Requirements Unmentioned

clipped from www.slate.com But Obama said nothing in the speech that put actual pressure on the government. The surge can succeed militarily but won't be worth anything if Hamid Karzai doesn't change his behavior and the Afghan army doesn't improve. Obama knows the government in Kabul is corrupt or, more benignly, that Karzai's goals don't match America's. President Obama wants to pressure Kabul but can't be seen to be doing so too openly, or it will undermine Karzai with his own people. So President Obama announced no verifiable set of benchmarks or penalties for Afghanistan—the very requirements that Sen. Obama said were necessary for for Bush's Iraq troop surge in 2007. The president's strategy, according to administration officials, is to circumvent the Karzai government, inspiring regional agencies through financial incentives and basically avoiding the Kabul government altogether.