To the Editor,

I completely disagree with Lewis Lehe’s Oct. 19, column, “The Key to… To the Editor,

I completely disagree with Lewis Lehe’s Oct. 19, column, “The Key to Enduring Freedom.” The United States cannot simply consolidate its forces around Kabul “because the goals of the troops … are too vague.” While I agree that no one really knows what Afghanistan will look like if we succeed, abandoning most of the country would be asking for failure. Areas such as Helmand province still have a dangerous Taliban presence, even with a sizable British and U.S. Marine contingent located there. If the provinces outside of Kabul were abandoned, how would we protect the civilians of these areas? How would we prevent the Taliban from attempting to regain control of them?

It is impossible for the military to take “the focus off the Taliban” in order to “better occupy themselves with defeating al-Qaida.” The Taliban and al-Qaida are very closely linked. Let’s not forgot that the Taliban allowed al-Qaida to flourish in Afghanistan during the 1990s, giving Osama bin Laden and his minions breathing space to plot Sept. 11 and a host of other deadly terror attacks. Lehe didn’t even mention two of the big problems facing Operation Enduring Freedom: The feckless regime of Afghan President Hamid Karzai and the volatile provinces of Pakistan along the border with Afghanistan. If these problems are not solved, the mission in Afghanistan will be hopeless.

Michael Tatarski

School of Arts and Sciences