quarta-feira, 9 de dezembro de 2009
Obama recebe o Nobel da Paz (I): o discurso de Praga
Na véspera da cerimónia de entrega do Prémio Nobel da Paz, em Oslo, a Barack Obama, o CASA BRANCA recorda-lhe o discurso de Praga, proferido em Abril passado, e que terá valido ao Presidente dos EUA a conquista desta distinção -- sobretudo pela declaração de querer contribuir para um Mundo sem armas nucleares.
terça-feira, 8 de dezembro de 2009
Com tantos democratas «desalinhados» no Congresso, Nancy Pelosi é figura central para o sucesso de Obama
«The day after President Obama's inauguration, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi described herself as "on a high."
"I am very excited about the prospect of serving as the speaker of the House with President Barack Obama because of the power of his ideas, the strategic thinking that he brings to it and the leadership that he provides to speak to the American people," the California Democrat said.
Obama laid out his agenda for the country and his plan to bring about the change he promised during the campaign. Still glowing from the elections, Pelosi said, "my attitude is to take his lead."
In the 10 months since then, Pelosi has successfully done what she's needed to do to push Obama's agenda through the House -- so much so, that some have asserted she's more effective than the president.
"I think she is a very effective speaker. She can deliver votes. Since 2006, since the Democrats took over, she's consistently been able to unite the Democratic caucus," said Julian Zelizer, a professor of history and public affairs at Princeton University.
Last month, Pelosi cut deals in order to get the Democrats' health care bill passed in the House. She was hands-on in the negotiations, agreeing to a less-robust public option than she originally wanted and allowing a vote on an amendment banning most abortion coverage from the public option. She's also played a key role in getting some of Obama's other priorities through her chamber, including the stimulus bill and the budget.
"Thus far, President Obama -- I think the jury is still out. He doesn't have a huge legislative record, we're still waiting to see what happens with health care. But [Pelosi's] delivered the votes already," Zelizer said.
Pelosi has a longer resume than the president, but it doesn't mean she carries more weight, Zelizer said.
"I don't think she is more powerful than the president; I think she's just been thus far able to deliver the votes that she's responsible for affecting," he said.
Pelosi grew up in a political household. Her father, Thomas D'Alesandro, spent eight years in the U.S. House and was the mayor of Baltimore, Maryland, for another 12. Her brother, Thomas D'Alesandro III, also served as Baltimore mayor from 1967 to 1971.
Throughout the late '70s and '80s, Pelosi held several positions in the California Democratic Party, including state chair from 1981 to 1983. She was first elected to the U.S. House in a June 1987 special election to fill the seat of the late Rep. Sala Burton.
She served on the Appropriations Committee, the Banking and Financial Services Committee, the Committee on Standards of Official Conduct (ethics) and the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence before taking on the role of minority whip, then minority leader.
[Republican critics] have kind of created a caricature of [Pelosi] and made this argument that she's running the show.
For conservative critics, Pelosi has become a vehicle to paint the Democratic Party as left of center, Zelizer said. "And they have kind of created a caricature of her and made this argument that she's running the show and used it," he said.
Some people see a contrast with Pelosi's ability to run the House and cut deals and the president, who "at times seems to be having more difficulty getting the Democrats together around his legislation," Zelizer said.
Pelosi's also dealing with a different beast. She needs only a simple majority to control debate in the House. In the Senate, Majority Leader Harry Reid needs 60 votes. The president, however, needs both the chambers to reach an agreement on legislation before he can sign it into law.
Thus far, former Rep. Victor Fazio said he'd characterize Pelosi and Obama's alliance as "extraordinarily good."
"There is more thinking as a team, more operating as a majority team than simply the presidency and everybody else," said Fazio, who served in the House for 20 years.
The last time there was a Democratic president and a Democratic House speaker was in the beginning of the Clinton administration, when Tom Foley held the speakership. But in those years, the House was more decentralized and much of the power was in the committee chairs, said Fred Beuttler, deputy historian of the House.
Fazio said that while he thought Clinton and Foley were a good pair, Clinton "never really had the kind of personal rapport with Tom Foley that I see between Pelosi and Obama."
Prior to Clinton, the Democrats last held the presidency and the speakership under Jimmy Carter and Tip O'Neill.
Carter ran his campaign against Congress and Washington and almost went out of his way to snub the speaker, Beuttler said. "That was where the personal relationships really damaged the national agenda."
Fazio recalled a lack of respect between Carter and the speaker. O'Neill referred to Chief of Staff Hamilton Jordan as "Hannibal Jerkin," he said.
Pelosi, however, has a close relationship with Obama's chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel. Emanuel served in the House from 2003 until 2009, when he joined the Obama administration. Pelosi's ties to Emanuel, Fazio said, made it "that much easier to work with the White House."
While Pelosi and Obama don't agree on everything, overall, they have similar agendas.
"I think they understand history very well -- that if the speaker of the House and the president, when they are of the same party, aren't on the same page, then it's very difficult to get things done," Beuttler said, likening their relationship to that of President George W. Bush and Speaker Dennis Hastert.
Hastert rounded up the votes Bush needed and largely able to keep the Republicans together behind Bush's policies during his first term.
But Pelosi and Obama are only a year into their relationship, and there could be potential tension over issues like joblessness or Afghanistan, Zelizer said.
"As midterms are closer or are taking place, if [the Afghanistan] war is deteriorating, if there is no sign of progress, I do think you could have open fighting between the administration and the speaker," he said.
Shortly before Obama announced plans to send more troops to Afghanistan, Pelosi said there was "serious unrest" in her caucus over the cost of the war.
As with Vietnam, there could be funding battles down the road. "During Vietnam it was Democrats fighting against Democrats. It wasn't one party against the other. You could have that again," Zelizer said.
