Matthew Hoh, a highly regarded U.S. foreign service officer, who also served as a Marine captain in Iraq, has resigned over what he sees as a hopeless situation in Afghanistan. In his resignation letter, Hoh said he had "lost understanding" of why the U.S. is fighting, and that the presence of foreign soldiers just fuels the insurgency. Should policymakers pay attention to the thoughts of one midlevel official?
The U.S. should follow Hoh's example and leave: Clearly, Matthew Hoh didn’t resign for ideological reasons—he’s just a smart guy who understands the real situation in Afghanistan, says Glenn Greenwald in Salon. As Hoh notes, we soon will have been in Afghanistan as long as the Soviets were. Now that the presence of U.S. troops "exacerbates the very problem we are allegedly attempting to address—terrorism"—by "increasing anti-American anger," it's time to go.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
