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Conclusion

The domestic – political and economic – consequences for the United States of the decisions that this announcement reflects will no doubt emerge in due course. Clearly the escalation of war – forced upon Mr. Obama by American Militants, in direct contradiction to his earlier goals and strategy – will not only add to dissatisfaction in U.S. military families and sap already low troop morale, but will also compromise the strength and timing of economic recovery and his social programs. The extent of the costs, benefits, interactions, and outcomes of these complex factors however requires a more careful analysis than has been possible here.

Outside the United States, however, the main contours of the likely impact on American allies, and strategic partners are clearer. The central unresolved dilemma of Mr. Obama’s war is his need to convince his voters that America’s commitment to foreign ventures is strictly time-bound, while persuading his disbelieving state and non-state allies and partners in the theatre of military operations, that this commitment is a durable long-term commitment. Mr. Obama’s solution to this public relations dilemma is to condition his contradictory commitments to both audiences: telling Americans he will withdraw, subject to security objectives being met; and his allies and regional and local partners that he will stay, subject to performance conditions being met. While his patriotic, more credulous, American audience may buy this, few in Europe (and other American allies), Afghanistan and Pakistan will be taken in by this obvious double-speak.

In the “Af/Pak” theatre, Karzai will celebrate continued American support for his puppet regime, while in Pakistan the government of Zardari is expected to fall – meaning either that he becomes a vulnerable figurehead with the repeal of the 17^th amendment to the Constitution, or flies out to an American safe haven like the U.A.E. or the U.K. – while the army and the citizens prepare for the now open American invasion.

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