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US President Barack Obama has insisted that his fairly modest objectives in the war-ravaged Afghanistan can be accomplished. In an interview with CBS, Obama highlighted that though the US-led effort to make Afghanistan into a perfect Western-style democracy is unlikely to succeed, he said that his war on terror will be successful. “Nobody thinks that Afghanistan is going to be a model Jeffersonian democracy. What we’re looking to do is difficult, very difficult, but it’s a fairly modest goal, which is, don’t allow terrorists to operate from this region; don’t allow them to create big training camps and to plan attacks against the US homeland with impunity,” CBS News quoted Obama, as saying. “That can be accomplished,” he added. He said that his government can stabilise Afghanistan sufficiently, but ruled out the withdrawal of American troops from the country till the mission was accomplished. “If I didn’t think that it was important for our national security to finish the job in Afghanistan , then I would pull them all out today. Because I have to sign the letters to these families when a loved one is lost,” Obama said. On December 1, 2009, Obama had announced that he would escalate US military involvement by deploying an additional 30,000 soldiers over a period of six months. He had also proposed to begin troop withdrawals 18 months from that date.

Obama says his ‘fairly modest’ Afghan aims can be achieved