We will share some of the details. Is itr in afghanistan, still worth it . Our phone lines are open at 202 7488000 free democrats, 202 7488001 for republicans. If youre an independent, 202 7488002. Join us on social media. We will read your tweet at cspanwj. Also taking your Text Messages. Tell us your first name and where your texting from. Here is that number, 202 7488003. If youre driving, dont text and drive. Front page of the Washington Post, the latest installment in a multi part series on afghanistan and reporting of craig with law focusing on opioids. The headline is unguarded nation question ma we also unguarded nation. From the website and news. Com, the Trump Administration intending to announce the drawdown of about 4000 troops from afghanistan as early as next week. The withdrawal will leave between 8000 and 9000 troops in afghanistan. The u. S. Has between 12000 and 13,000 troops in afghanistan today. Officials would not say when the drawdown would begin. A combination of troops redeploying early and others not being replaced when they rotated out. President trump promised since campaigning in 2016 to end wars like the one of like the one in afghanistan and reduce the number of troops deployed overseas. His advisors have convinced him not to pull the plug on the mission but the president willing to take such a step when he abruptly pulled troops out of syria. The president has made clear to his advisors that he wanted to withdraw all troops from afghanistan by the november 2020 election. Story that was part of the three year investigation by Craig Whitlock of the Washington Post on the afghanistan papers. A confidential trove of ferment documents obtained by the Washington Post reveals that senior u. S. Officials failed to tell the truth about the war in making rosy pronouncements that they knew to be false and hiding unmistakable evidence the war had become unwinnable. More than 400 insiders offering unrestrained criticism of what went wrong in afghanistan and how the u. S. Became mired in nearly two decades of warfare. With a bluntness rarely expressed in public, the interviews lay bare the pent up complaints, frustrations and confessions along with secondguessing and backbiting, that from the Washington Post and the full Series Available online at Washington Post. Com. Craig whitlock is the reporter who looked into that in on cspans washington today, our Radio Program at 5 00 p. M. Eastern monday through friday, asked why three administrations failed to tell the truth about whats happening in afghanistan. Heres part of that conversation. Too. Ve asked myself that how could people have misled the public for so long and i think many journalists knew that things werent going best new things were going wrong. Thaturnalists knew things were going on. Maybe if you are not personally responsible nobody wants to admit that cant succeed at a mission. The military mindset and culture is that no mission is too difficult. If youre given a mission you will, bush it no matter what and they just have to get more people and money and time and effort and lead and sweat and tears to accomplish the mission. This was kind of fuzzy. What were we trying to accomplish . What was the strategic objective . I think its a cultural problem they dont want to admit it was. Ailing one of the very few commanders in the war in 18 years, whoever said we were losing, was a guy named general david mckiernan. Were going well. He said i think were losing. He got fired. You can argue whether he got. Ired for that or other reasons theres a long record if you tell the truth in the u. S. Military it doesnt always end well with your career. Host that from Craig Whitlock, who will join us later on the washington journal this month to talk about investigative reporting. His peace, available at Washington Post. Com. If youre an afghan war veteran or a Family Member who served in. Fghanistan, 202 7488000 if youre active or retired military, 202 7488001. For all others, 202 7488002. Lets go to kathy in dear be healed in deerfield beach, florida. Guest guest i am livid caller every single one of the senators and Commerce People took an oath to swear to support the constitution of america and they have not done it and they are cowards. I dont understand how they can get away with it. I dont know what the Bar Association is thinking that this is disgusting. Host kathy from florida. A look at the numbers the 18 year war in afghanistan. More than 775 thousand troops serving in afghanistan over the last 18 years. 2300 deaths, more than 20,000 wounded and the price tag estimating nearly 1 trillion. Jay from Arlington Virginia, good morning. Caller good morning. Longtime listener. These kinds of conversations fromyour show different others that are out there. Its mostly propaganda. Misplaceding to say patriotism but patriotism of putting a context where you need to go out for blood and things like that. I lived in Arlington Virginia when the 9 11 attacks occurred. I remember the hysteria around a moment totaking figure out whats going on. Why these things happening. What these people have against us and things like that. Biggest hardest thing you can and smash them. A lot of people who work hasnt lost their lives. You take that, 18 or 19 years il now and youve got larger spot the population for the people in that region. Many any innocent people have lost their lives. Filteringhow many those days. Number of military men and women , the proudest, the best trained you have. Men and women with ptsd, all kinds of injuries. The untold fortune we lost, continued that we continue to incur, really for what . , thextension of that situation in iraq host thank you for the call. I will leave it there. This response from the department of defense with regard to the reporting by the