The White House's chart of troop levels is wildly misleading

Earlier this week, the White House released this chart of troop levels in Afghanistan and Iraq during the Obama administration:

Combining the two is strange, isn't it? Consider what happens when you break out Afghanistan alone, as Reuters did awhile back:

That's telling, especially given that the Afghan troop increase was a cornerstone of President Obama's foreign policy back in 2009. Seems like a tacit admission that the surge was not, in fact, a very good idea.

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