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RedditDon't expect any miracles after President Karzai's decision to accept a second round in the much-disputed Afghan elections. (The latest totals give Karzai 49.7 percent of the vote from the August election, just under the 50 percent needed to avoid a runoff. Earlier, Karzai had claimed 54 percent of the vote.)
First of all, it's unlikely that a second round of elections will be much fairer, or better run, than the fraud-marred first round. Turnout, which was estimated to be about 30 percent in the August round, may fall further. In Pashtun areas, and in areas where the Taliban is strong, turnout was often 5 percent -- or less.
Second, the extreme international pressure on Karzai makes him seem puppet-like, in spite of his defiance. He was called or visited by virtually the entire US government, and British Prime Minister Brown called Karzai three times in three days. Senator Kerry, who traveled to Afghanistan, met repeatedly with Karzai. In deciding to go along with a second round of elections, perhaps Karzai was acceding to the inevitable. But to many Afghans, his decision will look like what it is: a humiliating capitulation to US-UK pressure and intimidation. That can hardly enhance Karzai's ability to present himself as a credible national leader.
Third, whatever the outcome, the road ahead is extremely difficult. Perhaps Karzai will be reelected, the most likely outcome. Perhaps Karzai and his challenger, Abdullah Abdullah, will strike a deal, either after the election -- to form a coalition of sorts -- or before it happens, thus making a second round unnecessary. But in either case, the resulting government in Kabul will still be seen by the armed opposition, including the Taliban and its allies, and by the majority of the ethnic Pashtuns as one-sided, representing the interests of the old Northern Alliance, and the ethnic Tajik, Uzbek and Hazara minorities that dominate it.
The path to a passably stable Afghanistan will require a new Afghan national compact, one that results in a rebalanced, power-sharing agreement between the ruling powers in Kabul and the Pashtuns. That, in turn, will mean accommodating the Taliban, or most of it, and winning the support of the Taliban's backers in Pakistan.
President Karzai has repeatedly declared his willingess to negotiate a deal with the Taliban and to convene a tribal council for reconcilation among Afghanistan's factions. Once the election crisis is out of the way, it will be critical for the United States and world powers to support Karzai in that direction -- making it clear, at the same time, that Karzai may ultimately have to step aside to make it work. That's the political solution to the war, and it will have to be underwritten by Afghanistan's neighbors, especially Pakistan, India and Iran, who are all heavily invested in support of Afghanistan's factions. (Iran, for instance, has strongly backed Abdullah.)
Too often, the Obama administration seems to indicate that they see the emergence of a new Afghan government under Karzai as critical to the counterinsurgency (COIN) policy that the generals are addicted to. But that's a formula for a Thirty Years' War. A new Afghan government could indeed kick start a solution there, but only if it's focused on a diplomatic and political settlement, not an escalated war.
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Robert Dreyfuss
A chronicle of America's adventures in foreign policy and national security.
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I admit ignorance -- who is Abdullah, in what ways does he claim to be substantively different from Karzai, practically what would be different if he wasis there any indication that the Afghanis care.
Posted by gren at 10/21/2009 @ 08:59am
Posted by gren at 10/21/2009 @ 08:59am | ignore this person | warn this person
See Abdullah Abdullah's Unmentioned History - 08/09 - The Nation - Crossette for a little backround.
Posted by OneVote at 10/21/2009 @ 09:28am
I have two concerns about Afghanistan. The first is to reduce the chances of any future proxy wars in Afghanistan. The second is to reduce Pakistani anxiety over the use of some Afghan organizations by India. I believe it is in the interests of Pakistan, Iran, and, of course, Afghanistan that they have friendly relations between them. If it would be acceptable to the present Afghan government, Pakistan and Iran might cooperate in training the Afghanistan army. A close relationship between the Pakistan and Afghan armies would be helpful in dealing border problems that are a mutual concern. These countries have a fairly good relationship now, but closer ties might be useful. These relationships should not involve their individual relationships with India. I believe it would be helpful to relations between India and Pakistan if tensions were reduced on one border. Accidental conflicts can have unforeseen consequences.
Posted by pjcasey at 10/21/2009 @ 12:08pm
This is what we should have said to the Afghans in 2001:
"The time has come for Afghanistan to decide whether she will continue to be controlled by those self-willed militaristic advisers whose unintelligent calculations have brought their homeland to the threshold of annihilation, or whether she will follow the path of reason.
Following are our terms. We will not deviate from them. There are no alternatives. We shall brook no delay.
There must be eliminated for all time the authority and influence of those who have deceived and misled the people of Afghanistan into embarking on global jihad, for we insist that a new order of peace, security and justice will be impossible until irresponsible militarism is driven from the world.
The Afghan Government shall remove all obstacles to the revival and strengthening of democratic tendencies among the Afghan people. Freedom of speech, of religion, and of thought, as well as respect for all of the fundamental human rights shall be established. They shall not ever be infringed even slightly. Women are to have full equal rights and privileges for all time.
All terrorists camps must be destroyed immediately and those training at them exterminated without any slight hint of mercy."