As rough patches come along, Zelizer said it will be important for Obama to continue to nurture the relationship with Pelosi.
"The president is more prominent and has more power, but in the end, every president depends on their legislative allies and the speaker of the House and the Senate majority leaders are the focal points for Democrats in Congress and I think he needs to be careful that the divisions don't grow too severe," he said.»
in CNNpolitics.com
'Frayed Nerves, Short Tempers'
Um artigo de George Will, na Newsweek:
«An adolescent asked Mozart how to compose symphonies. Mozart said that because the lad was so young, perhaps he should begin composing ballads. "But," the young man objected, "you wrote symphonies when you were only 10 years old." Mozart replied: "But I didn't have to ask how."
This week the man who may fancy himself the Mozart of American politics—a prodigy—flies to Oslo to deliver an acceptance speech worthy of the Nobel Peace Prize that he has been awarded in recognition of the magnificence of his speeches. Later Barack Obama will go to Copenhagen, where in October he delivered a speech urging the Olympic Committee to award Chicago the 2016 games. Oh, well.
This time in Copenhagen, at the 192-nation summit on climate change, he must explain an inconvenient fact: Since he won the presidency promising to stop the rise of the oceans, there has been a substantial decline in American support for the global-warming catechism, which proclaims that warming is (a) a big deal and (b) substantially America's fault. Americans have noticed that, judging by the words and deeds of the president and of the Congress his party controls, global warming is (a) an imminent threat to the planet but (b) not as urgent a concern as health-care reform.
Something that Obama said in October was a really big deal was Iran's dusty semi-acceptance of ambiguous future restraints on its processing of enriched uranium. Obama's policy of "engagement" was paying off. Well, not exactly. To the surprise of no one who did not doze through the last decade, Iran immediately backed away from its faux commitment. Then in November, Mohamed ElBaradei, the pathologically optimistic head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, at last admitted that his attempts to pierce the veil of Iran's nuclear program had "reached a dead end." One day later, the IAEA "censured" Iran for failing to play nicely with others. Two days after that, Iran announced plans for 10 more uranium enrichment plants. The Obama administration admonishes Iran that the clock is ticking. Clocks do indeed do that, but Iran seems unimpressed.
In NATO's infancy, a military man said the purpose of the alliance was to protect Western Europe—"to keep the Russians out, the Americans in, and the Germans down." Today NATO is fighting its first war in Afghanistan. (The only territory of a NATO nation invaded since 1949? Britain's Falkland Islands, in 1982.)
The publics of the NATO nations are (a) unstinting in their adoration of Obama and (b) parsimonious with their support for the war in Afghanistan. Will other NATO nations send more troops than the Canadians, Dutch, and perhaps Germans are going to withdraw? For that matter, will even half of Speaker Nancy Pelosi's House Democratic Caucus support Obama's Afghanistan surge?
America's nerves are frayed and tempers are short. The country is uneasy, even queasy, because Obama and Congress seem to be dashing through an ambitious agenda in a slapdash manner. Their haste reflects a hubris that prevents them from acknowledging that they do not know how to do all that they are attempting. Consider the exasperation of Lamar Alexander.
A Tennessee Republican of mild mien, Alexander is a former governor and former president of the University of Tennessee. For seven years in the Senate he has been a model of the moderate Republicanism that is, we are mournfully told by the Republican Party's non-Republican moral auditors, as valuable as it is scarce. So it was noteworthy that he recently had this to say about Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's proposed health-care legislation:
"This bill is historic in its arrogance—arrogance that we in Congress are wise enough to take this complex health system, that is 17 percent of our economy and serves 300 million Americans, and think we can write a 2,000-page bill and change it all…c It's arrogant to dump 15 million low-income Americans into a medical ghetto called Medicaid that none of us or any of our families would ever want to join."
Alexander is not the only temperate person who is being driven to distraction by the sense that whirl is now king in Washington. And by the worry that the people driving the pell-mell agenda will not pause to ask how to do all of it, because they fear that the answer is: You can't.»
segunda-feira, 7 de dezembro de 2009
Obama e os generais
Um artigo de David Rogers, no POLITICO.com:
«Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the U.S. commander in Afghanistan, goes before Congress this week, and with him comes this question: Who’s really in charge here, the generals or President Barack Obama?
The long-awaited hearings, beginning Tuesday before the House and Senate Armed Services committees, are a bookend of sorts to Obama’s address last Tuesday at West Point committing 30,000 more troops to the war effort in Afghanistan. Implicit in the president’s decision is an effective cap of about 100,000 for the American force, but top Democrats fear that unless Obama is more assertive, the military chain of command will undermine his July 2011 target to begin some U.S. withdrawal.
“The president’s decision is already being softened and made mush of,” Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin (D-Mich.) told POLITICO. And within the House and Senate Appropriations committees, senior Democrats — themselves veterans of past wars — have grown increasingly concerned by the political clout of a generation of younger, often press-savvy military commanders.
McChrystal and his strong ally, Gen. David Petraeus, commander of the U.S. Central Command, are quotable stars in today’s modern media; their wartime budgets not only are large but also give them exceptional discretion that is the envy of their foreign policy partners in the State Department.
The September leak of McChrystal’s confidential report on the need for more troops helped box in Obama and quickly became grist for the Republican political mill. Even before that, Rep. John Murtha (D-Pa.), chairman of the House defense appropriations panel, complained of what he saw as a pattern of news reports from the military in Afghanistan promoting a buildup. And while Obama has a retired general of his own in National Security Adviser Jim Jones, the 65-year-old Marine four-star has not been the counterweight that many of his admirers had predicted.
