ASP Fellow Joshua Foust quoted in US News and World Report blog
Source: US News and World Report, February 27, 2012
“From what I’ve heard from people in Kabul and Jalalabad, this is much more about Afghans’ frustrations about the war, their lives and U.S. policies,” says Joshua Foust, a fellow at the American Security Project. “This might end up being more of a ‘straw that broke the camel’s back’ situation. Afghans are saying, ‘On top of everything else, you burned our holy book?!'”
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Foust and Sanok say State Department officials—and some inside the White House—have worries about the state of the war and the declining prospects for a U.S. victory.
“It is anyone’s game on whether Obama will start listening to the civilians more than the military,” Foust says.
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Radical clerics have been involved in “ginning up some of the vitriol” among Afghans, Foust says.
“The U.S. military and NATO have never really been focused on the political and social aspects of the war, and so they have no way to really respond.”
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For Foust, the NATO-Afghan relationship has been in decline for several years.
“The patience and trust was strained long before this,” he says.