Instead, we've set up an undemocratic, brutal, evil militant Islamist and misogynistic Iranian puppet regime allied with tribalists and theocrats and crazed warlords out of fear that we would inflame "Muslim opinion" if we did anything more forceful. Bush's politically correct appeasement of the world's most intolerant creed in history is a pathetic, laughable, and cowardly disgrace, a capitulation of American values and a sign that we lack the moral certainty to impose them by force if necessary.
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/21/2009 @ 5:22pm
Kerry and the Obamanation have pulled off a great political ploy using the Afghanistan election as their excuse for denying their general's request for more troops and allowing more of our troops to be killed before the Obamanation and the Demoncrats failing miserably in the future in the war on terror defund, cut and run!
They get an A in planing for failure!
Posted by BigPasture at 10/21/2009 @ 6:07pm
An Easy Military Decision for Obama: He Asks 'Brave' Troops to Compete in Green Government Contest!
Guess he doesn't want the military polluting the air of the world using those heavily armored gas, jet fuel, and diesel using military vehicles, planes, and drones! And all that smoke from those nasty guns and artillery are really adding to pollution!
Posted by BigPasture at 10/21/2009 @ 6:24pm
They get an A in planing for failure! Posted by BigPasture at 10/21/2009 @ 6:07pm |
Dubya's plan (or lack thereof).
Dubya's failure (to focus on Al Qaeda instead of Iraq).
Posted by snowball777 at 10/21/2009 @ 7:45pm
Obama plans to fail in Afghanistan!
In asking for new troops, McChrystal told the White House, "Failure to gain the initiative and reverse insurgent momentum in the near-term (next 12 months) -- while Afghan security capacity matures -- risks an outcome where defeating the insurgency is no longer possible."
McChrystal's timeline began Aug. 30, meaning those critical 12 months are ticking, down to 10-1/2 months today. In other words, the four-star general is running out of time to turn the tide of battle against the resurgent Taliban.
Yet on Sunday, Rahm Emanuel, White House chief of staff, announced a significant delay in deciding whether to meet the general's request for up to 40,000 more troops.
The White House's latest position is that the political situation in Afghanistan must be settled first. A runoff election is set for early next month. But deciding whether the runoff has resulted in the kind of government the White House likes (and is sufficiently unencumbered by charges of election fraud) could takes weeks or months longer, leaving McChrystal little option but to do the best with the 68,000 American troops allotted.
Other military experts say the White House-imposed delay is dangerous to American troops.
"Once a commander makes a decision and it is changed by higher authority you've got a problem," Sam Cockerham, a retired Army general who commanded a helicopter combat brigade in Vietnam, told Human Events. "You get a morale problem. You get a focus problem. You get the troops down at a lower level, the squadron level, saying 'why the hell am I doing this when the president doesn't want to do it.'" McChrystal is not political. He's is telling what has to be done if you want to win. If we can't support Gen. McChrystal we cannot win."
Posted by BigPasture at 10/21/2009 @ 7:58pm
deaths of soldiers don't bother me as much as civilian deaths."
"soldiers are trained to kill. so if they die, oh well."
Posted by darladoon at 10/17/2009 @ 12:41pm | ignore this person | warn this person
QUOTE OF THE CENTURY! from the most honest leftist HATER we know! ?
We know Darlaloon hates herself and all American soldiers who she would rather see DEAD! She is the Islamic fascist terrorist best friend at home!
Intresting how so many leftist including the so called comander in chief "sign on" to her philosophy in so many vicarious ways!
Posted by BigPasture at 10/21/2009 @ 8:02pm
Intresting how so many leftist including the so called comander in chief "sign on" to her philosophy in so many vicarious ways!
Posted by BigPasture at 10/21/2009 @ 8:02pm
Bush, the so called lover of troops, send 400 Americans off to die in an illegal an unnecessary war, yet it's the left that hates the troops.
Un-friggin-believable.
If you gave a damn about the troops, you'd think twice about sending them off to war every time you get a hard on.
Posted by Shingo at 10/21/2009 @ 10:55pm
Obama plans to fail in Afghanistan!
In asking for new troops, McChrystal told the White House, "Failure to gain the initiative and reverse insurgent momentum in the near-term (next 12 months) -- while Afghan security capacity matures -- risks an outcome where defeating the insurgency is no longer possible."
Posted by BigPasture at 10/21/2009 @ 7:58pm
New troops? What's wrong with the old ones?
It's pretty obvious that McChrystal is just covering his ass because he doesn't want to go down as the General under who's watch the US let Afghanistan defeated.
The US military have had 8 and a half year to get it right, all all they have to show for it is a stalemate, having told us in 2003/2004 that the war had been won.
Just like Patreaus, all McChrystal is thinking about is his own career and epitaph. Just keep the situation at bay for long enough to spin it as though the job was done and long enough to hand the poisoned chalice to the next schmuck who can be blamed for the inevitable failure.
Posted by Shingo at 10/21/2009 @ 11:06pm
Posted by Shingo at 10/21/2009 @ 10:55pm | ignore this person | warn this person
Just as long as its infidel unbelivers such as you its worth the cost!
Posted by BigPasture at 10/21/2009 @ 11:08pm
"The US military have had 8 and a half year to get it right, all all they have to show for it is a stalemate"
That's because we didn't go far enough. We weren't nearly forceful enough. And we failed to stand for human rights.