“I’ve always believed that the president of the United States is the commander in chief,” said Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii), who was awarded the Medal of Honor in World War II. “It concerns me when I see my president, the commander in chief, having to debate with generals. They can do that privately, but he should be able to say to General A, ‘This is the way we’re going to do our business.’ ... I would expect generals to advise the president but not to go public.”
The U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan, retired Lt. Gen. Karl Eikenberry — whose own cables critical of a military buildup were leaked in November — appears alongside McChrystal this week. And having them side by side underscores the need for greater clarity and cooperation going forward.
“The pace [of withdrawal] is condition-based. The location is condition-based. But what wasn’t condition-based is the beginning,” Levin said of the July 2011 date. “I want to see if McChrystal says, yes, he understands that.”
“Second, does he support it? He’s not obligated to. I’m asking for his honest personal opinion. If he has a different opinion, he should tell us. He’s obligated to tell us. ... Their advice should be private, ... with the one caveat [that] if they are asked by a congressional committee for their best professional opinion, they are duty bound to give it to us.”
For all the tensions, independent observers say the driving force behind Obama’s decision was the deteriorating security situation in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and Jones couldn’t be expected to stand down the military. “Our system is a dialectical one. Countering forces produce a ‘synthesis,’” said one Washington veteran of past war debates. But much will rest now on Defense Secretary Robert Gates to make the decision stick — and be a bridge between the uniformed military and White House.
Together with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Gates dominated House and Senate hearings last week on the president’s decision, and the two were prominent on Sunday morning new shows, as well.
July 2011 is “the beginning of a process,” Gates told NBC News’s “Meet the Press” and one that he estimated could run three to four years past that date. “We will begin to thin our forces and begin to bring them home. But the pace of that ... will depend on circumstances on the ground. And those judgments will be made by our commanders in the field.”
Just as important, in Senate testimony last week, Gates said what has been left unsaid by others: that the military establishment agrees no more troops will be requested beyond the current planned surge.
This came in a little-noticed exchange in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, where Gates first spelled out that he has been given the discretion to add 3,000 support personnel beyond the combat brigades, bringing the so-called surge component to potentially 33,000.
“You have no doubt that we will not be adding more troops to Afghanistan after this deployment, outside of the 3,000 potentially that you have may have to add?” asked Sen. Ted Kaufman (D-Del.).
“That is the commitment that we have made to the president,” Gates said.
That Kaufman pursued this question was not entirely surprising: His former boss, Vice President Joe Biden, was among those most leery of McChrystal’s initial troop request. But it also shows how much the administration, beginning with the president, wants to beat down any comparisons to the steady escalation of troops committed to Vietnam in the ’60s.
“So this is not like ... comparisons to Vietnam. This is not even like Iraq,” Kaufman said in reply to Gates. “This is a firm commitment by the president of the United States, agreed by the major foreign policy strategic planners in our government, that in July 2011 we’re going to start drawing down troops and we’re not going to be adding more troops.”
To be sure, implementing that decision — like Vietnam — is easier said than done, and one of the ironies of the debate thus far is that while the administration keeps saying this isn’t Vietnam, they keep talking about it.
In explaining the “unholy alliance” of Al Qaeda and Taliban forces, Gates suddenly felt compelled to double-back and say he wasn’t restating a new domino theory — made famous by Lyndon B. Johnson’s insistence that the U.S. would be fighting on “the beaches of Waikiki” if Vietnam fell to the communists. Clinton herself spoke of “Afghanization” — echoing then-President Richard Nixon’s “Vietnamization” policy in 1969. And in the long press accounts Sunday of their own decision making, White House aides — many of whom grew up after Vietnam — made a point that they’d gone back and read Gordon Goldstein’s 2008 “Lessons in Disaster” on McGeorge Bundy, a key adviser to both John F. Kennedy and Johnson on the Indochina war.
In truth, there’s nothing about the U.S. involvement in Afghanistan thus far that matches the murderous killing in Vietnam — and nothing quite like North Vietnam itself, which was able to send large, even mechanized, forces into the South to support insurgent guerrillas.
But the presence of porous borders, the challenge of building and partnering with the Afghan security forces and the large costs to the American taxpayer are all real — and similar to Vietnam.
Most focus has been on the immediate cost of the added troops this year and a forthcoming supplemental spending bill that could approach $40 billion, when added funds for the State Department’s “civilian surge” are added. But this is only a first payment, and given Gates’s and Clinton’s answers, the increased commitment knocks a far larger hole in Obama’s budget.
Until now, the administration has estimated it could get through fiscal 2010, ending next Sept. 30, with $130 billion for overseas contingency funds for Iraq and Afghanistan. From 2011 through 2014, it predicted it would need only $50 billion annually since the pace of the U.S. withdrawal from Iraq is to accelerate over the coming year.
In fact, these numbers will clearly be inadequate, and in 2011 alone, whatever happens in July that year, the war-related costs will be double, if not triple, what’s projected.
Perhaps the most difficult challenge for McChrystal in this same period is the planned buildup of Afghan forces, who must be prepared to begin taking over territory from McChrystal’s troops in 18 months. In this case, both he and Obama are paying a huge price for the lack of investment under the Bush administration, and the U.S. must run at almost double-time pace to catch up with where it wants to be.
Gates has testified that the goal is to have an Afghan army of 170,000 by July 2011, but Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told senators that only about 98,000 Afghan troops are trained to date, and many of them are not yet in the field.
In a year’s time, the goal is to have this number at 134,000, but the lack of Afghan partners poses a more immediate challenge in deciding where the U.S. can now best target its own military operations against Taliban strongholds in the Kandahar and Helmand regions.
How long can the U.S. hold an area — without Afghan partners — and not appear to be an occupying force to villagers most affected? It’s a decision for McChrystal in the field but also one that has to be watched closely for Obama, now that this is his war, as well.
