On Afghanistan

It seems to me that the story here is that the Afghans flocked to the polls. There was far less violence than was predicted and I assume that next time they will buy some heavy duty Sharpie permanent markers. Anyone that has seen the pictures of the women lined up to vote, http://asmallvictory.net/archives/007547.html or the 19 year old girl that cast the first ballot, http://www.indcjournal.com/archives/001120.php can have no doubt that these people want some control over their own lives.

Odds are we will be in Iraq much longer than in Afghanistan. The nature of the countries are so different. Iraq has a battered, but complex infrastructure; Afghanistan is rocks and caves. The US had problems finding targets to hit in Afghanistan during the war, the difficulty in Iraq was preventing further damage to the electrical grid, water, sewer, and oil lines. The terrorists have access or lack thereof to the same number of targets, thus Iraq will be harder to control. It's not that the Iraqi people have less desire for self-rule than the Afghanis, rather the terrorists have more at stake in Iraq.

But today, the international community http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/3731746.stm chose to approve the election, whatever its faults, which in my opinion seemed to be fewer than could have been predicted. So I celebrate, I pray that in less than a year, Iraq may experience the same empowerment. I hope I see a far more robust and secure Afghanistan in a decade.

Update via Instapundit, http://instapundit.com/archives/018345.php seems many are celebrating too!