Swar War News Today

Little bit earlier as a result. >> 7,000 injured and killed in this war. nine years later, a person who is not reliable as the president of that country. h this refocus the attention and the white house, the american people start having a real conversation about this war? >> i think that it will. i think theres a perception among many of us that theres absolutely no light at the end of the tunnel despite the eight, nine, ten years that weve been involved in this. and whats significant to me is t...

Volunteer force, we know they said ill raise my hand and do this. and mothers, fathers, brother, sisters, sons and daughterses. theyre the best team weve ever fielded. so this is about them. their ranks could increase before they decrease. its a heck of a place to wage war especially if its not your environment. and general petraeus goes in knowing the grounds. knowing the individual commanders, knowing the units there, knowing the challenge. and hes not -- he is a realist. he has indicated to i...

Around the war there, the situation on the ground was different, there was a civil war under way. he had the undivided attention and a very large budget given to him by the bush administration. will he have that same sort of access to the president? he certainly had it today. will that access to the president continue? one of the frustrations is that he doesnt have that kind of access. >> is there any indication that he would not? as we talked about this importance of this war not just for this ...

Commander of our forces in afghanistan. thats a judgment the president made. it was also speaking to the fact that general mccaffrey just alluded it, youve got a poisoned inner agency process. which sounds like a lot of washington speak, but its important baut way that everybody works together frrks the state department to the defense department to inside the white house matters. the bush administration had a broken interagency process with regard to the invasion and the immediate post war perio...

In. no one redistripre-difficulted on what this would evolve to. the administration was lied to by bp. first they said there wasnt that much coming out and it grew as the days went on. and i thought the proper reaction was there by the president. so i think hes being wrongly criticized for it. the president goes out and gets $20 billion from a company thats butchering our environment and the republicans are criticizing him for it. i find it absolutely amazing. it just goes to show how divided we...

Enemy that were fighting in the taliban. very difficult president bush told people on the way out that afghanistan would be by orders of magnitude more difficult than iraq, which was saying something given how difficult iraq was for him and his team. >> lets bring in richard engel who is the on ground for us in kabul. the president said the swar war is bigger than any one man. but we know that david petraeus is seen as a larger than life man. >> talk about larger than life, hes certainly popular...

Troop morale there in afghanistan? >> it certainly could. it remains to be seen whether or not it will be a positive impact or negative impact. weve heard many times from troops that any uncertainty leads them upset and worried about what their taught is. but especially with petraeus coming in, hes goal a much stronger reputation. it could have a positive effect or unsettling effect. >> well, time will only tell. thank you, leo. greatly appreciate. great article. the president stated unequivoc...

This would have an entirely different outcome. i think everyone will be on the same page now. >> we know that afghanistan is called the forgotten war by the previous administration. the president committed more troops by saying he would in fact focus more on this war. with this situation, is our attention now back in the right place, which is the men and women who are there, and what are we going to do about the situation? will we stay on schedule as the president has presented? >> i think a lot...

That david petraeus is the guy to take us in the direction this administration says it is committed to. >> well, i can tell you well spend the entire hour on the strategy and what weve achieved. one of the reasons is where the president is. this was a moment generated by a crisis brought about by some horrible pr and poor judgment by the commanding general who thought it would be a good idea to sit down and really spill his guts to "rolling stone" magazine. but the reality is that policy is unde...