“He’s got to be very, very much on top of the type of missions and the way in which these troops are deployed,” Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman John Kerry (D-Mass.) told POLITICO. “It’s clear to me that there are limitations. We should not be going in, clearing and holding areas where we don’t have the ability to come in immediately with Afghans.”
“If we don’t, we’re going to be digging ourselves a hole,” he said. “[Obama] has to very careful not to allow that to happen.”»
quinta-feira, 3 de dezembro de 2009
Afeganistão: análise à decisão de Obama
Texto publicado no «Histórias da Casa Branca», no site de A Bola:
A jogada mais arriscada de Barack
Por Germano Almeida
Terá sido o momento mais difícil desde que Barack Obama prestou juramento como 44.º Presidente dos Estados Unidos. O discurso feito na Academia de West Point, perante uma plateia repleta de militares, confirmou a decisão de enviar mais 30 mil soldados americanos para o Afeganistão.
Para a ala mais esquerdista do Partido Democrata, foi uma desilusão. Para uma boa fatia dos congressistas republicanos, foi uma boa surpresa. E ficou claro, para quem ainda tinha dúvida, que Barack Obama está longe de ser o «Presidente mais à esquerda» das últimas décadas como, precipitadamente, muitos conservadores o rotularam. Obama provou ser um Presidente que não tem medo de desagradar à sua principal base de apoio (os democratas moderados), se a força das circunstâncias assim o exigirem.
Em contrapartida, Obama recebeu elogios de uma parte do universo republicano, pela primeira vez desde que chegou à Casa Branca. Num focus group preparado pelo site da CNN, entre eleitores da Virgínia (estado tradicionalmente conservador, mas que votou Obama na última eleição presidencial), os republicanos mostraram-se mais agradados com o discurso de West Point do que os democratas. «Votei em McCain, mas gostei do que ouvi de Obama, esta noite. Senti-o como o Presidente que está a defender a América», observou Linda Burnett, eleitora republicana.
Alta tensão
Foi um Obama de expressão dura e reflexiva, que adoptou o tom «presidencial» em versão mais séria, longe do registo de «esperança» e «mudança» que dominou as suas intervenções na campanha. Mas essa é uma das facetas que o tornam um Presidente singular: em diferentes palcos, Barack assume diferentes registos – e a alta tensão que este momento implicava exigia fez com que Obama tivesse sempre em mente que estava a anunciar uma decisão que obrigará 30 mil jovens americanos a arriscar a vida.
Depois de três meses de consultas exaustivas, em que ouviu os seus conselheiros de segurança e as mais altas patentes militares americanas, Obama tomou uma decisão que, numa primeira análise, responde aos pedidos do general Stanley McChrystal, comandante das forças militares americanas e da NATO em Cabul, que apontaram a urgência de receber um reforço de 40 a 60 mil soldados, para poder estancar o avanço dos taliban.
Antes de tomar a decisão final, Obama quis saber todos os cenários: o que pode acontecer se o Paquistão for dominado pelos taliban? Que custos teria um prolongamento da presença militar americano para lá de 2012?
Na primeira fila da plateia, em West Point, estavam Hillary Clinton e Robert Gates, os secretários de Estado e da Defesa – mas não o vice-presidente Joe Biden.
Hillary e Gates foram mostrando sinais, nas últimas semanas, de serem sensíveis aos apelos de McChrystal. E Hillary terá insistido, junto do Presidente, no problema do Paquistão, perante dados alarmantes sobre a vulnerabilidade das instituições de poder em Islamabad em relação à ameaça taliban. Já Joe Biden, saiu politicamente fragilizado: foi o maior opositor deste reforço militar e chegou mesmo a advogar uma mudança para uma estratégia de «contraterrorismo», que acabou por não vingar.
«Não será um novo Vietname»
O reforço de 30 mil homens parece mostrar que Obama não quis enveredar pela margem superior dos pedidos dos generais no terreno. A preocupação de evitar uma «escalada militar» parece óbvia, mas o número decretado pode também significar outra coisa: a responsabilização dos aliados dos EUA num problema que afecta todo o Mundo – e não só a América.
Foi, sem dúvida, uma risky move, com resultados imprevisíveis: reforçar agora para poder retirar daqui a ano e meio. Obama fez questão de recordar que «a América não escolheu esta guerra – foi por ter sido atacada no 11 de Setembro que teve que responder.»
Nesse aspecto, Barack tinha créditos que usou em West Point: sempre falou do Afeganistão como «uma guerra necessária», contrapondo-a ao Iraque, que rotulou, certeiramente, como «uma guerra estúpida».
Associando esta decisão à necessidade de «continuar a lutar pela segurança interna da América», Obama lembrou que «os autores do 11 de Setembro preparam-se nas montanhas do Afeganistão, não no Iraque».
Este argumento colheu em sectores que, habitualmente, não apoiam o Presidente. Falta saber se será digerido pelo grosso do Partido Democrata.
Sobre o espectro, que vai crescendo, de «um novo Vietname», Barack fez questão de diferenciar: «Há muitas diferenças. No Vietname, estávamos sozinhos e agora temos uma coligação composta por 43 países. No Vietname, havia uma forte insurgência popular, no Afeganistão defrontamos grupos terroristas e não a população.»
A jogada é muito arriscada, mas terá que dar certo, se Obama quiser ser reeleito: reforçar agora as zonas urbanas, para que o plano de McChrystal possa mesmo impedir que os taliban dominem núcleos fundamentais de poder no Afeganistão, na fronteira com o Paquistão e no Vale do Swat; estancada a ferida, a retirada começa em Julho de 2011, para que os EUA saiam do Afeganistão até ao início de 2013.
