A Bad Idea

Training Georgian Army soldiers for duty in Afghanistan.

This is a really bad idea. The last time we got involved in training the Georgian Army was for duty in Iraq. Their crackpot president, Mikheil Saakashvili, took advantage of the training received by the Georgian Army and the new weapons they had purchased to start a war with Russia. The Russian Army, largely using weapons and equipment that dated back to the 1970s, stomped the Georgian Army into little pieces.

I understand that we need more soldiers in Afghanistan, but in order to get 750 more soldiers from Georgia, we have to train them and then supply them with everything other than uniforms and rifles and I'm not even certain of that. There is no way to be certain that Saakashvili now understands that being trained to operate in a counter-insurgency war doesn't mean squat when the other side has motorized rifle divisions which have heavy artillery, armor and air support.

The next time that Saakashvili picks a fight with Russia, the Russian Army will probably carry out Putin's threat to "hang him by his balls". Do we really want to be in a position of having enabled that Bush-grade moron to start another war with the Russians?