even an embattled regime like Iran's. Legitimizing them, however, will be hard for some Americans to swallow. Already, hawks have slammed Obama for negotiating with Iran's mullahs while the blood of Iranian protesters is still fresh on their hands. And "reconciliation" with the Taliban, while necessary for the U.S.'s eventual withdrawal from Afghanistan, might be a horror show for Afghan women. It is worth noting that while many historians applaud Nixon...
...second problem with Obama's agenda is that although he wants to cut deals with regimes like Iran's and movements like the Taliban, he's not in a particularly strong position to do so. Back in 2002 or 2003, when the U.S. looked almost invincible, the Iranians appeared willing to concede a lot simply to forestall a U.S. attack. Now, with the U.S. mired in Afghanistan and Iraq, they are less afraid and thus less willing to deal. Similarly, the Taliban have little incentive to break with al-Qaeda so long as they feel they're gaining momentum...
...Taliban's local roots, Obama officials suggest, also make it harder to vanquish than al-Qaeda. The implication is that as with Hizballah and Hamas, the U.S.'s only realistic goal is to bring the Taliban into the political process. Despite his decision to send 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan, Obama has abandoned the goal of making the country Taliban-free. For all the attention it has received, the decision about troop levels is essentially tactical: it's an effort to win the military leverage necessary to persuade elements of the Taliban that they're better off in government...
...Downside of Downsizing In general, Obama's bid to shrink the war on terrorism makes sense. Since the U.S. lacks the capacity to eliminate Hizballah, Hamas and the Taliban and since we are probably unable to overthrow the regimes in Syria and Iran, we need to rethink our goals. Many on the American right believe the lesson of the Reagan years is that the U.S. can bludgeon our enemies into submission if only we don't lose our will. But Ronald Reagan didn't bludgeon Mikhail Gorbachev into submission; he seduced him with intensive diplomatic engagement and arms-control agreements...