As I already said:
"This is what we should have said to the Afghans in 2001:
"The time has come for Afghanistan to decide whether she will continue to be controlled by those self-willed militaristic advisers whose unintelligent calculations have brought their homeland to the threshold of annihilation, or whether she will follow the path of reason.
Following are our terms. We will not deviate from them. There are no alternatives. We shall brook no delay.
There must be eliminated for all time the authority and influence of those who have deceived and misled the people of Afghanistan into embarking on global jihad, for we insist that a new order of peace, security and justice will be impossible until irresponsible militarism is driven from the world.
The Afghan Government shall remove all obstacles to the revival and strengthening of democratic tendencies among the Afghan people. Freedom of speech, of religion, and of thought, as well as respect for all of the fundamental human rights shall be established. They shall not ever be infringed even slightly. Women are to have full equal rights and privileges for all time.
All terrorists camps must be destroyed immediately and those training at them exterminated without any slight hint of mercy."
Instead, we've set up an undemocratic, brutal, evil militant Islamist and misogynistic Iranian puppet regime allied with tribalists and theocrats and crazed warlords out of fear that we would inflame "Muslim opinion" if we did anything more forceful."
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/21/2009 @ 11:30pm
Just as long as its infidel unbelivers such as you its worth the cost!
Posted by BigPasture at 10/21/2009 @ 11:08pm
That's what Madelaine Alright said about the deaths of half a million Iraqi children in the 90's.
Gutless chicken hawks like yourself are always prepared to fight to the last drop of other people's blood, even when it's for no other reason that to make you feel like the man you wished you were.
Posted by Shingo at 10/21/2009 @ 11:32pm
"Just like Patreaus, all McChrystal is thinking about is his own career and epitaph."
Hmm....
Shingo, you DO realize that the surge saved Iraq from a massive genocidal holocaust and that we've won the war, right?
You hate the general who accomplished this anyway?
Do you wish millions of Iraqis had died? I know you love genocide and slavery and tryanny, but it's always surprising how passionate you can be when advocating your position.
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/21/2009 @ 11:35pm
It looks like the Afghan war is hopeless unless we just send in more than 60,000 troops, so I say just send in 100,000 or withdraw.
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/21/2009 @ 11:38pm
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/21/2009 @ 11:30pm
That's because we didn't go far enough. We weren't nearly forceful enough. And we failed to stand for human rights.
You mean, we didn't kill enough people.
"The time has come for Afghanistan to decide whether she will continue to be controlled by those self-willed militaristic advisers whose unintelligent calculations have brought their homeland to the threshold of annihilation, or whether she will follow the path of reason."
Translation: You can be rules by the Taliban or ruled by the US.
"Following are our terms. We will not deviate from them. There are no alternatives. We shall brook no delay."
Sounds like the Borg from Star Trek. You are about to be assimilated, resistance is futile. Behold our great leader.
Instead, we've set up an undemocratic, brutal, evil militant Islamist and misogynistic Iranian puppet regime allied with tribalists and theocrats and crazed warlords out of fear that we would inflame "Muslim opinion" if we did anything more forceful."
That's because it's what we've always done. It's the only thing we know how to do. We're good at supporting brutal puppet regimes, not nation building.
It's time we stopped kidding ourselves.
Posted by Shingo at 10/21/2009 @ 11:39pm
"Sounds like the Borg from Star Trek."
Actually, it's the Postdam Declaration adopted for Afghanistan.
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/21/2009 @ 11:41pm
Madelaine Alright
Posted by Shingo at 10/21/2009 @ 11:32pm | ignore this person | warn this person
Its Albright, but then she never said what you posted, even if I think she is one of the worst appointments to office ever made!
Posted by BigPasture at 10/21/2009 @ 11:45pm
Its Albright, but then she never said what you posted, even if I think she is one of the worst appointments to office ever made!
Posted by BigPasture at 10/21/2009 @ 11:45pm
Of course she said what I posted. It's available on numerous podcasts in mp3 format.
I agree she is one of the worst appointments to office ever made, but then again, the policies she advocated were inherited from James Baker, so that makes him also one of the worst appointments to office ever made!
Posted by Shingo at 10/21/2009 @ 11:57pm
Actually, it's the Postdam Declaration adopted for Afghanistan.
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/21/2009 @ 11:41pm
Adopted for Afghanistan or by Afghanistan? There's a huge difference.
Posted by Shingo at 10/21/2009 @ 11:58pm
The election outcome is a setback to US and NATO allies, as they supported their puppet Karzai. So they kept mum about he election fraud.Let us see, the results of the next election. WITH OR WITHOUT KARZAI THE WAR IS LOSING.KARZAI IS THE PRESIDENT OF THE CAPITAL KABUL ONLY.TALIBAN RULE THE REST.
Posted by Dastu11 at 10/22/2009 @ 03:54am
I juar went to Abdullah's campaign website and all I can say is that he is using the same themes that Obama used in 2008.
Other than that, I think the administration sees support for a runoff as a chance to score points with the Afghan people. If Karzai wins, we'll simplly point to our support for a runoff as an indication of our willingnes to get tough on him. If Abdullah wins, we'll simply claim that the people have spoken and continue the war with the support of the new president. Above all, what the administration really seemed to fear was a win by Ramazan Bashardost.
