The presidential candidates should listen
to Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta when he reminds us that there is
still a war being fought in Afghanistan. And we should remember what
Panetta’s predecessor, Robert Gates, had to say about Afghanistan in
2010, too.
After a speech at Duke University in September 2010, Gates explained to students
that eastern Afghanistan “is increasingly an unholy syndicate of
terrorist groups working together: al Qaeda, the Haqqani network, the
Pakistani Taliban, the Afghan Taliban and groups like Lashkar-e-Taiba.”
“A success for one is a success for all,” Gates warned.
