Spain says no to Bush's fake war, but yes to the real one.
Spanish to raise Afghan efforts
Spain will double its peacekeeping contingent in Afghanistan to 250 soldiers this summer, an aide to the future defence minister said yesterday as the incoming Socialist party stood firm on its plans to remove Spanish troops from Iraq unless the United Nations takes charge.
Seems to me, this is solid policy. In the wake of the Spanish elections, the media was in a frenzy on how the Spanish voters handed terrorists a victory by voting in the Socialist Party. Now, pulling troops out of Iraq (where the voters believe they had no business in the first place) and sending troops to Afghanistan, it would appear as though they are not cowering to terrorism, but going after it in a more proper arena..
While not only a good foreign policy move for Spain, I also see this as a blow to the Bush administration, who tried to paint them as terror loving pacifists who would give in to terrorist demands before stepping up to the plate in the "war on terror". I don't agree that pulling their troops out of Iraq was the best idea. They were a part of the 'coalition of the willing', and all those who participated in the complete leveling of Iraq and the ousting of Saddam owe it to the Iraqi people to see them through this transitional period, or we will doom them to a life much worse than the one they had a little more than a year ago.. but that damage is already done, so I applaud their efforts to do what needs to be done elsewhere.
I also wonder why this is getting so very little media coverage..