"Whac-a Mole": the regional game

Official: Afghanistan suffering from Iraqi gains
By AMIR SHAH, Associated Press Writer
14 Oct 2008
KABUL, Afghanistan - U.S. military successes in Iraq have forced sophisticated and well-trained insurgents to pour into Afghanistan instead, part of the reason violence has spiked in Afghanistan, the Afghan defense minister said Tuesday.

John McCain once characterized the U.S.'s military strategy in Iraq as "Whac-a-mole": we sweep Samarra, the bad guys pop up in Mosul; we sweep Mosul, the bad guys pop up in Tikrit; repeat.

Seems we've now enlarged the playing area: the bad guys the surge chased out of Iraq are now popping up in Afghanistan.

Do we have a regional strategy?
[... personally, I'm not inclined to bet too much that we do!]

Stop the madness!!!