Obama in Afghanistan

President Obama has just arrived at Afghanistan’s Bagram airbase for an unannounced trip during which he will meet U.S. troops and hold a meeting by videoconference with President Hamid Karzai. Obama had originally planned to travel to Kabul by helicopter to meet Karzai in person but the trip was called off because of bad weather.  ...

By , a former associate editor at Foreign Policy.
561052_obama_214.jpg
561052_obama_214.jpg

President Obama has just arrived at Afghanistan's Bagram airbase for an unannounced trip during which he will meet U.S. troops and hold a meeting by videoconference with President Hamid Karzai. Obama had originally planned to travel to Kabul by helicopter to meet Karzai in person but the trip was called off because of bad weather. 

President Obama has just arrived at Afghanistan’s Bagram airbase for an unannounced trip during which he will meet U.S. troops and hold a meeting by videoconference with President Hamid Karzai. Obama had originally planned to travel to Kabul by helicopter to meet Karzai in person but the trip was called off because of bad weather. 

It’s not clear how far in advance the trip was planned by the timing is certainly interesting with the latest releases from WikiLeaks painting a picture of Afghanistan as a society awash in corruption and Karzai as an increasingly marginalized and erratic figure, distrusted even by his own government.

Obama and his retinue will also get a chance to see how the tenor of private conversations with foreign governments changes when confidentiality is no longer guaranteed. I wonder who gets to write the cable on this one.  

Joshua Keating was an associate editor at Foreign Policy. Twitter: @joshuakeating

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