Recently in Afghanistan Category

by shep

Certain people, who need not be named but who whisper in the ear of the president and the leading Republican candidate to replace him and who are hired by the most prestigious (and not so much) news organizations to share their opinions with the public, think we should attack the country of Iran for providing (completely unproven) support for insurgents fighting against the US occupation of Iraq.

Well, who wouldn’t want to attack the country that arms its enemies, who end up killing their troops? Still, the main moral difference between Iraq/Iran and this seems to be that the Soviets were actually invited into Afghanistan by its government (much like our own venture into Vietnam). (Can you imagine if they simply came up with some phony excuse to invade and occupy the country, hanging its leaders and killing a million innocent Afghanis?)

Yet the IEDs Stinger missiles and other support supplied by our Quds Force CIA and China, Pakistan and Iran (”The Coalition of the Willing”), killed 10,000 or more Soviet troops (good thing the Soviets didn’t have nuclear weapons and strategic bombing capability, huh?).

The (most ironic) poison fruit, poisons us still:

“Some American groups, particularly neoconservatives came to believe that they were responsible for the fall of the Soviet Union. The Islamists that fought also believed that they were responsible for the fall of the union, and this may have indirectly lead to 9/11. Osama bin Laden, for example asserting the credit for ‘the collapse of the Soviet Union ... goes to God and the mujahidin in Afghanistan ... the US had no mentionable role,’ but ‘collapse made the US more haughty and arrogant.’”

But, as we have learned from tragic effect, they are absolutely incapable of learning anything from history:

“Some participants felt leverage was not the main issue; rather, US policymakers knowingly abandoned Afghanistan to the Pakistanis and Saudis to ‘sort out’ Afghanistan’s future. However, the participant said, ‘The Pak-Saudi agenda for Afghanistan was totally ruinous . . . it was [that] agenda which leads to Al Qaeda and all the rest of it. . . . Did you not see this in 1992, as it emerges?’”

The obvious answer is either “no” or they just didn’t think it mattered very much.

Regardless, the Soviets didn’t attack the US over arming its enemies in Afghanistan, we didn’t attack China for arming our enemies in Korea and Vietnam and China didn’t attack us for arming theirs. Pakistan has illegal nuclear weapons, Maddrassas, a Muslim population that is far more radicalized than Iran and it arms Islamic radicals who kill our troops in Afghanistan while it provides safe haven to Osama bin Laden (if he's still alive). We call it an ally.

In any event, the people who have shaped the foreign and military policy of the United States for the past seven years (especially Vice President Cheney) are not the people who should be allowed anywhere near that sort of power ever again. Just as their authoritarianism, bellicosity and aggression has made Osama bin Laden’s fondest wishes come true it has also driven the price of oil to record highs, funneling ever more $billions to countries like Iran and Russia even as it unites Muslim nations against us and weakens us economically and militarily.

If the nation’s political and media leaders had either the slightest bit of level-headed judgement or a functioning moral compass the neoconservatives wouldn't be setting the agenda, they would be driven from the public sphere in shame and eventually tried for their crimes against humanity.

[Cross-posted at Dispassionate Liberal]

Here it is -- we (you and I) are slated to spend $2.4 trillion (with a T) over the next 10 years on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The White House brushed off the estimate as too conditional. "It's just a ton of speculation," said White House press secretary Dana Perino. "We don't know how much the war is going to cost in the future."

Better not to think about the future. Same goes for how we got here -- that's the past and we certainly don't want to dwell on that either. All there is, is today. Live in the moment! That's the ticket.

House Democratic Caucus Chairman Rahm Emanuel, D-Ill., said voters were suffering from "sticker shock...America's future is being held hostage by the cost of the war," he said.

His concern would be most admirable if it wasn't totally covered in crap. Why doesn't he just say "no" to more funding? Why doesn't he, you know, lead the way to ending the war?

It reminds me of something I saw while watching the trailer for that new Robert Redford movie, Lions for Lambs. In it, Reford's character said this:

"They bank on your apathy. They plan strategies around it...The problem is not with the people who started this. The problem is with us -- who do nothing."

Don't just sit there: call your Congressman. NOW.

Call Rahm Emanuel.

Call Nancy Pelosi.

Tell them -- again, as many times as it takes -- "no." Just "no."

"The problem is with us who do nothing."

Look everybody -- the buck finally stops over there:

After a frustrating search for a new "war czar" to oversee the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, ABC News has learned that President Bush has chosen the Pentagon's director of operations, Lt. Gen. Douglas Lute, for the role.

In the newly created position of assistant to the president and deputy national security adviser for Iraq and Afghanistan policy and implementation, Lute would have the power to direct the Pentagon, State Department and other agencies involved in the two conflicts.

Excuse me for asking, but isn't this why we have a National Security Advisor?

Lute would report directly to the president and to National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley.

...freeing up Hadley to...to...just what exactly does Stephen Hadley do again?

