International, or foreign, affairs are certainly major issues of this year’s presidential election. The United States’ participation in the war in Afghanistan is absolutely no exception. In the September 15, 2008 article of Time, Mark Thompson/Washington writes about “Collateral Tragedies: Why the U.S. military’s air campaign against the Taliban in Afghanistan is claiming the lives of more and more innocent civilians” While having troops in Afghanistan is a logical and intelligent plan in the War on Terror that President Bush declared years ago, the deaths of innocent Afghan civilians are NOT acceptable parts of this plan. U.S. air raids on Afghanistan are the main causes of these civilian deaths. From 2006 to 2007, the number of accidental civilian deaths went from 116 to 321. Wedding parties traveling to their sacred venue have been killed. Innocent children and desperate mothers are also among those that have fallen to accidental deaths due to war. The Time article states that a major cause of these civilian deaths is the lack of ground troops located in Afghanistan. If there were more troops on the ground, the air campaign would be more informed of the location of civilians in relation to a target.

Both McCain and Obama claim to support an increase of troops in Afghanistan. Senator Obama has spoken of taking some of the troops in Iraq and transferring them into Afghanistan and Senator McCain has stated his goal of sending three more brigades to Afghanistan, as well as a unified military commander.

If both of these candidates are sincere in what they propose, than hopefully relief will come to Afghani citizens in the near future. What happened on September 11, 2001 to America and to her citizens was beyond devastating, and those terrorists behind the attack should indeed be located and punished. However, those Afghani civilians who face the fear of air raids every day are just as innocent as we American citizens are and should not have to live in fear from day to day. Hopefully which ever candidate is elected will truly turn their attention to the deaths of these innocent people—to the terror and the dread that the U.S. air campaign brings upon them and their society. As Thompson writes, “The sad reality is that so long as the war persists, Afghan citizens will be the ones paying the heaviest price.”