Support In U.S. For Afghan War Drops Sharply, Poll Finds

A U.S. Marine watches as an Osprey carrying Defense Secretary Leon Panetta arrives at Forward Operating Base Shukvani, Afghanistan, Wednesday, March 14, 2012 (AP Photo/Scott Olson, Pool)

Support for the Afghan War has dropped precipitously, according to a New York Times/CBS News poll released Monday.

The results come after the killing this month of 17 Afghan civilians, allegedly by Staff Sgt. Robert Bales, who has been charged by the military with 17 counts of murder, six counts of attempted murder and six counts of assault.

Sixty-nine percent think the U.S. should not be involved in the war in Afghanistan, up from 53 percent as measured by CBS in November. A Washington Post poll conducted before the killings, but after burned Qurans were found at Bagram Air Base and after American soldiers were caught urinating on the bodies of dead Taliban fighters, found that 60 percent said the war not worth fighting.

The poll also shows that Americans think the war is not going well for the U.S. -- 68 percent think it's going badly, with 35 percent saying "very badly." In addition, 59 percent think the war was not a success, versus 27 percent who think it has been.

A plurality of 44 percent think that troops should be withdrawn sooner than 2014, when the U.S. is scheduled to withdraw all of its troops and hand over control to Afghan forces. One-third of respondents agree with the 2014 timeline, while 17 percent want to stay.

More Americans lacked a clear idea of why the U.S. was still in Afghanistan. When asked why the U.S. was still there following the death of Osama Bin Laden, 55 percent did not know, up from 43 percent last fall.

Even among the 29 percent who did know, the responses were varied as to why the U.S. was there. "Fighting terrorism" was the generic answer given by 15 percent overall. Seven percent said to stabilize the country and 5 percent said to prevent the Taliban from taking control.

Just 1 percent said 9/11 -- the reason the U.S. invaded the country in the first place more than 10 years ago.

Comments

[Dale INFoNT]

06:48 PM on 04/10/2012

Your numbers are skewed, Everyone That I have spoken to in the last four months agrees that we should have pulled out while the Afghan people still respected our soldiers. I have spoke to over three hundred people and all but one have had the same view.

So in Panetta's words, Polls do not reflect what the REAL Feelings of the American People, I do however know that we are really getting sick of paying for other people to enjoy a good quality of life while we struggle to make it from day to day, because or Government is over spending to create what is being bubbed a "Little America" in Afghanistan. The Project is doomed to fail wether we are there for two more years or ten. THEY DO NOT WANT US THERE. They simply wish to drain us financially.

[Shawn Wheeler]

01:38 PM on 03/29/2012

Duh...

[ttsgw]

10:17 AM on 03/29/2012

If they knew that the main reason for going and remaining there is to spend their tax money enriching the owners and executives of the military industry, I'm sure the support would have been much bigger.

[Roger Cottrell]

08:59 AM on 03/28/2012

No there's a surprise - given that the whole Afghan campaigne has been such an abject failure from day one. The arbitrary repression, including rendition and drone attacks, the routine and systemic brutalization of the civilian population, the refusal to collaborate with Iran in tackling teh Taliban (who are actually vital to the oil industries assets and thereby being softened up for a settlement), the consequent insincerity of commitment to democracy in Afghanistan, the failure to tackle corruption or build proper institutions (that Rumsfeld derided as nation building), the failure to pat farmers to grow something other than opium, the embarking on a 2nd illegal wr in Iraq just as the Taliban were feeling the military pressure and the fallback on repression alone from about 2005. Shall I go on?

[muck-raker]

06:12 PM on 03/28/2012

excellent post.

[Roger Cottrell]

05:44 AM on 03/29/2012

Thanks!

[Alexey Braguine]

08:37 AM on 03/28/2012

The strategy in Afghanistan is the same as using a sledge hammer to kill a fly who has landed on your head.

[Daniel Alman]

08:10 AM on 03/28/2012

Imagine all the women and children who will be killed the first month after we pull out...

[68Namvet]

11:39 AM on 03/28/2012

Imagine all the women and children who were killed since we invaded.

[rla927]

09:38 PM on 03/29/2012

Right on

[born 2b different]

12:02 PM on 03/28/2012

Imagine all the women and children who have been killed as a result of the invasion and occupation.