Filling the position had become a priority for the White House, after a handful of retired generals told the White House they did not want the job.

They turned down the Commander in Chief? Is that how far we've come now?

Among them, retired Marine Corps four-star Gen. Jack Sheehan, who proved an embarrassment to the White House after he wrote an op-ed piece in the Washington Post saying there were "huge shortcomings" in the White House view of the strategy in Iraq.

"What I found in discussions with current and former members of this administration," wrote Sheehan, "is that there is no agreed upon strategic view of the Iraq problem or the region."

In other words, we have no idea where we're going but we're making really good time.

Lute must gain congressional approval before he can assume the position.

...which is right next to Alberto Gonzalez, George Tenet and Harriet Miers.

(cross posted at Daily Kos)

Recently, while browsing another blog's comment thread I was brought up short when I came upon this statement:

It’s still unclear where the main source of our problem in Iraq lies.

Gosh, where do we start?

But let's cut the snark and try to answer the man's question. Because until we can do that, not only will we have lost the Iraq war, we will have embarked on a path that will lead to one disastrous war after another, being bled dry by "leaders" who want one thing only: ultimate power.

Shorter Charles Krauthammer:

We have to keep fighting the war in Iraq, against the fanatics in Afghanistan, because that’s where the oil is.

• Economic indicators (including consumer confidence) are pointing downwards.
• Remember the Taliban? They're back.
• Jack Murtha has seen the ISG's recommendations and he is not impressed.

(Video included below)
(Cross posted to Daily Kos)

If I were a Democratic challenger for Congress, I'd use any (or all) of the following issues to beat my Republican opponent like a rented mule.

In no particular order:

• The latest Abramoff revelations,
  
• Foley sex scandal and the resulting House leadership crisis
  
• Troubles in Iraq (including the Saudis building a 550 mile security fence along their Iraqi border)
  
• Troubles in Afghanistan
  
• The Iraqi poll showing we are not greeted as liberators by the by the Iraqis.
  
• Woodward's book

The formula is simple:

1. Bush is atrocious
2. The Republican incumbent IS Bush
3. So the Republican incumbent is atrocious.
4. Had enough? Then vote for change, vote Democratic.

[I posted this before I saw Mark's previous post below. Sorry, Mark!]

Slated for Fox News Sunday, Sept. 24:

Chris WALLACE: Do you think you did enough [to get Bin Laden] sir?

CLINTON: No, because I didn’t get him.

WALLACE: Right…

CLINTON: But at least I tried. That’s the difference in me and some, including all the right wingers who are attacking me now. They ridiculed me for trying. They had eight months to try and they didn’t…I tried. So I tried and failed. When I failed I left a comprehensive anti-terror strategy and the best guy in the country, Dick Clarke… So you did FOX’s bidding on this show. You did you nice little conservative hit job on me. But what I want to know..

WALLACE: Now wait a minute sir…

CLINTON:…

WALLACE: I asked a question. You don’t think that’s a legitimate question?

CLINTON: It was a perfectly legitimate question but I want to know how many people in the Bush administration you asked this question of. I want to know how many people in the Bush administration you asked: Why didn’t you do anything about the Cole? I want to know how many you asked: Why did you fire Dick Clarke? I want to know…

WALLACE: We asked…

CLINTON:…

WALLACE: Do you ever watch Fox News Sunday sir?

CLINTON: I don’t believe you ask them that.

WALLACE: We ask plenty of questions of…

CLINTON: You didn’t ask that did you? Tell the truth.

WALLACE: About the USS Cole?

CLINTON: Tell the truth.

WALLACE: I…with Iraq and Afghanistan there’s plenty of stuff to ask.

CLINTON: Did you ever ask that?

This seminal work on 4GW can be downloaded here.

Another good sourcebook is The Sling and the Stone: On War in the 21st Century which I've put, ahem, on my wish list.

by Mark Adams

Some things have been bugging me.

• Where's bin Laden?
• What's Turkey's problem with a Kurdish homeland?
• Why haven't Richard Perle and Doug Feith been used as scapegoats for the Iraq mess?
• How on Earth does Dennis Hastert remain Speaker of the House?

Then along comes a tale from former FBI interpreter, Sibel Edmonds, and her wrongful termination suit for blowing the whistle on what looks for all the world like a spy ring and corruption scandal that could expose our entire Middle East policy as a criminal enterprise.

"State Secrets" is the excuse that has slammed the door on her every attempt to get this matter fully investigated.  The little she is permitted to say without violating the gag order promises more questions than answers, but it started with talk of a bag of cash delivered to Dennis Hastert and leads to speculation that our entire Middle East policy is not some Zionist conspiracy, but a con game by the Turkish Mafia played on US neo-cons.

Keep reading, this is the tip of the iceberg.
As Mike Mejia advises: "Okay, take a deep breath and take a step back: it’s not a pretty picture. "