Following the assassination of al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden, the U.S. congressional call for a political settlement and an accelerated exit strategy from Afghanistan has increased in the U.S. House of Representatives. However, a recent vote in the capitol to mandate such a strategy failed by only a handful of votes.
On May 26, U.S. Rep. Lois Capps, who represents California’s 23rd Congressional District, voted in favor of an amendment to the National Defense Act, which would have forced President Barack Obama to submit a timetable for withdrawal of U.S. forces from Afghanistan.
The amendment was introduced to the Legislature by Democratic Rep. Jim McGovern, from Massachusetts, and Republican Rep. Walter Jones, from North Carolina. At first, it seemed to enjoy bipartisan support.
However, the amendment was narrowly shot down 215-204, with Republicans overwhelmingly voting it down, 207-26. Only eight of the 186 Democratic representatives opposed the bill.
Though it failed, the amendment vote indicates that opinions on the Afghanistan effort are changing. A similar vote in July 2010 lost by a landslide. But this time around, Republican Minority Whip Steny Hoyer, of Maryland, spoke in favor of the proposed amendment and was joined by a number of prominent voices on national security issues, as well as a vast majority of the Democratic leadership.
“Our military—those in uniform and their families—have done everything asked of them and more. They’ve done it for years and they’ve done it without complaint,” Capps said in a statement following the vote. “Our military and diplomatic personnel have given the Afghan people an historic opportunity to build a future for a new Afghanistan and it is time that this effort be fully turned over to them. We cannot build that future for them.”
This article appears in Jun 2-9, 2011.