President Obama and Afghanistan

Image by Army.mil via Flickr

Since 2009 began more deaths have occurred in Afghanistan. There are now 38,000 troops serving there and President Obamas plan is to send in 17,000 more. He also plans on using insurgents to help us in this fight. This will help a great deal to hold back the Taliban forces.

In the first two months of 2009 there have been twenty nine US troops killed. The reason they say for this is that in 2008 there were 27,000 troops in Afghanistan and now there is only 17,000. US troops are also operating in more dangerous parts of this country, which is another reason for the influx of deaths.

Pressure from our US troops was maintained through out the winter months which also is why we saw the increase in the death toll.

One third of the deaths were caused by roadside bombs. The insurgents are using more IEDS because more of them would die if they faced US troops head on. It has been said that the Taliban militants are very resilient but not necessarily stronger.

General David McKiernan, the top U.S. and NATO commander in the country, said he is not going to be pessimistic of 2009, but will instead say he feels the glass is half full. Militant deaths have also increased with a total of 308 in 2009 so far.

Civilian deaths are also up according to despite the pleas from the Afghan President Hamid Karzai. Last year the Taliban set off big bombs which killed 180 civilians and Us death toll for civilians was 10.

This year it has been reversed and US troops have killed 100 so far.

Will this ever be over? Will the fight that has raged in the middle East ever be silenced and the fighting removed from this place?

How many have to  give their lives? How many more have to suffer from all of this? Hopefully with the New Presidents strategies soon we will have peace.