The Afghan War has become increasingly unpopular as its grinding cost ($2B a week) receives belated scrutiny. Obama sticking to the promised troop reduction timetable, despite little in the way of tangible results from 'the surge', will make few happy. It will be seen as a trickle not a flow. The Army wants more time at maximum troop strength. And the public is bored shitless with the whole costly affair especially since the US is now perceived to be “broke”, overextended militarily and in headlong decline.
Obama in the heat of the 08 campaign let his hubris get out hand. Along with promising to leave Iraq, he also promised to prevail in Afghanistan and track down Osama Bin Laden - two different and only partially related objectives. To Obama’s credit Osama Bin Laden is now history and his terrorist organization with its holy war ideology seems to have been eclipsed by the "Arab Spring" which is anything but Jihadist.
But promising to succeed in Afghanistan was a big mistake. Apparently Democratic Presidents (and candidates for such) have to appear strong on military matters to avoid being called out as wimps and ‘out hawked’ by Repubs (especially ex war hero John McCain.) Yet by honoring his campaign promise (at least this one) and doubling down in Afghanistan, Obama's commitment has only made things worse not better - the classic tar baby effect (as Lyndon Johnson learned in another war in another time.)
Furthermore, the US military officers corps (who are mostly Republican-leaning and don't much trust Democratic Presidents) do not want to be a part of another war that 'was lost.' That's not exactly career building. Besides not offending the military establishment, Obama did not want to oppose the popular Gen. David Petraeus, whose 'surge' in Iraq allowed that war to be perceived as a sort of victory or at least not an abject defeat, as big a disaster as it was and still is. Also to make matters worse, Afghanistan and Pakistan are totally interlocked geopolitically (remember the Pakistan ISI originally established the Afghan Taliban.) This regional relationship wouldn't matter except Pakistan has deliverable nuclear warheads (and has been known to proliferate said technology.) Furthermore the ‘incubated virus’ of the Afghan Taliban has now come back and infected Pakistan further destabilizing an already dysfunctional country.
The original sin here was that after our war of vengeance against the Taliban for not coughing up Al Queda after the 9/11 attack actually succeeded, Bush and Co., idiots that they were, turned away and started a second even bigger war. This as we know allowed the Taliban to regroup, regain territory and support, and define the US presence as an evil occupation army not as benevolent 'nation builders' as we liket to see ourselves.
Obama should have run as a total anti-war candidate and offered to redirect all or part of the money being spent there on military operations instead on making Afghanistan a showcase example of what can be done with a failed Muslim state. And if it was too late for that, then cut our losses and get the hell out– after all it was Bush’s war, not Obama's yet. He still would have beat McCain. Remember in those days the Repubs were still being blamed for the economy then in a full nosedive.
Now he’s stuck. If he pulls out too fast and Afghanistan and/or Pakistan plunges into chaos and/or the Taliban take over again after ten years heavy fighting, many lives lost and something approaching half a trillion dollars pissed away, it will certainly be a post-mortal victory for Osama Bin Laden. Yet with all attention now fixed on “the Deficit” and how to reduce it, how can he afford to stay? Plus the original reason for invading them has been 'deep sixed' and the remnants of his organization run out of the country. The Graveyard of Empires indeed…