Posted by nkurland at 10/22/2009 @ 11:10am
Conservatives: I pray that God will burn you for what you did in Iraq, it was you Conservative war-hawks who insisted it was "necessary" to give Saddam Hussein chemical weapons, insisted it was okay when he killed people with them, then insisted it was "necessary" to give him some more. Most of the people Saddam Hussein killed were during the Iran Iraq war, which it was you who insisted that Reagan had to support, out of "national security". Conservatives, it was because of your lies about mobile biological weapons labs and fleets of un-manned drones capable of crossing the Atlantic and spraying chemicals on Americans, Conservatives it was your lies about grateful happy Iraqis, Conservatives it was your lies about efficient private contractors, Conservatives it was on your watch that the crates of $100 bills got lost over there, Conservatives it was on your watch that the weapons depots werent secured, Conservatives F--- you because you dont have any right to talk about a "surge", because you're known liars and idiot Bush-dupes.
Posted by DPGrassley at 10/22/2009 @ 3:29pm
Wasnt supposed to be any "surge". Supposed to have been a cake-walk. F--- Conservatives.
Posted by DPGrassley at 10/22/2009 @ 3:30pm
I just wanted to be the first to offer my congrats to Robert Dreyfuss on his latest piece for the mag, "How to Get Out".
I've been quite critical of his coverage of the Iranian post-election miasma, in particular, his --and the magazine's-- lack of acknowledgment of well documented indications of US intelligence involvement in fomenting the so-called Green Revolution. Lately, we've seen renewed evidence of US involvement in fomenting amongst Sunni malcontents in extreme SE Iran (Baluchistan) with the --US "mainstream media" noted-- attack on high ranking Revolutionary Guards there.
We can, and should, all hope for worldwide developments that bode well for a more peaceful and cooperative future --including a Green Revolution if it eventually helps positively contribute.
But please excuse me for being deeply skeptical of the honesty and integrity of official (and unofficial) US efforts to bring these changes about. The body politic, unfortunately, is very unlike a human body in that entire organ systems so often are determined to wrest away the control and useful function of other organs and organ systems --to the grave detriment of the body as a whole.
The core principle of the defenders of democracy is that we must have an educated critical mass of citizenry to regulate our homeostasis and keep major organs from going, essentially, cancerous against the whole.
The Nation magazine, I believe, is a very important component in this effort. I sincerely hope we can all keep up enough intellectual and political pressure on the severely bleeding wounds of the current US body politic to enable the survival of our dangerously traumatized democracy.
Again, thanks for the fine article, Robert.
Peace, ~B
Posted by b_kool_66 at 10/22/2009 @ 3:58pm
"President Karzai has repeatedly declared his willingess to negotiate a deal with the Taliban and to convene a tribal council for reconcilation among Afghanistan's factions."
That is important to remember. There is no such thing in as a victory in Afghanistan, from a Western viewpoint. The Taliban is never going away, we cannot eliminate them militarily or economically. I can only guess right now, but it seems that for the average citizen in Afghanistan, victory means another foreign invader gone, and hopefully as little ethnic cleansing and revenge murders as possible afterward. That is what Karzai is trying to secure, he's not trying to turn his country into Florida. There will not be any significant improvement in the quality of life in Afghanistan in the foreseeable future no matter how much money we dump into the place.
Posted by Milhaus at 10/22/2009 @ 6:06pm
Wasnt supposed to be any "surge". Supposed to have been a cake-walk. F--- Conservatives.
Posted by DPGrassley at 10/22/2009 @ 3:30pm
Did the doctors forget to give you your meds today?
Posted by antisocialist at 10/22/2009 @ 6:37pm
That is important to remember. There is no such thing in as a victory in Afghanistan, from a Western viewpoint. The Taliban is never going away, we cannot eliminate them militarily or economically.
Posted by Milhaus at 10/22/2009 @ 6:06pm
That's what many on the right have trouble getting their heads around. They insist we stay until we have a victory a la WWII, with ticker tape parades and brass bands marching down the main streets of Kabul. So until that happens, they will insist we remain.
In the case of Iraq, some realized this was never going to happen, so their answer is to invent victory days to celebrate the victory we never had.
Posted by Shingo at 10/22/2009 @ 7:41pm
"That's what many on the right have trouble getting their heads around. They insist we stay until we have a victory a la WWII, with ticker tape parades and brass bands marching down the main streets of Kabul. So until that happens, they will insist we remain."
It won't happen until we brutalize the Afghan populace sufficiently in order to force them to accept freedom and force their government to stop supporting Islam.
Maybe we should just let the Taliban take over Afghanistan again. Bush refused to eliminate its leadership with overwhelming force. Now, they are dispersed widely and spread over Pakistan. Let's let them take over, and wait for them to march on the capital and consolidate control. We'll wait until we get intelligence about the location or locations of all the important Taliban leaders and the bulk of their forces and wait for them to congregate in places like Kabul. Then we'll do to those cities what we did to Hiroshima and Nagasaki. We will vow to keep taking out cities until the Taliban surrenders or is rendered impotent. We will then write a new Constitution for the Afghans guaranteeing them the exact same rights we enjoy. We will arrange to have Karzai assassinated. We will work to assassinate Islamist Afghan politicians covertly. We will remind the Afghans that their sorrow is a result of their own foolish actions and that if they want to be prosperous and happy and free, they must embrace the values that have made us so much richer, happier, and stronger than them. We will remind them that all the deaths from Hiroshima-style bombs dropped on them are the fault of the Afghans who resisted the US occupation. We will covertly assassinate all militant Islamic leaders and Mullahs we can.
