Don't send more troops--Start making peace in Afghanistan

Congress, the Obama Administration and the military are considering significantly increasing U.S. troop numbers in Afghanistan. But we believe that troops do not bring security or peace.

Tell both President Obama and your Congressional representatives that we need to take the emphasis off military operations and put it into support for locally controlled education, health and economic infrastructure programs. Groups like Mennonite Central Committee (<http://mcc.org/afghanistan>), Greg Mortenson's Central Asia Institute (<http://www.ikat.org>) and Afghan Women's Mission <http://afghanwomensmission.org/> are showing us that local civilian projects are far more effective than military actions at stopping terrorism and promoting local democracy. These are crucial days, and with so much attention focused on heath care, we need to make sure we speak up for peacemaking and against a quagmire of killing.

• President Barack Obama: <http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/>

• Senate members: <http://senate.gov>

• House members: <http://house.gov/>