WaPo: CIA digs in as Americans withdraw from Iraq, Afghanistan

[Boombaby]

The CIA is expected to maintain a large clandestine presence in Iraq and Afghanistan long after the departure of conventional U.S. troops as part of a plan by the Obama administration to rely on a combination of spies and Special Operations forces to protect U.S. interests in the two longtime war zones, U.S. officials said.

U.S. officials said that the CIA’s stations in Kabul and Baghdad will probably remain the agency’s largest overseas outposts for years, even if they shrink from record staffing levels set at the height of American efforts in those nations to fend off insurgencies and install capable governments.

The withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq in December has moved the CIA’s emphasis there toward more traditional espionage — monitoring developments in the increasingly antagonistic government, seeking to suppress al-Qaeda’s affiliate in the country and countering the influence of Iran.

In Afghanistan, the CIA is expected to have a more aggressively operational role. U.S. officials said the agency’s paramilitary capabilities are seen as tools for keeping the Taliban off balance, protecting the government in Kabul and preserving access to Afghan airstrips that enable armed CIA drones to hunt al-Qaeda remnants in Pakistan.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/cia-digs-in-as-americans-withdraw-from-iraq-afghanistan/2012/02/07/gIQAFNJTxQ_story.html?hpid=z3

This is the way Af/Pak should have been dealt with from the get-go. Iraq should not have been dealt with, period.

[kickysnana]

1. Aha, this is a plot by our commie President to neutralize the CIA by bogging them down

in Afghanistan. Very, clever I might add. Where all imperialist hubris goes to die.

[Selatius]

2. Using the CIA is a less expensive route than a full-blown occupational army to control a host nation

At most, the CIA should be used to preserve the parliamentary form of government that Iraq has, but if it's used to simply try to steer Iraq's government towards an outcome beneficial to US interests at the detriment of the Iraqi people, we've gone too far and have no moral justification for such a presence.

I generally believe the situation, given American history in propping up undemocratic regimes and overthrowing democratically elected governments, is going to be the latter.

[Octafish]

3. Better believe they'll be keeping the private airstrips open.

There's real money to be made in the import-export business.