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Anonymous Posted 16 years ago
Speech & Pronunciation
Afghanistan
http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/video/conversation-leave-afghanistan-10972246
Following is the script I wrote of the video above. The underlined parts are where I had difficulty to understand clearly. Hope some one will help me.......................
StartFragment>
These additional American and international troops will allows to excellerate handing over responsibility to Afghan forces and allow us to begin the transfer of our forces out of Afghanistan in July of 2011.
All right Afghanistan, here we are, 34 soldiers have died, which means it's en route to becoming the deadliest month in this war. Winning or losing?
Certainly at the moment, I don't think you could argue that we're on track in terms of the broader strategy to get to the president's stated drawdown date of July 2011, 'cause all of uncertainty I think that's associated with the fact that we are not clearly winning or losing right now on the ground .
One of the points I make in the book is that it's a harsh but unescapable fact of life, that you can only be as good as the government you are supporting and you might be perfect at the military level, at the techniques of counter-insurgency, you know, and we are not, but if we were, it still doesn't compensate for not having a viable local partner.
Because you're saying in page 46 of your book, one of the key instructions you give is keep your extraction plan secret.
You're trying to communicate one kind of message to the Afghan people which is we are gonna stick around, we are gonna be with you. But you are trying communicate completely different set of messages to the american people and international community, which is, don't worry, this isn't gonna go on forever, there is an end in sight, we're gonna start to downsize, and it's a very very tricky balance to maneuver between convincing Afghans that we are gonna stick around but simultaneously convincing our own people that this isn't gonna drag on forever.
So tell me about how difficult it is in this climate to conduct hese kinds of counter-insurgency operation. I'm thinking about Wikileaks handing a video now that they get from secret sources. How tough is that?
The media environment of today is dramatically different from the media environment at the time when counter-insurgency was a concept, was inventive.
We've moved to a situation where people are both consumers and producers of media. You know, people can put stuff on Youtube, people can put out blogs. These are constant networking effect between many many different sources of information. When traditional news media like the broadcast networks and newspapers...
How much does Wikileaks hurt the secrecy therefore to hurt the strategy?
I think in terms of long term broad brush, derating information freedom, probably benefits our strategy better than benefits the insurgent, primarily because it makes it a lot harder for the
deception in the manipulation and conspiracy theories and so on that these guys paddle to stand out but in the short term it gives this communication problem.
You are trying to communicate different messages to different groups of people.
You have been a key adviser to General Petraues, General MaChrystal. Given the fact that the government component of what has to be in place in Afghanistan's problematic, given the fact, that a deadline has been set which undermines the credibility of the long term presence there. Should the US continue fighting this? Why's it that we're going to be lost?
I think that you have to see it in the context of what we're doing now in Afghanistan is a fighting to try a stable enough platform that we can exit. We are trying create the conditions that allow us to start getting out, without having to subsequently have to re-invade the place in 2 or 3 years you know, if Al Kaeda comes back in. And I think that's the issue right now.
So it's worth it?
I think we need to get out of there, and I think getting out of there in a way that avoids a lot of mass bloodshed and avoids us having to go back there, I think that's worth it.
Yes, you're right referencing Augustine, the object of war is not victory but a better peace.
Right. I don't often try the allusions but I think that's the case in this, in a sense.
Following is the script I wrote of the video above. The underlined parts are where I had difficulty to understand clearly. Hope some one will help me.......................
StartFragment>
These additional American and international troops will allows to excellerate handing over responsibility to Afghan forces and allow us to begin the transfer of our forces out of Afghanistan in July of 2011.
All right Afghanistan, here we are, 34 soldiers have died, which means it's en route to becoming the deadliest month in this war. Winning or losing?
Certainly at the moment, I don't think you could argue that we're on track in terms of the broader strategy to get to the president's stated drawdown date of July 2011, 'cause all of uncertainty I think that's associated with the fact that we are not clearly winning or losing right now on the ground .
One of the points I make in the book is that it's a harsh but unescapable fact of life, that you can only be as good as the government you are supporting and you might be perfect at the military level, at the techniques of counter-insurgency, you know, and we are not, but if we were, it still doesn't compensate for not having a viable local partner.
Because you're saying in page 46 of your book, one of the key instructions you give is keep your extraction plan secret.
You're trying to communicate one kind of message to the Afghan people which is we are gonna stick around, we are gonna be with you. But you are trying communicate completely different set of messages to the american people and international community, which is, don't worry, this isn't gonna go on forever, there is an end in sight, we're gonna start to downsize, and it's a very very tricky balance to maneuver between convincing Afghans that we are gonna stick around but simultaneously convincing our own people that this isn't gonna drag on forever.
So tell me about how difficult it is in this climate to conduct hese kinds of counter-insurgency operation. I'm thinking about Wikileaks handing a video now that they get from secret sources. How tough is that?
The media environment of today is dramatically different from the media environment at the time when counter-insurgency was a concept, was inventive.
We've moved to a situation where people are both consumers and producers of media. You know, people can put stuff on Youtube, people can put out blogs. These are constant networking effect between many many different sources of information. When traditional news media like the broadcast networks and newspapers...
How much does Wikileaks hurt the secrecy therefore to hurt the strategy?
I think in terms of long term broad brush, derating information freedom, probably benefits our strategy better than benefits the insurgent, primarily because it makes it a lot harder for the
deception in the manipulation and conspiracy theories and so on that these guys paddle to stand out but in the short term it gives this communication problem.
You are trying to communicate different messages to different groups of people.
You have been a key adviser to General Petraues, General MaChrystal. Given the fact that the government component of what has to be in place in Afghanistan's problematic, given the fact, that a deadline has been set which undermines the credibility of the long term presence there. Should the US continue fighting this? Why's it that we're going to be lost?
I think that you have to see it in the context of what we're doing now in Afghanistan is a fighting to try a stable enough platform that we can exit. We are trying create the conditions that allow us to start getting out, without having to subsequently have to re-invade the place in 2 or 3 years you know, if Al Kaeda comes back in. And I think that's the issue right now.
So it's worth it?
I think we need to get out of there, and I think getting out of there in a way that avoids a lot of mass bloodshed and avoids us having to go back there, I think that's worth it.
Yes, you're right referencing Augustine, the object of war is not victory but a better peace.
Right. I don't often try the allusions but I think that's the case in this, in a sense.
Top answer
You did a nice job transcribing it. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- These additional American and international troops will allow us to accelerate handing over responsibility to Afghan forces and allow us to begin the transfer of our forces out of Afghanistan in July of 2011. All right Afghanistan, here we are, 34 soldiers have died, which means it's en route to becoming the deadliest month in this war.
- You did a nice job transcribing it.
- -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- These additional American and international troops will allow us to accelerate handing over responsibility to Afghan forces and allow us to begin the transfer of our forces out of Afghanistan in July of 2011.
- All right Afghanistan, here we are, 34 soldiers have died, which means it's en route to becoming the deadliest month in this war.
- Winning or losing?
- Certainly at the moment, I don't think you could argue that we're on track in terms of the broader strategy to get to the president's stated you know drawdown date of July 2011, there's a lot of uncertainty I think that's associated with the fact that we're not clearly winning or losing right now on the ground .
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1 Answers
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You did a nice job transcribing it.
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These additional American and international troops will allow us to accelerate handing over responsibility to Afghan forces and allow us to begin the transfer of our forces out of Afghanistan in July of 2011.
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These additional American and international troops will allow us to accelerate handing over responsibility to Afghan forces and allow us to begin the transfer of our forces out of Afghanistan in July of 2011.
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