Washington Post. Thee has been no content by department of defense to Mislead Congress or the public. Officials have briefed the press in our efforts in afghanistan and dod provides regular reports to congress that highlight these challenges. Information was provided to the forial Inspector General the express purpose for the inclusion in public reports. Most of the individuals interviewed spoke with the benefit of hindsight. Back to your phone calls. The war in afghanistan, based on what we are learning from the Washington Post, is it still worth fighting . Mark from the schenectady, new york. Caller i think that the war in afghanistan is worth fighting criminalhe islamic outfits like al qaeda and taliban are sowing corruption and disturbing commercial interests. Tons of opiumrol fields in afghanistan and it is so we should be in there to destroy the criminal isis,ates like taliban, corrupting the entire region. That should be our objective. Host thanks from the thanks for the call from schenectady, new york. To 202 messages 7488003. Secretary Donald Rumsfeld telling Washington Post the following, i may be impatient, i know im a bit inpatient. We are never going to get the u. S. Military out of afghanistan unless we take care and see there is something going on that will provide the stability that will be necessary for us to help. Anding by saying kenneth is joining us in buffalo, new york. The question should be not still worth fighting but is at war that can be won. Host what do you think . Take compare Northern Ireland for instance afghanistan. Northern ireland, the ira against the british army. The ira is never more than 300 or 400 guys. Everybody spoke the same language. It was in a small place. The british army could not beat the ira. Here you have afghanistan, heres country. Terrible. N is. Ountains and deserts hundreds of different ethnicities and languages. Not whether we should be fighting, but whether we can win. I will say the answer to that is no. We will never be able to pacify the country. Thats got to come from within and we are just wasting our treasure. Lives and treasure. Maybe we are justified in fighting that war but the question was whether it was a good idea and i say it was never a good idea. Host the counter argument is that if we dont fight them there we will fight them here in the u. S. And our involvement in afghanistan began after 9 11 and the attacks by saudi pilots who crashed planes into the World Trade Center, the pentagon and in pennsylvania. How do you respond to that . Caller people crashed the planes into the World Trade Center were mostly savvy arabians. Their main beef was our occupation of their country. American troops in saudi arabia. The question is not answerable as to what will happen. I believe if we leave those people alone, maybe they believe us alone. You know what i mean . We are not going to win. That is for sure and the longer , were just going to. Ose more and more i guess thats the only answer i have. Host thanks of a call from buffalo new york. The afghanistan papers, a secret history of the war and more from the reporting of Craig Whitlock. We are devoid of a fundamental afghanistan understanding of afghanistan. ,hat from douglas lute threestar army general who served as the wars are during the bush and Obama Administrations. He told that to government. He added, we did not have the fogs notion of what we were undertaking. If the American People knew the magnitude of this dysfunction of 2400 lives lost he said blaming the deaths of the u. S. Military personnel on what he called your credit breakdowns among congress, the pentagon and state department, who will say this was in vain . The afghanistan papers, secret history of the war is the investigative piece by Craig Whitlock in the Washington Post. That is our focus. The Afghanistan War still worth fighting based on mobile enough from this. Next to joe in gibson, nebraska. Caller good morning. Done twouggest, having tours in vietnam, and vietnam we did not have an understanding of the culture or the country or its history was like. We seemed not to learn anything from history. Afghanistan has never been kind to outsiders. The russians did not have much truthnd they put 100,000 there and they were more ruthless than we are willing to be. If i recall correctly, the mongols did not have much look. When youre in a country in a country and the average age of death of the male is 39 and usual cause is gunshot wound, tribes fight among each other until outsider comes in and then they like to fight against the outsider. I dont think you are going to get very far. The argument if we dont fight them there we will have to fight them here is perhaps worth mentioning, but at least if were fighting them here or on screening,ar using travel limitations and if necessary some form of quarantine of the country, we would be on better ground than in afghanistan. In afghanistan for a long time. Its my belief that the last war we really won was the second world war. If memory serves correctly, that was the last war in accordance with the constitution of the United States, declaration of war by congress occurred. Host thank you for the call from frasca. Heres a topic that most agree on, since trumpet is for ending in endless war that started the deficit in the first place. This from david, i never considered afghanistan to be a war, seemed more like a conflict. All the time the treasure invested will yield a solid result, time to wage peace. This from a viewer with a text message. Sonia saying she lives in maryland. The war on terror is a forever war. There should be no afghan war. I favor reducing troops. And jan saying cheney, bush and the rest will never be held accountable. Talking about the war in afghanistan 18 years, nearly two decades and an