U.S. Commander's Aide: Taliban Not Winning

(CBS/AP)  A spokesman for the commanding general in Afghanistan, Stanley McChrystal, admits the Taliban is gaining momentum in new areas, but he denies insurgents are winning the war, reports CBS News correspondent Mandy Clark.

Gen. McChrystal told the Wall Street Journal for an interview published Monday that coalition forces face "a very aggressive enemy," and that Taliban militants are gaining momentum in new areas, particularly northern and western Afghanistan.

"The commander did not say the Taliban was winning in his interview with the Wall Street Journal, as suggested by the headline," said Rear Admiral Gregory J. Smith in a statement Tuesday.

"He explained that International Security Assistance Forces are facing an aggressive enemy, employing complex tactics that are gaining momentum in some parts of Afghanistan. During the course of the interview he also observed that insurgents in Afghanistan face their own problems in terms of popularity, cohesiveness and ability to sustain morale and fighting capacity," Smith, the communications director for coalition forces in Afghanistan.

CBS News chief foreign affairs correspondent Lara Logan spoke to one of McChrystal's top aides on Monday about the Journal's report. He emphasized that the commander was speaking about Taliban advances in a very specific context.

"In certain parts of the country, in the eyes of the people, the Taliban have gained the upper hand, but this does not apply to the whole of Afghanistan," .

"They hold greater sway over some places, looking at all of that in concert, one may say that the Taliban is doing quite well," said CBS News security analyst Juan Zarate.

Gen. McChrystal warned that casualty figures would remain high for months as forces push further into Taliban strongholds in the South.

Driving that point home, NATO announced Tuesday morning that three American troops had been killed in Afghanistan's southern Helmand province in unrelated incidents. No further information on the latest casualties was immediately available.

The U.S. commander's comments came as a top military adviser called for 45,000 additional troops to combat the insurgency - that would bring the American military presence in Afghanistan to about 100,000.

Insurgent attacks have increased by almost 60 percent during the last eight months alone, and with the Afghan presidential elections just nine days away, the threat is only expected to increase.

Richard Haass, president of the Council on Foreign Relations, told Early Show co-anchor Harry Smith on Tuesday that President Obama really doesn't have any good options right now on the Afghan battlefront, "if by good you mean something in the short run that is going to turn this thing around. That's simply not in the cards."

"We're looking at something very long and very difficult," added Haass.

Haass said that, with his policy of ramping up America's troop presence in Afghanistan, Mr. Obama is "trying to push the Taliban back."

"He wants to buy time and space to build up the police forces and the armed forces of the government of Afghanistan. The real question is how well does this work?

Will the Afghans prove able to be built up, and will we, the United States, have the staying power? We're not talking about months. We're talking about years, conceivably even a decade," said Haass.

[mjlewis6]

Thanks to Bush/Cheney's abandoning the Afghanistan theater of operations against the Taliban and Al Qaeda, the source of the 9/11 attacks, for the preferred target of Iraq whose Saddam Hussein would not tolerate such religious extremists in that country and had nothing to do with 9/11.....had to be the OIL RESERVES in Iraq, for which Cheney held an energy advisors meeting in April 2001, some 5 months before 9/11/2001.....WE ARE STILL FIGHTING THE WAR THEY REFUSED TO PROSECUTE TO AN END!!!!

[naj1953]

Bring Our Troops Home..........................

[ToolMangler1]

It distracted the cops from giving me a parking ticket, Good show, ol' Top!!!!

[mjlewis6]

The unfortunate issue of Afghanistan is before us....and has been since September 11, 2001...

Why George Bush and VP Cheney abandoned the battlefield to the Taliban should be clear to all Americans and the rest of the world. The Bush Administration USED our Armed Forces for aggressive war against Iraq, a country that had nothing to do with 9/11 on the pretext of WMDs which not even UNSCOM could locate with our CIA's best information. When all other options fail the test...the only one left is the truth: Bush lied regarding an 'Imminent Attack" on American by Iraq in his prelude to war speech in March of 2003 before the invasion.

There has NEVER been disclosed any IRAQ plan for attacking the United States.