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/22/2009 @ 10:19pm
It won't happen until we brutalize the Afghan populace sufficiently in order to force them to accept freedom and force their government to stop supporting Islam.
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/22/2009 @ 10:19pm |
Brutalize the Afghan populace? Wow, my head is about to explode at the deranged ideology behind such a statement. How has that worked before? How does brutalizing a populace win hearts and minds and convince them that the freedom we represent is in their best interests? How does nuking cities in Afghanistan bring freedom?
I take it your post was an attempt at sarcasm. After all, brutalizing the population and while guaranteeing them the exact same rights we enjoy is a complete contradiction. One of the rights we enjoy is freedom from occupation and the right not to be brutalized.
You exemplify the very reason why we have no chance of success in Afghanistan. Freedom can only come from a society's desire for it. You cannot for it upon people down the barrel of a gun. Even in Iraq, the government there is becoming increasingly authoritarian and Iraq is retuning to a police state.
The Taliban may not be liked, but unlike the occupation forces, and the local police, they can offer security, so ironically, they are more trusted. Face it, the war in Afghanistan is lost and the American public have o stomach for doing "to those cities what we did to Hiroshima and Nagasaki" or "taking out cities until the Taliban surrenders" or "assassinate Karzai", which itself woudl be odd, given that we installed him.
What your advocating is a continuation of a cycle of failure we have witnessed over the past 8 years.
Posted by Shingo at 10/23/2009 @ 01:22am
Now that is really funny there sHiNgO! How do you have a cycle of failure if little was even attempted or done over the last 8 yrs. in Afghanistan? (just as the Obamanation and leftist claimed)
It has been status quo since we ran the taliban out until now since al qaeada has been run out of Iraq into pakistan where they are allying with the taliban and local terrorist raising "cane" on both sides of the border. Our biggist problem security and resolving that country is the "I can't decider" Obamanation in the W.H.!
Posted by BigPasture at 10/23/2009 @ 02:21am
Posted by BigPasture at 10/23/2009 @ 02:21am
let me explain it to you BigPasture.
You see, we've been in Afghanistan nearly twice as long as we were in involved in WWII, so there has been ample time for cycles to emerge.
The cycle was mirrored with Iraq. In both cases, we had our mission accomplished moment, until we figured out that we were losing. In fact in 2004, the war lovers were holding up Afghanistan as an example of success. What a joke that turned out to be.
The right keep insisting that we can have victory and a ticker tape parade so long as we stay long enough, be it 10, 50 or 100 years, but the fact is that the war was lost long before Obama came to power.
Posted by Shingo at 10/23/2009 @ 02:46am
Shingo, brutalizing the populace until they stop allowing the Taliban to exist and realize that any resistance is futile is the only way to force them to be free. That's what we did to the Japanese and it worked.
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/23/2009 @ 06:57am
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/22/2009 @ 10:19pm | ignore this person | warn this person
OK Captain America. Why stop at Afghanistan if that is really the mission, because even if we succeed at ousting them there (which means they die of old age in another country) then it will be the same fight in another country, and another. When all the countries run out we will start back at the beginning again. We can do it people. I don't want to hear any complaints about how your tax money is being spent, on any matter, ever.
Posted by Milhaus at 10/23/2009 @ 07:09am
I find it interesting that the Nation has an article from its Editor about not escalating the Afghan war, alongside an article about how not escalating would be disastrous for Afghan women, alongside this article about the run-off election in Afghanistan and how it might affect American security and military interests.
Afghanistan has a different culture from ours; one in which women are second class (if not lower) citizens; in which tribal leaders are the norm; in which the drug trade is their major source of income, and there is no sense of a centralized government and almost never has been in the history of the nation.
Regardless of what morons like "rightwingnutcase" say, we cannot impose our society on theirs; we cannot "build" a state where not has previously existed. While I feel for the oppressed people of Afghanistan (especially the women), we cannot impose anything on them (like the Russians tried) by sheer force of will. We can bomb them to hell and back, but that won't do anything except kill people, will it? We can send them money to rebuild infrastructure, but because of the warlords and tribal chieftains, that money will inevitably be used to either sell more drugs or buy more guns.
Every uprising in human history has been because the oppressed people stood up against the oppressors and fought for what they wanted. No uprising or nation was built from outside, with foreign money or power.
Personally, I believe we must pull out of Afghanistan, and I am actually unhappy in saying this. A culture of appreciating women cannot be imposed, especially by another culture [ours] that doesn't appreciate women. A culture of anti-drug production cannot be imposed, especially be another culture [ours] that is a major consumer of drugs. Truly, truly sad.
Posted by Stephen_Carver1 at 10/23/2009 @ 12:05pm
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/22/2009 @ 10:19pm
Wow. Seig Heil!
Posted by Stephen_Carver1 at 10/23/2009 @ 12:10pm
OK Captain America.
