Attacks in Afghanistan

The lead story in today’s New York Times is titled, “Afghan Elections Called a Success Despite Attacks.” It describes the results of voting in the country yesterday and the attempts by the Taliban to disrupt it.

The article goes on to note that the turnout was less than 70 percent, but even that was considered a success in light of the Taliban’s pledge to stop voting in major swaths of the country, especially their stronghold of the south. Vows to cut off the stained fingers of any voters — a process used at polling stations to prevent people from voting more than once — failed to scare off people in any significant numbers and did not call into question the results of the vote.

In my opinion, this represents a major foreign policy success for President Obama and vindicates his increase of troops in the country. The election seems to have been competitive between Hamid Karzai, the current President, and his former foreign minister, Abdullah Abdullah, and there may even be a runoff if noone gets 50 percent.

Though the article warned that any voting fraud would take place in the counting, not the voting, I do not feel we need to worry about an Iran-style debacle in this respect. Somehow the election seems to have been a success, and I think the United States can pat itself on the back for a job well done.