indepth story by the Washington Post. The latest installment is in thele this morning newspaper and online. I think there are a lot of lessons not learned. I think that is what comes out so clearly in these documents. One pretty basic lesson, if you go to war, who is the enemy . Who are we fighting . We thought we were fighting al qaeda in the beginning but quickly changed into a different war. We have not been fighting al qaeda in afghanistan in 17 years probably. You cant even identify the enemy. In these documents of could not. Donald rumsfeld said ive note beer no idea who the bad guys are. The troops kept asking who are the bad guys and i could not tell them. If you dont know who the enemy is or what your objective is, its hard to win a war. Host that from Craig Whitlock from the washington today program. Theael ohanlon, from perkins institution, critical of the Washington Post for writing. He said, it is a serious charge to a huge to accuse u. S. Fficials of duplicity the Washington Post did a disservice with this report at a time when trust in american institutions is already weak and officials at accusing each other of line all the time being wrongly demeaned and diminished. Next up is james from norfolk, virginia. Caller hows it going . My view on this is, it is a war of attrition as we can see. We had to take a broader view and see what we have actually done in this region. In afghanistan the taliban or major stronghold player in that region. Once we moved in a lot of the people there started to look better. What i mean by that is, your females that can go to school past the age of seven. A lot of other things. Human rights, a lot better around that region and iraq as well. I feel from a standpoint of a civilian you can see the tide of the war and the sentiment is going last. Inre are people struggling that region. It smells going to help them america has to stand up and do the right thing. Host this from edward who says on our twitter page, was the war ever worth fighting . Bring our troops home and all of congress voted for that, how may representatives except for barbara lee . The next call was from cary, North Carolina. Well go to joseph in boston. Good morning, joe. Caller i served in the marine corps reserves. Infantry school, i came to the conclusion i dont want to go to war. War is hell. I think america has been successful as a country that we became isolationist and we look power sincean took 1996 in afghanistan. , the russiansll lost 20,000 troops. Why does america why doesnt america think it over . Up afterd be a big set 9 11. I was in manhattan i see what happened after 9 11. Do you think we should really go to war . The most powerful military in the history of mankind. The most economic country in the history of mankind. Country thinking they have a plan b . Exactly what happened. Chinas financing are war in afghanistan. Of course it was a waste of time. Troughrt donald 100 . Donald trump 100 . Bring the troops home. We are wakingline up to this morning, but Trump Administration intending to announce the withdrawal of about 4000 troops from afghanistan. Available online on nbc news. Com. William, good morning from tennessee. Caller good morning. You for cspan. Been watching since i was a teenager. Host glad to hear from you. Caller the last bastion of true freespeech. As far as the wars and the middle east from carter through today, we are not fighting the middle east. Thats not a certain region we are against. It is islam and that is the danger. , hehindis like gandhi loved the muslims, the muslims did not like him, thats why they get pakistan. Jesus taught everyone to love everyone. Thats why a lot of the world is christian. Mohammed, of islam, taught people to hate rob and steal and pillage. That is the real war we are against. I wish more americans and worldwide fresh worldwide christians and handys and everyone would realize and indis host why do our forces protect the poppy fields . We are not there to stabilize the country or the poppy fields who would been destroyed. Afghanistan is where empires poked a die. From todays installment in the againn post, almost from todays Washington Post. Part of a multi part Series Available online. This text message from julius North Carolina. The narrative from the empire is about misdirection. Anyone who believes America White into afghanistan on some moral principle is a fool. Its always about oil and real estate. Since 2001, more than 775,002 been a ploy to afghanistan. Many repeatedly. Died, the2300 interviews through extensive array of voices ring into sharp relief the core failings of the war that persists to this day. They underscore how three president s and their military commanders have been unable to deliver on their promise to prevail in afghanistan. With most speaking on the assumption that the remarks would not be made public, officials acknowledging there were their strategies were flawed and that washington wasted a normas sums of money trying to remake afghanistan into a modern nation. Back to phone calls from susan in appomattox, virginia. Caller good morning. Not right to people, the 18yearolds who get drafted or the military, the young people that get sent to a country that has no semblance so what they are used to, sent just to fight and kill casual way we do it. Ts ok if these people die it goes on generation after generation. Youngs in the military or , i would say, why dont you go over there and fight . Thank you. Promisessident trump to get us out of afghanistan. This is the 1058 day of his presidency, what is the hold up . I frequent critic of the war in afghanistan is senator rand paul and this week he had these comments on fox news. [video clip] i think our young men and women we send to war, they deserve more. I dope and airing of what is the mi