We are still fighting the war...George Bush REFUSED to address, for the hearts and minds of Afghanis tired of the Taliban and the destruction of their society by the extremist applications of their faith. We have yet to both militarily and politically defeat and isolate the leadership and the weapons flows..

Thanks to George Bush's excellent planning for the war....we are still fighting it. This is not a Democratic or Republican war....it is our war to complete and end the threat to America. Incompetence knows no political persuasion. We have to eliminate the threat...foreign-borne and IGNORANTLY addressed by our leadership to have lost the support of allies....we now have to have an incredible loss of life....all due to an incompetent George Bush to have failed to prosecute the war to a conclusion owing to his preference for invading Iraq and sustaining a stake in its oil revenues.

[JBARON79]

Good post!

[speakinup22]

Yeah - if you are a lying liberal that wants to deamonize Bush.

So I keep on hearing the same ole lies from you libs, but I have never noticed any of you putting forth a REASONABLE motive as to why Dubya would do as mjlewis6 claims.

What, not enough oil in kiwait ? Oh, better yet, "he wanted to avenge his daddy."

So if Bush did lie, why wouldn't he plant evidence to show he was correct ?

Yup, you are correct about one thing mjlewis6, there has never been and DISCLOSED plan on Iraq (or IRan) to attack the US (if you want to discount the shape charges used for roadside bombs.

Key word would be disclosed.

What makes you think the President of the US would disclose all of our intelligence ability to squash your lies ? But hey, lie on dude - we love making fools of you and your ilk.

Fact is, you personnally have done MUCH more than Bush to bring down this country - jerk.


And, as for the oil revenues - uh, have you checked the oil companies profits as of late ? They are still up there. And so why aren't you pissin into the wind about Obama making his oil buddies rich ? Oh, I'm sorry. How foolish - he's the messiah. The chosen one.

Pull you head out and breath, liberal.

[underdogus09]

"U.S. Commander's Aide: Taliban Not Winning" The Propaganda War Heats Up.....

[ramos1129]

If the Taliban is not winning, who is?

[Benton09]

Corporate Industrial War Complex...that's who.

[edward1975-2009]

Followed by a news conference where the Taliban stated that the US is not winning. And the spin machine keeps spinning.

[AJMarine12]

by fuzzyi August 11, 2009 8:08 AM EDT

Geez are these Americans thick-skinned or what. They are gonna lose this war, whether they like it or not. They can have all the fancy weapons etc. at there disposal.





"Senate majority leader Harry Reid said yesterday that the war in Iraq is ??lost,?? triggering an angry backlash from Republicans who said the top Democrat had turned his back on the troops"

??I believe myself that the secretary of state, secretary of defense, and ? you have to make your own decisions as to what the president knows ? [know] this war is lost and the surge is not accomplishing anything as indicated by the extreme violence in Iraq yesterday,?? said Reid, a Nevada Democrat."





Reid said the same thing about Iraq and didn't know what he was talking about.

[babooph]

If the US went to leave ,the Afghan govt. would beat them out.The wars go on,the rich keep their massive tax cuts,healthcare still sells out to ins. co.etc etc etc...

[steve54z]

Rebels prefer stealing Helmand's poppies and cannabis for making extreme forms of narcotics. These Criminals use the street drugs during illicit sexual contact with small Children. If the Children object, they are blown-up by bombs on the way to Church. Kabul should use technology donated by the Obama Administration. Fast eradiction of the Enemy will end their debauched lewdness and murders in Afghanistan.

[worldcitizen1]

There is an "extreme form of cannabis"?? This is a war to wipe out perverts???? FUNNY!! Congress won't like that, to close to home, wink wink nod nod know what i mean?

[mav547166]

The Islamists radicals have a lot in common with Custer mostly his fate. They have been pushed out of every country from Algeria into some caves in Pakistan.

[fuzzyi]

Idiot

[Snowhare]

fuzzyi
Should I call you a radical a-h*le?
mav is probably not right but what he describes is the fate I wish for any radical. Radical Muslims to the caves of Pakistan, radical Christians to some caves in the Rockies and other radicals to other caves!
In the end we would smoke them out. All of them.
Unfortunately radicalism will come up again but with the new ones we may be able to deal if the world is less stupidly radicalized in the first place!