6/3/2019 Ariann Adams - Blog Post 3 Different Lenses (Historical, Cultural, Geographi - 861348 - Google Docs

Name: Ariann Adams

Blog Post #: 3
From my previous blog posts we know that, following the 9/11 attack President Bush decided to target
Osama Bin Laden and Al-Qaeda terrorist group for retaliation. Political situations arises as the U.S refrained from
hitting the Taliban forces outside of Kabul. They feared that the North Alliance would take over the capital city
and the country. How does one solve a problem such as this? Well, Americans wanted to build “a broad coalition
of afghan forces, one that would threaten diplomacy with the Pakistanis.” (Bargeron,1). The only problem was
that Pakistanis refused to cooperate U.S forces. They wanted the north alliance to seize Kabul.
Bin Laden is still at large, and Taliban proving difficult to eliminate President Bush warned Americans that
the war was far from over, and it still is to this day. As Bush began to negotiate with other nations to assist in U.S
efforts, he expanded his list of nations that posed a possible threat to american security. It seems as if one thing
was leading to another as Hamid Karzai, an Afghan politician negotiated with the remaining taliban soldiers to lay
their weapons down and surrender. 2001 had come to an end and American led coalition forces had defeated the
taliban and uprooted al qaeda. With these two groups now under US control, Bush focused on Iraq. His goal was
to gather evidence against Saddam Hussein. Early 2002, troops were deployed to prepare to take action on Iraq.
Changing the course was hard, president Bush knew the importance of staying in Afghanistan to find Bin
Laden. Bush “invoked the Marshall plan, the post world war II rebuilding effort in Europe.” (Bargeron,4). He
wanted to avoid the term nation building to describe his hoped for an American role in Afghanistan. Many
criticized bush for invading iraq. They said it was “irresponsible to start another war without finding Bin Laden.
Some worried that war in Iraq would make an incomplete job of Afghanistan, threaten the Karzai administration
and allow the Taliban to regain control.” (Bargeron,4). This could possibly caused the region to destabilize, but
despite the risks of fighting both wars at the same time Bush made sure the troops were ready for Iraq, while
reassuring the Afghan people they will not forget them.
This post was important because it described some of the decision making President Bush went through
when calling the two wars. It showed was went on behind the scenes. In my next blog post I’m going to be
focusing on possible solutions to this issue. Like what can be done by the government to possibly end the war
peacefully? I do want to know more about what was going through the mind of President Bush, as he stepped out
of office leaving this mess for future presidents to try and clean up. Why did Bush feel the need to keep adding
fuel to the fire if he was under so much stress? Coming up with a solution to this war won’t be so I intend on
doing plenty of research in my next blog post.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1TbPtbNsUzvrD5EoosbP4-K6adFhNej9JiIH52jRDQ28/edit 1/1