Posted by Milhaus at 10/23/2009 @ 07:09am
Please don't disparage Captain America by comparing him to "nutcase." Nutcase is in now way comparable.
:-)
Posted by Stephen_Carver1 at 10/23/2009 @ 12:23pm
I support the Biden counter-terrorism strategy with two or three wrinkles: 1) additional forces for counter-insurgency efforts need to come from NATO allies or Afghans--we can develop a program to train in those programs (unless it's all about extrajudicial killing) but can't spare the troops; 2) regional militias in the North need to be empowered; 3) somewhere in the South, we should assist the Afghans in or setting up an autonomous zone for Taliban-type sharia.
I don't know Afghan geography enough to name the place, but I can describe it: That zone should be habitable, but ringed by mountains, not near the strategic Kandahar-Kabul highway, someplace where the Karzai government is already irrelevant.
I know it didn't work in Swat in Pakistan, but this is a different country. There will never be a strong central government in Afghanistan, even with--especially with--a 30-year occupation.
At the same time, we can not tolerate a new Taliban regime in Kabul, and there is no need to do so. If they mass their armies again, we will rout them again--and this time wipe them out completely.
Posted by chinshihtang at 10/23/2009 @ 12:56pm
"A culture of appreciating women cannot be imposed, especially by another culture [ours] that doesn't appreciate women."
Our cultural values are superior to the primitive, inferior, mystical cultural values of otherworldly emotion and inciting jihad that Afghans subscribe to. We should encourage them to abandon such ideals and embrace our way of life. There is no co-equivalent legitimacy between the way we treat women and the way they do.
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/23/2009 @ 7:33pm
I think it's also time for us to start using the CIA to infiltrate mosques and to assassinate the preachers in them throughout Europe, the Middle East, and America whenever we find them inciting their audience to jihad or anti-Western/anti-civilization/anti-woman sentiment.
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/23/2009 @ 9:02pm
The war in Afghanistan should have been simple.
All we had to do was obliterate, from high altitude and long distance, all known Taliban military assets, all known and suspected terrorist training camps, all Taliban government buildings, all Afghan mosques and madrassahs, and the residences of all Taliban and Taliban-affiliated and suspected Taliban-affiliated leaders, imams, clerics, and government officials. We should have hit these targets when they were most likely to be occupied (mosques during the day and residences at night). We should have carried out this bombing without warning and sustained it indefinitely until it was clear the Taliban was essentially neutralized. During this time, we should have allowed no food packets or humanitarian aid into Afghanistan. We then should have sent in an overwhelming force of hundreds of thousands of American troops to occupy the country with orders to weed out and destroy all remaining resistance. Then, we could have moved on to sending in humanitarian aid and building a stable Afghan democracy with a good Constitution that does not allow for unlimited majority rule.
Bush is pathetic. That's all he had to do! It is so simple; how could he have fucked up so badly? If he had started out with hundreds of thousands of troops in Iraq, the war would have cost much less in terms of human life, the insurgency and Shiite retaliation would have been prevented, and Iraq's borders secured. Bush's utterly extraordinary incompetence and stupidity has cost tens of thousands of innocent people their lives.
Posted by destroyevil at 10/24/2009 @ 12:27am
"All we had to do was obliterate, from high altitude and long distance, all known Taliban military assets, all known and suspected terrorist training camps, all Taliban government buildings, all Afghan mosques and madrassahs, and the residences of all Taliban and Taliban-affiliated and suspected Taliban-affiliated leaders, imams, clerics, and government officials. We should have hit these targets when they were most likely to be occupied (mosques during the day and residences at night). We should have carried out this bombing without warning and sustained it indefinitely until it was clear the Taliban was essentially neutralized. During this time, we should have allowed no food packets or humanitarian aid into Afghanistan. We then should have sent in an overwhelming force of hundreds of thousands of American troops to occupy the country with orders to weed out and destroy all remaining resistance. Then, we could have moved on to sending in humanitarian aid and building a stable Afghan democracy with a good Constitution that does not allow for unlimited majority rule."
And by the way, when we were done with that, we should have done the same thing to the Taliban's clone in Saudi Arabia, and done the same thing to Sudan, and Syria.
Posted by destroyevil at 10/24/2009 @ 12:46am
Posted by destroyevil at 10/24/2009 @ 12:46am | ignore this person | warn this person
Your comments display a total lack of understanding of politics, military capability, and human nature. Also you have bad morals.
Posted by Milhaus at 10/24/2009 @ 10:06am
"Your comments display a total lack of understanding of politics, military capability, and human nature. Also you have bad morals."
Do you think that Bush's "compassionate approach" to Afghanistan has been better for the Afghan people?
We've been there nearly 9 years under Bush's stupid, incompetent plan. The Taliban is resurgent. Afghanistan is on the verge of collapse into brutal civil war and a Taliban takeover. The Taliban is able to beat and gas little girls at will for going to school. Afghanistan is a brutal Islamic theocracy run by Iran that enslaves women and kills apostates. Bin Laden has gotten away. Mullah Omar has gotten away. Most of the Taliban and AQ, located in masses before the war, is dispersed and widely spread out into nuclear-armed Pakistan. The Pakistani government may collapse at the hands of the jihadists. We'll be in Afghanistan for years, perhaps decades, fighting a futile fight.
