Panetta, however, still saw threats coming out of both occupied Afghanistan and neighboring Pakistan, as well as growing threats across the rest of the planet. He offered no solutions to this.
The reality, of course, is that both the Crocker and Panetta claims are grounded not in reality, but in expediency. Crocker was hoping to sell continuing the Afghan occupation for decades to come as a cure-all, while Panetta is hoping to add to his department’s already record budget by claiming threats are on the rise.
