And Yet Their Grandfathers Conquered Most of Europe

Germany is so unwilling to engage in combat operations in Afghanistan that their troops are getting fat as they sit behind the wire in their bases. The death of scores of Afghan villagers has been blamed on the Germans' disdain for getting out in the field. (H/T)

Meanwhile, our own troops exhibited the utmost bravery by storming a hospital and searching the women's ward.

And the allegations that Hamid Karzai has stolen the presidential election in Afghanistan just keep on coming.

So, we are backing a tinpot dictator who maintains his hold on power by holding fraudulent elections, members of his family are engaged in grand-scale criminal activity, his army is ineffective in the field, the cops are corrupt, his government is both completely ineffective and thoroughly corrupt, the American people are losing their patience after several years and the insurgents have full sway everywhere in the country that is not under the gaze of a foreign soldier.

Yeah, I've seen this movie before.

It is probably time to confront the obvious: The only interests that we have in Afghanistan is that the nation not be used as a launching pad for terrorism and that they not grow poppies on a huge scale. Other than that, I can't think of a damned reason to care about the place or who governs it. That's a concern of the Asian powers (Russia, China, India, Iran, Pakistan), but it is not our concern.

So let's tell the Asian powers that we are going to leave and it is up to them whether they want to help us do so orderly or if they want to deal with the aftermath if we just go.