Exit strategy or “No Exit”?

Council on Foreign Relations President Richard Haass (who was also the State Department’s Director of Policy Planning under George W. Bush) likens our commitment to Afghanistan to Sartre’s play, “No Exit,” in which the characters cannot seem to escape one another.

“Hell is other people,” one says. Why is this relevant? Because in both Iraq and Afghanistan, America finds itself involved (some might say trapped) in difficult situations (some might describe them as hell) where its ability to exit successfully depends largely on its local partners.

In order to successfully “sell” this war to an increasingly war-weary public, the administration has emphasized its intentions to leave the region sooner than later.  Unfortunately, Haass reminds us, “conflicts are easier to get into than out of.”

-Colin

Related posts:

  1. Obama and Afghanistan
  2. Should Obama have fired McChrystal?
  3. Free market journalism
  4. For Sale: Acropolis
  5. The drone dilemma

December 9, 2009 · Filed Under Colin, Free choice, International Relations, Obama, War

Share

Comments

Leave a Reply




  • Editors

    Jacob Bronsther is a law student at NYU, a former Fulbright Scholar to Mauritius, and a graduate of Cornell University. He has an MPhil in Political Theory from the University of Oxford.

  • Sam Gill is a consultant in Washington and a graduate of the University of Chicago. He studied Political Theory at Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar.

  • Marc Grinberg is a Presidential Management Fellow with the U.S. government and a graduate of Princeton University. He earned an MPhil in Political Theory from the University of Oxford.

  • John Rood is the founder of Next Step Test Preparation and a graduate of Michigan State University. He has an AM in Political Theory from the University of Chicago.

  • Luke Freedman is a student at Carleton College, pursuing a double major in Philosophy and Political Science.


  • Sign up for the TPP Weekly Rewind



  •

  • Share us