This approach has brought both the American people and the Afghan people nothing but misery. While I suppose Bush was vaguely better than leaving the Taliban in power indefinitely, his strategy has failed spectacularly.
There is no reason why the war in Afghanistan could not have been won by now. I think my strategy would have won it. Look at how long it took us to defeat Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan! Why should THE TALIBAN take decades to defeat? They're cavemen from the Stone Age!
Posted by destroyevil at 10/24/2009 @ 12:52pm
While Afghanistan was the correct main target for retaliation for the 9/11 attacks, the secondary targets of our response should have been Saudi Arabia and Syria. There is very little difference in human rights between the Taliban's Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia. More importantly, the Saudis train terrorists, create terrorists, indoctrinate terrorists, and fund terrorists with millions and millions of dollars every year. Most of the suicide bombers in Iraq came from Saudi Arabia. Most of the 9/11 attackers came from Saudi Arabia. The Saudis are the main state sponsor of AQ and the Taliban. They offer invaluable help to insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan in killing Americans every day. They are the maniacs whose slave state gave us Osama bin Laden. The Koran is their Constitution. Their regime is at war with us, and we should destroy it.
Syria, as the premier state sponsor of Sunni Islamic jihad, should have been taken out when we were done with Saudi Arabia. Not only was the regime recently on the verge of collapse, but its people desperately want it to fall. More importantly, the Syrian regime has killed hundreds of American soldiers in Iraq because the foreign jihadists almost always have to enter Iraq through their country. Syria supports and harbors and funds AQ. It is trying to develop nuclear weapons.
Instead, we threaten Iran, a Shiite country that is a staunch foe of AQ and has been waging a covert war against the Taliban for two decades. We invade the secular dictatorship of Iraq, an enemy of AQ that was not hostile towards the United States.
Posted by destroyevil at 10/24/2009 @ 1:08pm
Our cultural values are superior to the primitive, inferior, mystical cultural values of otherworldly emotion and inciting jihad that Afghans subscribe to. We should encourage them to abandon such ideals and embrace our way of life. There is no co-equivalent legitimacy between the way we treat women and the way they do.
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/23/2009 @ 7:33pm
Sounds like an excerpt from Mein Kampf.
Posted by Shingo at 10/25/2009 @ 9:41pm
Posted by destroyevil at 10/24/2009 @ 1:08pm | ignore this person | warn this person
Afghanistan was the correct main target to focus on for threat reduction, that much is clear. Let's not pretend that there was a better way to do it. There was no good way to do it, and we will be back again. That's the key, we will be back. Attempting to maintain this permanent militarization will help, but it doesn't have to be inside Afghanistan itself. The Taliban can be kept on the run without having a huge military force in country. When Dreyfus says that there needs to be a new new compact he is right, but we will have absolutely nothing to do with it whether we want to or not. Ancient and deeply rooted traditions of tribal bargaining patch together that country. Attempting to do so would make us just another obtuse foreign invader void of any understanding of how their society functions. Trying to drop a template of central government onto Afghanistan is stupid and ignorant. It will never happen, probably not even in a thousand years, and definitely not in 30. So lets not be naive. We will have to get our hands dirty fighting jihadists, but we have to make sure it's for the right reasons, and our own values are honored at all times. Failing to do that will only deliver a victory to them, not us. It is a matter of principle. Principles wrote our Constitution, and have driven our quest for liberty for over 200 years. We must respect that, and respecting that means carrying out this fight in the knowledge that every time we murder civilians to bomb one guy with a drone it is a victory for our enemy in this war. That's not true for all wars, but it is in this one.
Posted by Milhaus at 10/25/2009 @ 9:44pm
Posted by destroyevil at 10/24/2009 @ 1:08pm | ignore this person | warn this person
I have actually been forced to watch videos about how our "warrior culture" needs to be eliminated for the good of the Armed Forces. I was a young man sitting there thinking, "wait a minute, wtf is that supposed to mean." Because failure of the warrior code got Dresden fire bombed and Japan nuked. Those were not decisions made by our guys, those were politicians (and/or some Generals, same thing). These are marks of disgrace. It is impossible to fully understand why until you spend a lot of time talking to soldiers from friendly countries. It is painful memory for them, and they aren't even Americans. Severe breaches of honor are remembered and have real consequences for us.
Posted by Milhaus at 10/25/2009 @ 9:50pm
"Sounds like an excerpt from Mein Kampf."
Looks like I've fallen for the sin of thinking American cultural values are superior because they forbid the beating of wives to force them to perform sexual favors.
Shingo, as you yourself said, Americans would never have the stomach to nuke Afghans to defeat the Taliban. But the Taliban would happily use nukes to defeat us if they could build them. We are the more morally humane people.
The truth is, we could win the war by repeatedly nuking Afghanistan. Would that be morally justifiable? No. Of course not. Americans are willing to instead win the war by sacrificing their sons and daughters for freedom. They are willing to suffer so that the Afghan people have a better future. No other country is so humane. The USSR killed 1-2 million Afghans to oust the jihadists we defeated in a matter of weeks. In contrast to their behavior, we have saved 180,000 Afghan civilians every year since 2006.