[muck-raker]

07:39 AM on 03/28/2012

GLENN GREENWALD: The CIA’s drone campaign in Pakistan has killed dozens of civilians who had gone to help rescue victims or were attending funerals,

The findings are published just days after President Obama claimed that the drone campaign in Pakistan was a “targeted, focused effort” that “has not caused a huge number of civilian casualties”. . . .

A three month investigation including eye witness reports has found evidence that at least 50 civilians were killed in follow-up strikes when they had gone to help victims. More than 20 civilians have also been attacked in deliberate strikes on funerals and mourners. The tactics have been condemned by leading legal experts.

Although the drone attacks were started under the Bush administration in 2004, they have been stepped up enormously under Obama.

There have been 260 attacks by unmanned Predators or Reapers in Pakistan

As I indicated, there have been scattered, mostly buried indications in the American media that drones have been targeting and killing rescuers. As the Bureau put it: “Between May 2009 and June 2011, at least fifteen attacks on rescuers were reported by credible news media, including the New York Times, CNN,Associated Press, ABC News and Al Jazeera.” Killing civilians attending the funerals of drone victims is also well-documented by the Bureau’s new report:

America now complicit in MAKING REAL TERRORIST
good short read:http://www.salon.com/2012/02/05/u_s_drones_targeting_rescuers_and_mourners/

[Janna03]

09:23 AM on 03/28/2012

More civilians were killed in WWII than soldiers. The only way for us to stop killing civilians is to leave Afghanistan totally. In war, civilians get killed. Of course, when we leave a lot of civilians are likely to be killed but it won't be the U.S. doing the killing.

[slybarbara]

08:42 PM on 03/28/2012

Good point, our unnecesary presence there has just stirred up a hornet's nest of bad opinion about American intentions, to begin with, if they are even valid, or are we just using places like Afganistan as some sort of training ground.
SlyBarbara

[BraveWarrior]

04:09 PM on 03/28/2012

Don't forget all the drone strikes during the massive flooding in Pakistan. Cowards and bullies operate the same all over the world. We don't respect anyone, except Israel-who doesn't respect us either.That is why we are universally hated and reviled. Doesn't matter if you kill one or a million-unarmed civilians, like we did in Iraq, after our sneak attack. Obama was awarded his Nobel peace prize before he became a war criminal. He and his minions, like Lady Hillary are covered in blood-along with the rest of our citizens who remain silent.

[muck-raker]

06:09 PM on 03/28/2012

my sentiments exactly...FF

[muck-raker]

07:31 AM on 03/28/2012

America has now become what we Lothe: In the biggest official files leak in history nearly 400,000 Iraq war logs reveal the massive scale of civilian deaths and new torture allegations following an investigation by Channel 4′s Dispatches.

Channel 4 News has accessed the data in the classified documents via The Bureau of Investigative Journalism and WikiLeaks.

The only TV doc to have advance access to the biggest Wikileaks release ever. This is what really happened during the Iraq war, not what the US PR machine of the time wanted us to believe. The reality behind the civilian death count; al-Qaeda’s fictitious presence; torture, torture and more torture. A wall of truth revealing unprecedented levels of unwarranted aggression.

Dispatches, Channel 4′s flagship current affairs strand, exposes the full and unreported horror of the Iraqi conflict and its aftermath, revealing the true scale of civilian casualties and allegations that even after the scandal of Abu Ghraib, American soldiers continued to abuse prisoners.

And that US forces did not systematically intervene in the torture and murder of detainees by the Iraqi security services. The programme also features previously unreported material of insurgents being killed while trying to surrender.

more: http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/iraq-secret-war-files-wikileaks-special/

[muck-raker]

07:24 AM on 03/28/2012

AMERICANS Listen UP: Think of it as the 800-pound gorilla in the American living room: our longstanding reliance on imperialism and militarism in our relations with other countries and the vast, potentially ruinous global empire of bases that goes with it. The failure to begin to deal with our bloated military establishment and the profligate use of it in missions for which it is hopelessly inappropriate will, sooner rather than later, condemn the United States to a devastating trio of consequences: imperial overstretch, perpetual war, and insolvency, leading to a likely collapse similar to that of the former Soviet Union.