Para uma guerra que já dura há oito anos, é, no mínimo, uma estratégia ambiciosa. No mesmo lance, Obama agradou aos meios militares (mais apoiados pelos conservadores) e lançou expectativas à ala esquerda, apontando uma data para o fim da guerra.
Desilusão e apoio
Russ Feingold, senador democrata que integra o Comité de Relações Externas, está frontalmente contra esta «escalada de tropas americanas no Afeganistão». «É um erro que podemos vir a pagar caro», avisa o influente senador, eleito pelo Wisconsin.
Charles Krauthammer, colunista do Washington Post e vencedor do Prémio Pulitzer, foi ainda mais crítico para com a decisão do Presidente: «Foi um discurso defensivo e um pouco estranho. Basicamente, ele repete a surge feita no Iraque em 2007. Mas não aponta os detalhes com que espera conseguir sair do Afeganistão daqui a ano e meio. Se não fossem os planos dos generais Stanley McChrystal e David Petraeus, não seria pelo Presidente que saberíamos o que a América pretende fazer lá».
Mas nem todas as reacções foram negativas. David Ignatius, no Washington Post, observou: «Obama tomou a decisão certa. A única forma viável de sair do Afeganistão é reforçar primeiro e retirar depois. De forma faseada e planeada».
Ninguém disse que isto ia ser fácil.
Allan Katz nomeado embaixador em Lisboa
Allan Katz, advogado da Akerman Senterfitt e 'lobbysta' de Tallahasse, financiador do Partido Democrata na Florida, foi nomeado pela Administração Obama como novo Embaixador dos Estados Unidos em Portugal.
Foi conselheiro dos congressitas democratas David Obey e Bill Gunter e é formado em Direito pela Washington College of Law.
Terá, ainda, que ser confirmado pelo Comité de Relações Externas do Senado e deverá iniciar funções no início de 2010. Sucede no cargo a Thomas Stephenson, que tinha sido nomeado pelo ex-Presidente Bush.
Foi conselheiro dos congressitas democratas David Obey e Bill Gunter e é formado em Direito pela Washington College of Law.
Terá, ainda, que ser confirmado pelo Comité de Relações Externas do Senado e deverá iniciar funções no início de 2010. Sucede no cargo a Thomas Stephenson, que tinha sido nomeado pelo ex-Presidente Bush.
quarta-feira, 2 de dezembro de 2009
Afeganistão: McCain considera que é um «erro apontar data para a retirada»
... mas mostra-se apoiante, no essencial, da decisão do Presidente Obama
O discurso completo de Barack Obama em West Point
«The Way Forward in Afghanistan and Pakistan
By Barack Obama
United States Military Academy at West Point
Good evening. To the United States Corps of Cadets, to the men and women of our armed services, and to my fellow Americans: I want to speak to you tonight about our effort in Afghanistan - the nature of our commitment there, the scope of our interests, and the strategy that my Administration will pursue to bring this war to a successful conclusion. It is an honor for me to do so here - at West Point - where so many men and women have prepared to stand up for our security, and to represent what is finest about our country.
To address these issues, it is important to recall why America and our allies were compelled to fight a war in Afghanistan in the first place. We did not ask for this fight. On September 11, 2001, nineteen men hijacked four airplanes and used them to murder nearly 3,000 people. They struck at our military and economic nerve centers. They took the lives of innocent men, women, and children without regard to their faith or race or station. Were it not for the heroic actions of the passengers on board one of those flights, they could have also struck at one of the great symbols of our democracy in Washington, and killed many more.
As we know, these men belonged to al Qaeda - a group of extremists who have distorted and defiled Islam, one of the world's great religions, to justify the slaughter of innocents. Al Qaeda's base of operations was in Afghanistan, where they were harbored by the Taliban - a ruthless, repressive and radical movement that seized control of that country after it was ravaged by years of Soviet occupation and civil war, and after the attention of America and our friends had turned elsewhere.
Just days after 9/11, Congress authorized the use of force against al Qaeda and those who harbored them - an authorization that continues to this day. The vote in the Senate was 98 to 0. The vote in the House was 420 to 1. For the first time in its history, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization invoked Article 5 - the commitment that says an attack on one member nation is an attack on all. And the United Nations Security Council endorsed the use of all necessary steps to respond to the 9/11 attacks. America, our allies and the world were acting as one to destroy al Qaeda's terrorist network, and to protect our common security.
Under the banner of this domestic unity and international legitimacy - and only after the Taliban refused to turn over Osama bin Laden - we sent our troops into Afghanistan. Within a matter of months, al Qaeda was scattered and many of its operatives were killed. The Taliban was driven from power and pushed back on its heels. A place that had known decades of fear now had reason to hope. At a conference convened by the UN, a provisional government was established under President Hamid Karzai. And an International Security Assistance Force was established to help bring a lasting peace to a war-torn country.
Then, in early 2003, the decision was made to wage a second war in Iraq. The wrenching debate over the Iraq War is well-known and need not be repeated here. It is enough to say that for the next six years, the Iraq War drew the dominant share of our troops, our resources, our diplomacy, and our national attention - and that the decision to go into Iraq caused substantial rifts between America and much of the world.
Today, after extraordinary costs, we are bringing the Iraq war to a responsible end. We will remove our combat brigades from Iraq by the end of next summer, and all of our troops by the end of 2011. That we are doing so is a testament to the character of our men and women in uniform. Thanks to their courage, grit and perseverance , we have given Iraqis a chance to shape their future, and we are successfully leaving Iraq to its people.
