[bailaviborita]

Not to downplay Mortensen, but I fail to see the connection between improvement in Pakistan and educating women. Unless the culture will allow women to change society, hold jobs, improve legal status, etc.- educating them IMO won't naturally lead to "good". Seems to me that our own example didn't begin with education for women as much as it began with a break from tribalism/nationalism/religion over time- and that eventually led to women enjoying the same opportunities.

Gerson seems to make the same points- education is needed- but I'm not sure that differs from Yon. Sure, education is a big part of it, but I think Yon is arguing that won't happen overnight.

While Americans are now starting to ask what we are doing in Afghanistan and how long it will take- and Europeans are growing weary, it is probably a good time for us to come to grasp with a few things:

- Afghanistan isn't like Iraq and it will be longer and more difficult
- There are limits to what we can do and the type of culture change/nation-building needed in Afghanistan will severely test those limits
- Limiting our objectives to denial of training areas for AQ might be the only real interest we have in the region- the rest will have to come from Af-Pak internally with some funding/help from us

Or we can continually beat the drum of nation-building (while calling it COIN) and spend tons of money and military effort at something that is arguably impossible (in 20 years), all the while letting our conventional military might deteriorate.