According to the 2008 official Pentagon inventory of our military bases around the world, our empire consists of 865 facilities in more than 40 countries and overseas U.S. territories. We deploy over 190,000 troops in 46 countries and territories. In just one such country, Japan, at the end of March 2008, we still had 99,295 people connected to U.S. military forces living and working there — 49,364 members of our armed services, 45,753 dependent family members, and 4,178 civilian employees. Some 13,975 of these were crowded into the small island of Okinawa, the largest concentration of foreign troops anywhere in Japan.
>
AMERICA, since 1945 wants to controls all of the Middle East OIL reserves: Prof. N. Chomsky
more: http://motherjones.com/politics/2009/07/three-good-reasons-liquidate-our-empire

[Daniel Alman]

08:08 AM on 03/28/2012

Well if you think that controlling the oil is bad stop using your hummer...

[2lilluc]

08:23 AM on 03/28/2012

We are doing exactly what we condemn in others. It seems our moral compass has lost its way somewhere along the road. Those who profit from war, including our "bloated military establishment," don't seem to care at all the consequences our actions might bring down upon our heads, and I don't think it's going to be pretty when it comes. Maybe this country will have to fall apart to put us back together again as a member of the Global Community, with dignity and a clearer sense of right and wrong. Maybe someday this beautiful country will learn to take better care of itself and stop trying to be the boss of the world. So far, on all accounts, we're failing.

[muck-raker]

08:49 AM on 03/28/2012

yes or Policeman of the World....today we seem to be trying to control all of the OIL countries...overthrowing them installing leaders that will "work" with us or bribe them if all else fails.

[James Borum]

06:16 AM on 03/28/2012

Fairweather patriots more concern for their own welfare than that of their country, & her Troops, they're cowards too.

[RomeoMD25]

04:58 AM on 03/28/2012

Oh yes in the next war they will not draft just the men, the women will go. So these overweight/obese middle aged couch generals that scream for more war, death and killing of poor people over seas

[maigoro]

04:28 AM on 03/28/2012

On about the 7th day after we withdraw, the Taliban and Al'Qaeeda will retake big swaths of the the country and start working their way to retaking the whole thing back. You cannot easily sweep away thousands of years of culture with a 10 year occupation.

[Talab]

10:04 AM on 03/28/2012

The British couldn't conquer and hold Afghanistan .. and then the Russians couldn't and now we cant .... no surprise

[maigoro]

04:15 AM on 03/28/2012

Pulling out an army that size will all it's equipment, personnel, etc is not an easy task. It takes months of planing and months to execute.

[pcs5141]

01:30 PM on 03/28/2012

I'm sure we will leave a few billion worth of equiptment behind.

[cincinnati]

02:24 AM on 03/28/2012

It NEVER made much sense.

The US thought [ !? ] that a small group had
done 911 and was mainly in Afgan. So CIA, special
forces, etc., went in and either got most of them or
made them flee within a few weeks !!!

So why invade the entire country and try to force it
to move forward about 200 years, at very, very, very
great expense $$$$$$$.....???

Of course if you look at that big event that supposedly
started this you will find a far more complex picture,
and like some on that Commission say, we need
a new one ! This was said by Hamilton and Kean
in 2006 and yet "missed" by the media and not
even mentioned in the weeks leading up to
it's 10th anniv......"amazing" or what ?

[pcs5141]

01:34 PM on 03/28/2012

War is very profitable, which means money flowing to politicians,which is why they are so anxious to get us into these wars.

[Leland White house]

01:47 AM on 03/28/2012

The only difference between Afghanastan & Vietnam is one was jungle and one is rocks and sand. The Young American blood is the same. Have them ALL home for THIS Christmas

[cincinnati]

02:25 AM on 03/28/2012

neither made much sense....except to the elite
and military industrial complex Eisenhower
warned about [ but too little and too late...
maybe even he feared them...]

[2lilluc]

08:30 AM on 03/28/2012

I don't know for whose benefit we're fighting but it certainly isn't for the benefit of the majority of American's or the Afghan people. Some people will dance with the devil for a profit.....