But while we have achieved hard-earned milestones in Iraq, the situation in Afghanistan has deteriorated. After escaping across the border into Pakistan in 2001 and 2002, al Qaeda's leadership established a safe-haven there. Although a legitimate government was elected by the Afghan people, it has been hampered by corruption, the drug trade, an under-developed economy, and insufficient Security Forces. Over the last several years, the Taliban has maintained common cause with al Qaeda, as they both seek an overthrow of the Afghan government. Gradually, the Taliban has begun to take control over swaths of Afghanistan, while engaging in increasingly brazen and devastating acts of terrorism against the Pakistani people.
Throughout this period, our troop levels in Afghanistan remained a fraction of what they were in Iraq. When I took office, we had just over 32,000 Americans serving in Afghanistan, compared to 160,000 in Iraq at the peak of the war. Commanders in Afghanistan repeatedly asked for support to deal with the reemergence of the Taliban, but these reinforcements did not arrive. That's why, shortly after taking office, I approved a long-standing request for more troops. After consultations with our allies, I then announced a strategy recognizing the fundamental connection between our war effort in Afghanistan, and the extremist safe-havens in Pakistan. I set a goal that was narrowly defined as disrupting, dismantling, and defeating al Qaeda and its extremist allies, and pledged to better coordinate our military and civilian effort.
Since then, we have made progress on some important objectives. High-ranking al Qaeda and Taliban leaders have been killed, and we have stepped up the pressure on al Qaeda world-wide. In Pakistan, that nation's Army has gone on its largest offensive in years. In Afghanistan, we and our allies prevented the Taliban from stopping a presidential election, and - although it was marred by fraud - that election produced a government that is consistent with Afghanistan's laws and Constitution.
Yet huge challenges remain. Afghanistan is not lost, but for several years it has moved backwards. There is no imminent threat of the government being overthrown, but the Taliban has gained momentum. Al Qaeda has not reemerged in Afghanistan in the same numbers as before 9/11, but they retain their safe-havens along the border. And our forces lack the full support they need to effectively train and partner with Afghan Security Forces and better secure the population. Our new Commander in Afghanistan - General McChrystal - has reported that the security situation is more serious than he anticipated. In short: the status quo is not sustainable.
As cadets, you volunteered for service during this time of danger. Some of you have fought in Afghanistan. Many will deploy there. As your Commander-in-Chief, I owe you a mission that is clearly defined, and worthy of your service. That is why, after the Afghan voting was completed, I insisted on a thorough review of our strategy. Let me be clear: there has never been an option before me that called for troop deployments before 2010, so there has been no delay or denial of resources necessary for the conduct of the war. Instead, the review has allowed me ask the hard questions, and to explore all of the different options along with my national security team, our military and civilian leadership in Afghanistan, and with our key partners. Given the stakes involved, I owed the American people - and our troops - no less.
This review is now complete. And as Commander-in-Chief, I have determined that it is in our vital national interest to send an additional 30,000 U.S. troops to Afghanistan. After 18 months, our troops will begin to come home. These are the resources that we need to seize the initiative, while building the Afghan capacity that can allow for a responsible transition of our forces out of Afghanistan.
I do not make this decision lightly. I opposed the war in Iraq precisely because I believe that we must exercise restraint in the use of military force, and always consider the long-term consequences of our actions. We have been at war for eight years, at enormous cost in lives and resources. Years of debate over Iraq and terrorism have left our unity on national security issues in tatters, and created a highly polarized and partisan backdrop for this effort. And having just experienced the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, the American people are understandably focused on rebuilding our economy and putting people to work here at home.
Most of all, I know that this decision asks even more of you - a military that, along with your families, has already borne the heaviest of all burdens. As President, I have signed a letter of condolence to the family of each American who gives their life in these wars. I have read the letters from the parents and spouses of those who deployed. I have visited our courageous wounded warriors at Walter Reed. I have travelled to Dover to meet the flag-draped caskets of 18 Americans returning home to their final resting place. I see firsthand the terrible wages of war. If I did not think that the security of the United States and the safety of the American people were at stake in Afghanistan, I would gladly order every single one of our troops home tomorrow.
So no - I do not make this decision lightly. I make this decision because I am convinced that our security is at stake in Afghanistan and Pakistan. This is the epicenter of the violent extremism practiced by al Qaeda. It is from here that we were attacked on 9/11, and it is from here that new attacks are being plotted as I speak. This is no idle danger; no hypothetical threat. In the last few months alone, we have apprehended extremists within our borders who were sent here from the border region of Afghanistan and Pakistan to commit new acts of terror. This danger will only grow if the region slides backwards, and al Qaeda can operate with impunity. We must keep the pressure on al Qaeda, and to do that, we must increase the stability and capacity of our partners in the region.
Of course, this burden is not ours alone to bear. This is not just America's war. Since 9/11, al Qaeda's safe-havens have been the source of attacks against London and Amman and Bali. The people and governments of both Afghanistan and Pakistan are endangered. And the stakes are even higher within a nuclear-armed Pakistan, because we know that al Qaeda and other extremists seek nuclear weapons, and we have every reason to believe that they would use them.
These facts compel us to act along with our friends and allies. Our overarching goal remains the same: to disrupt, dismantle, and defeat al Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and to prevent its capacity to threaten America and our allies in the future.
To meet that goal, we will pursue the following objectives within Afghanistan. We must deny al Qaeda a safe-haven. We must reverse the Taliban's momentum and deny it the ability to overthrow the government. And we must strengthen the capacity of Afghanistan's Security Forces and government, so that they can take lead responsibility for Afghanistan's future.
We will meet these objectives in three ways. First, we will pursue a military strategy that will break the Taliban's momentum and increase Afghanistan's capacity over the next 18 months.
