President Obama's plan for increasing troops in Afghanistan is in the US' best interest

I'm gonna go ahead and post my case in round 1. Thanks to anyone who accepts; this'll be practice for both of us. I'm running con because this is now my personal final version. Good luck. Please, no personal attacks, and try to be grammatically and structurally clear. Thanks :) _____________________________________________________________________ "[Since the] invasion by Genghis Khan and his two-million strong Mongol hordes to the superpower proxy war between the United States and the Soviet Union, Afghanistan's trade routes and land-locked position have for centuries rendered it vulnerable to invasion. Although Afghanistan has endured successive waves of Persian, Greek, Arab, Turk, Mongol, British, and Soviet invaders, no occupying power has ever [been] successful. [I]t has been described as the "graveyard of empires," and unless America alters its approach, it risks meeting a similar fate. [END QUOTE] ^1 Because I agree that we face the risks outlined by the CATO institute, I negate Firstly I would like to clarify Obama's plan; it contains 3 primary components 1.using the troop surge to stabilize the government 2.bolstering the fight against Al-Qaeda and Talibani insurgents 3.building infrastructure A withdrawal is set to be carried out after 18 months Contention 1: Winning in Afghanistan is impossible 1A.Terrain makes winning an impossibility Dan Simpson writes, (Former U.S. Ambassador & Former Deputy Commandant for International Affairs of the U.S. ArmyWar College), PITTSBURGH POST-GAZETTE, Dec. 9, 2009, B7. Mastering Afghanistan has been despair for Alexander the Great, the British and the Soviet Union. It is the size of Texas, with a difficult terrain, hard climate, an opium-dependent economy and people who generally unite around repelling any foreign power that tries to take over their country. [I]magine that we and our reluctant NATO allies, a crooked Afghan government and unreliable, sometimes dangerous Afghan security forces, can now with 30,000 more American troops bring order. [T]he assumption that it is possible after we have tried to do so unsuccessfully for eight years is so improbable that it is laughable. [END QUOTE] 1B.Training them won't work The shortcomings of training the police force are twofold. First, you can't guarantee that they will be an effective combatant force after we leave. Second, since they are looking for the "sweeter deal", our withdrawal will be the return date of the Taliban in which they will win back the support of the locals. 1C.The war will be too costly 1C-1The cost to the US http://politics.theatlantic.com...... Nov 25 2009, Derek Thompson writes Consider the price of war. [T]he Congressional Research Service estimates the cost of sending one soldier to Afghanistan for one year is approximately $1 million. A 30,000-troop escalation, which sounds like Obama's ceiling, would require a $30 billion yearly tax. That would be about four-times the proposed tax on alcohol.[END QUOTE] 1C-2.The cost to Afghanistan Fareed Zakaria for newsweek writes Sep 12, 2009 Building a strong security force, as proposed, will be arduous in this context, not to mention that its annual cost would be equivalent to 300 percent of the country's GDP. The focus must shift [away] from nation building.. The central problem in Afghanistan is that the Pashtuns, who make up 45 percent of the country and almost 100 percent of the Taliban, do not feel empowered. We need to start talking to them, whether they are Taliban or not.[END QUOTE] 1D. Military force NEVER works against terrorist organizations Seth Jones writes (RAND corporation) All terrorist groups eventually end. But how? The evidence since 1968 indicates that most groups have ended either because (1) they joined the political process in 43 percent of cases or (2) local police and intelligence agencies arrested or killed key members 40 percent of the time. Military force has never been the primary reason for the end of terrorist groups. This has significant implications for dealing with al Qaeda and suggests fundamentally rethinking post-9/11 U.S. counterterrorism strategy: policing and intelligence, rather than military force, should form the backbone of U.S. efforts against al-Qaeda. And U.S. policymakers should end the use of the phrase "war on terrorism" since there is no battlefield solution to al-Qaeda.[END QUOTE] 1E. We already accomplished our primary objective; we can't win more than victory When we launched the offensive after 9-11, our focus was to defeat al-Qaeda, who was the mastermind behind the plot. They are now insignificant, and only need to be dealt with preventatively such as through intelligence and policing; not with military. Moreover, we shouldn't be fighting the Taliban because they are a political party we need to be diplomatic with; not violent with. We must talk and make relations with them, which would be more in our best interest than fighting them wastefully and continually squandering money and lives. Contention 2- The focus of our troops should be in Pakistan exculsively, which is our best interest William Darlymple in his award winning novel for historical accuracy; Pakistan in Peril The Taliban have reorganized, advanced out of their borderland safe havens, and are now massing at the gates of Kabul, threatening to surround and throttle the capita. Members of the taliban already control over 70 percent of the country. The blowback from the Afghan conflict in Pakistan is more serious still. In less than eight months, Asif Ali Zardari's new government has effectively lost control of much of the North-West Frontier Province (NWFP) to the Taliban's Pakistani counterparts. Across much of the NWFP—around a fifth of Pakistan—women have now been forced to wear burqa, music has been silenced, barbershops are forbidden to shave beards, and over 140 girls' schools have been blown up or burned down. [END QUOTE] The best interest of the US is preventing destabilization in Pakistan because the results would be terrorists with nuclear weapons and an economic crater in our GDP that we can't afford. Taliban control in Pakistan would surely spark a war with India destroying yet another trade partner we need. The impact is the total desctruction of the United States through nuclear warfare and economic breakdown. Since survival is in our best interest, Obama's plan is not our best interest. Thank you for accepting this debate, Grape; thank you for your time, audience. I urge a con ballot. ^1 Malou Innocent is a foreign policy analyst at the Cato Institute who focuses on Afghanistan and Pakistan. Ted Galen Carpenter, vice president for defense and foreign policy studies at Cato, is the author of 8 and the editor of 10 books on international affairs **all other cards/ sources are mentioned before quotes