The 30,000 additional troops that I am announcing tonight will deploy in the first part of 2010 - the fastest pace possible - so that they can target the insurgency and secure key population centers. They will increase our ability to train competent Afghan Security Forces, and to partner with them so that more Afghans can get into the fight. And they will help create the conditions for the United States to transfer responsibility to the Afghans.
Because this is an international effort, I have asked that our commitment be joined by contributions from our allies. Some have already provided additional troops, and we are confident that there will be further contributions in the days and weeks ahead. Our friends have fought and bled and died alongside us in Afghanistan. Now, we must come together to end this war successfully. For what's at stake is not simply a test of NATO's credibility - what's at stake is the security of our Allies, and the common security of the world.
Taken together, these additional American and international troops will allow us to accelerate handing over responsibility to Afghan forces, and allow us to begin the transfer of our forces out of Afghanistan in July of 2011. Just as we have done in Iraq, we will execute this transition responsibly, taking into account conditions on the ground. We will continue to advise and assist Afghanistan's Security Forces to ensure that they can succeed over the long haul. But it will be clear to the Afghan government - and, more importantly, to the Afghan people - that they will ultimately be responsible for their own country.
Second, we will work with our partners, the UN, and the Afghan people to pursue a more effective civilian strategy, so that the government can take advantage of improved security.
This effort must be based on performance. The days of providing a blank check are over. President Karzai's inauguration speech sent the right message about moving in a new direction. And going forward, we will be clear about what we expect from those who receive our assistance. We will support Afghan Ministries, Governors, and local leaders that combat corruption and deliver for the people. We expect those who are ineffective or corrupt to be held accountable. And we will also focus our assistance in areas - such as agriculture - that can make an immediate impact in the lives of the Afghan people.
The people of Afghanistan have endured violence for decades. They have been confronted with occupation - by the Soviet Union, and then by foreign al Qaeda fighters who used Afghan land for their own purposes. So tonight, I want the Afghan people to understand - America seeks an end to this era of war and suffering. We have no interest in occupying your country. We will support efforts by the Afghan government to open the door to those Taliban who abandon violence and respect the human rights of their fellow citizens. And we will seek a partnership with Afghanistan grounded in mutual respect - to isolate those who destroy; to strengthen those who build; to hasten the day when our troops will leave; and to forge a lasting friendship in which America is your partner, and never your patron.
Third, we will act with the full recognition that our success in Afghanistan is inextricably linked to our partnership with Pakistan.
We are in Afghanistan to prevent a cancer from once again spreading through that country. But this same cancer has also taken root in the border region of Pakistan. That is why we need a strategy that works on both sides of the border.
In the past, there have been those in Pakistan who have argued that the struggle against extremism is not their fight, and that Pakistan is better off doing little or seeking accommodation with those who use violence. But in recent years, as innocents have been killed from Karachi to Islamabad, it has become clear that it is the Pakistani people who are the most endangered by extremism. Public opinion has turned. The Pakistani Army has waged an offensive in Swat and South Waziristan. And there is no doubt that the United States and Pakistan share a common enemy.
In the past, we too often defined our relationship with Pakistan narrowly. Those days are over. Moving forward, we are committed to a partnership with Pakistan that is built on a foundation of mutual interests, mutual respect, and mutual trust. We will strengthen Pakistan's capacity to target those groups that threaten our countries, and have made it clear that we cannot tolerate a safe-haven for terrorists whose location is known, and whose intentions are clear. America is also providing substantial resources to support Pakistan's democracy and development. We are the largest international supporter for those Pakistanis displaced by the fighting. And going forward, the Pakistani people must know: America will remain a strong supporter of Pakistan's security and prosperity long after the guns have fallen silent, so that the great potential of its people can be unleashed.
These are the three core elements of our strategy: a military effort to create the conditions for a transition; a civilian surge that reinforces positive action; and an effective partnership with Pakistan.
I recognize that there are a range of concerns about our approach. So let me briefly address a few of the prominent arguments that I have heard, and which I take very seriously.
First, there are those who suggest that Afghanistan is another Vietnam. They argue that it cannot be stabilized, and we are better off cutting our losses and rapidly withdrawing. Yet this argument depends upon a false reading of history. Unlike Vietnam, we are joined by a broad coalition of 43 nations that recognizes the legitimacy of our action. Unlike Vietnam, we are not facing a broad-based popular insurgency. And most importantly, unlike Vietnam, the American people were viciously attacked from Afghanistan, and remain a target for those same extremists who are plotting along its border. To abandon this area now - and to rely only on efforts against al Qaeda from a distance - would significantly hamper our ability to keep the pressure on al Qaeda, and create an unacceptable risk of additional attacks on our homeland and our allies.
Second, there are those who acknowledge that we cannot leave Afghanistan in its current state, but suggest that we go forward with the troops that we have. But this would simply maintain a status quo in which we muddle through, and permit a slow deterioration of conditions there. It would ultimately prove more costly and prolong our stay in Afghanistan, because we would never be able to generate the conditions needed to train Afghan Security Forces and give them the space to take over.
Finally, there are those who oppose identifying a timeframe for our transition to Afghan responsibility. Indeed, some call for a more dramatic and open-ended escalation of our war effort - one that would commit us to a nation building project of up to a decade. I reject this course because it sets goals that are beyond what we can achieve at a reasonable cost, and what we need to achieve to secure our interests. Furthermore, the absence of a timeframe for transition would deny us any sense of urgency in working with the Afghan government. It must be clear that Afghans will have to take responsibility for their security, and that America has no interest in fighting an endless war in Afghanistan.
As President, I refuse to set goals that go beyond our responsibility, our means, our or interests. And I must weigh all of the challenges that our nation faces. I do not have the luxury of committing to just one. Indeed, I am mindful of the words of President Eisenhower, who - in discussing our national security - said, "Each proposal must be weighed in the light of a broader consideration: the need to maintain balance in and among national programs."
Over the past several years, we have lost that balance, and failed to appreciate the connection between our national security and our economy. In the wake of an economic crisis, too many of our friends and neighbors are out of work and struggle to pay the bills, and too many Americans are worried about the future facing our children. Meanwhile, competition within the global economy has grown more fierce. So we simply cannot afford to ignore the price of these wars.
All told, by the time I took office the cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan approached a trillion dollars. Going forward, I am committed to addressing these costs openly and honestly. Our new approach in Afghanistan is likely to cost us roughly 30 billion dollars for the military this year, and I will work closely with Congress to address these costs as we work to bring down our deficit.
But as we end the war in Iraq and transition to Afghan responsibility, we must rebuild our strength here at home. Our prosperity provides a foundation for our power. It pays for our military. It underwrites our diplomacy. It taps the potential of our people, and allows investment in new industry. And it will allow us to compete in this century as successfully as we did in the last. That is why our troop commitment in Afghanistan cannot be open-ended - because the nation that I am most interested in building is our own.
Let me be clear: none of this will be easy. The struggle against violent extremism will not be finished quickly, and it extends well beyond Afghanistan and Pakistan. It will be an enduring test of our free society, and our leadership in the world. And unlike the great power conflicts and clear lines of division that defined the 20th century, our effort will involve disorderly regions and diffuse enemies.
So as a result, America will have to show our strength in the way that we end wars and prevent conflict. We will have to be nimble and precise in our use of military power. Where al Qaeda and its allies attempt to establish a foothold - whether in Somalia or Yemen or elsewhere - they must be confronted by growing pressure and strong partnerships.
And we cannot count on military might alone. We have to invest in our homeland security, because we cannot capture or kill every violent extremist abroad. We have to improve and better coordinate our intelligence, so that we stay one step ahead of shadowy networks.
We will have to take away the tools of mass destruction. That is why I have made it a central pillar of my foreign policy to secure loose nuclear materials from terrorists; to stop the spread of nuclear weapons; and to pursue the goal of a world without them. Because every nation must understand that true security will never come from an endless race for ever-more destructive weapons - true security will come for those who reject them.
We will have to use diplomacy, because no one nation can meet the challenges of an interconnected world acting alone. I have spent this year renewing our alliances and forging new partnerships. And we have forged a new beginning between America and the Muslim World - one that recognizes our mutual interest in breaking a cycle of conflict, and that promises a future in which those who kill innocents are isolated by those who stand up for peace and prosperity and human dignity.
Finally, we must draw on the strength of our values - for the challenges that we face may have changed, but the things that we believe in must not. That is why we must promote our values by living them at home - which is why I have prohibited torture and will close the prison at Guantanamo Bay. And we must make it clear to every man, woman and child around the world who lives under the dark cloud of tyranny that America will speak out on behalf of their human rights, and tend to the light of freedom, and justice, and opportunity, and respect for the dignity of all peoples. That is who we are. That is the moral source of America's authority.
Since the days of Franklin Roosevelt, and the service and sacrifice of our grandparents, our country has borne a special burden in global affairs. We have spilled American blood in many countries on multiple continents. We have spent our revenue to help others rebuild from rubble and develop their own economies. We have joined with others to develop an architecture of institutions - from the United Nations to NATO to the World Bank - that provide for the common security and prosperity of human beings.
We have not always been thanked for these efforts, and we have at times made mistakes. But more than any other nation, the United States of America has underwritten global security for over six decades - a time that, for all its problems, has seen walls come down, markets open, billions lifted from poverty, unparalleled scientific progress, and advancing frontiers of human liberty.
For unlike the great powers of old, we have not sought world domination. Our union was founded in resistance to oppression. We do not seek to occupy other nations. We will not claim another nation's resources or target other peoples because their faith or ethnicity is different from ours. What we have fought for - and what we continue to fight for - is a better future for our children and grandchildren, and we believe that their lives will be better if other peoples' children and grandchildren can live in freedom and access opportunity.
As a country, we are not as young - and perhaps not as innocent - as we were when Roosevelt was President. Yet we are still heirs to a noble struggle for freedom. Now we must summon all of our might and moral suasion to meet the challenges of a new age.
In the end, our security and leadership does not come solely from the strength of our arms. It derives from our people - from the workers and businesses who will rebuild our economy; from the entrepreneurs and researchers who will pioneer new industries; from the teachers that will educate our children, and the service of those who work in our communities at home; from the diplomats and Peace Corps volunteers who spread hope abroad; and from the men and women in uniform who are part of an unbroken line of sacrifice that has made government of the people, by the people, and for the people a reality on this Earth.
This vast and diverse citizenry will not always agree on every issue - nor should we. But I also know that we, as a country, cannot sustain our leadership nor navigate the momentous challenges of our time if we allow ourselves to be split asunder by the same rancor and cynicism and partisanship that has in recent times poisoned our national discourse.
It is easy to forget that when this war began, we were united - bound together by the fresh memory of a horrific attack, and by the determination to defend our homeland and the values we hold dear. I refuse to accept the notion that we cannot summon that unity again. I believe with every fiber of my being that we - as Americans - can still come together behind a common purpose. For our values are not simply words written into parchment - they are a creed that calls us together, and that has carried us through the darkest of storms as one nation, one people.
America - we are passing through a time of great trial. And the message that we send in the midst of these storms must be clear: that our cause is just, our resolve unwavering. We will go forward with the confidence that right makes might, and with the commitment to forge an America that is safer, a world that is more secure, and a future that represents not the deepest of fears but the highest of hopes. Thank you, God Bless you, God Bless our troops, and may God Bless the United States of America.»
Subscrever:
Mensagens (Atom)