Far from being hopeless, the war in Afghanistan is doing much better than Iraq prior to the surge.
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/25/2009 @ 9:56pm
And of course, most Afghans love America and support the war overwhelmingly.
There are many brave, heroic Afghans who have sided with us in this fight. I hope we don't betray them to be massacred by the Taliban.
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/25/2009 @ 10:01pm
"Posted by Milhaus at 10/25/2009 @ 9:50pm"
An invasion of Japan would have cost millions of lives and would have been one of the greatest bloodbaths in human history. Plus, Stalin would have got to occupy a chunk of Japan like he did Korea, were he set up a puppet regime that has killed 4 million people.
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/25/2009 @ 10:05pm
Looks like I've fallen for the sin of thinking American cultural values are superior because they forbid the beating of wives to force them to perform sexual favors.
Since when has that prevented thousands of men from doing so?
Arguing that the Taliban would happily use nukes is pure pretty hilarious given that we are the only country that has ever used nukes to defeat an enemy. Was that morally justifiable?
Americans don't give a crap about freedom in Afghanistan. We attacked because we were told we were going after Al Qaeda.
No one is suffering so that the Afghan people have a better future. We are there for one reason alone, our interests and some argue, our security.
If we'd defeated the jihadists in a matter of weeks, what are we doing there 8 years later? No lives have been saved by going into Afghanistan.
"Far from being hopeless, the war in Afghanistan is doing much better than Iraq prior to the surge."
Prior to the surge, Iraq was a basket case, so what your saying is that Afghanistan is slightly better than catastrophic.
Posted by Shingo at 10/25/2009 @ 10:45pm
And of course, most Afghans love America and support the war overwhelmingly.
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/25/2009 @ 10:01pm
Really? According to whom?
"There are many brave, heroic Afghans who have sided with us in this fight."
Nor really. They don't like the Taliban, but they hate police we have installed more.
Posted by Shingo at 10/25/2009 @ 10:55pm
"Since when has that prevented thousands of men from doing so?"
It hasn't. The difference is that in America, men who do so are looked upon with revulsion, disgust, and horror, and are tried and punished for their crimes by the state. By contrast, in Afghanistan, the law actually encourages and rewards men for such barbaric behavior.
"Arguing that the Taliban would happily use nukes is pure pretty hilarious"
Do you think they would refrain from doing so if they were free to employ them against us?
"Was that morally justifiable?"
An invasion of Japan would have cost millions of lives and would have been one of the greatest bloodbaths in human history. Plus, Stalin would have got to occupy a chunk of Japan like he did Korea, were he set up a puppet regime that has killed 4 million people.
"No one is suffering so that the Afghan people have a better future."
Our troops are suffering and the Afghan people have a better future.
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/25/2009 @ 11:19pm
"Really? According to whom?"
http://markhumphrys.com/afghanistan.html "Opinion survey, Jan 2006 82 percent of Afghans supported the American war on Afghanistan.
Poll, Dec 2006: 75 percent of Afghans believe their quality of life has improved since the fall of the Taliban. 70 per cent say they are "grateful" rather than "unhappy" with the presence of Nato troops in the country. Just 5 per cent expressed support for Taliban fighters.
Poll, Feb 2009 Only 4 percent of Afghans want the Taliban back! 69 percent approve of the US invasion."
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/25/2009 @ 11:23pm
"Nor really. They don't like the Taliban, but they hate police we have installed more."
Not according to the polls, but I'm sure you know what's good for the Afghans better than they do, Shingo.
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/25/2009 @ 11:25pm
An invasion of Japan would have cost millions of lives and would have been one of the greatest bloodbaths in human history. Plus, Stalin would have got to occupy a chunk of Japan like he did Korea, were he set up a puppet regime that has killed 4 million people.
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/25/2009 @ 10:05pm | ignore this person | warn this person
That's not true, it's a popular go-to for Americans who want to feel better about blowing away whole cities full of civilians. The fact of the matter is that they tried to prepare civilians to resist, and civilians, even the Japanese, have never been able to mount any kind of military action against a standing army. They would have done some damage, but not kill millions of Americans, possibly thousands nation wide. That said, it's not a soldiers place to willfully kill innocent unarmed civilians to protect himself. Even if that means facing terrible circumstances. Do you remember that last guy to use civilians as human shields to protect military targets? Saddam Hussein. That's the kind of element that intentionally harms civilians for military ends. Do you want to be counted among his lot? I don't, and almost all American soldiers don't.
Posted by Milhaus at 10/25/2009 @ 11:45pm
"Do you think they would refrain from doing so if they were free to employ them against us?"
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/25/2009 @ 11:19pm
If it meant using a nuke to win a war rather than an invasion that would have cost them millions of lives and would have been one of the greatest bloodbaths in human history, yes, maybe, but we'll never know. All we know is that the US did use one and used in unnecessarily.
Our troops are suffering becasue we have sent them into harms way without any meaningful task and without a goal, except to occupy Afghanistan.
The Afghan people have no future.
Posted by Shingo at 10/25/2009 @ 11:48pm
Not according to the polls, but I'm sure you know what's good for the Afghans better than they do, Shingo.
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/25/2009 @ 11:25pm
Please list one of those polls rightwingnutcase.
Posted by Shingo at 10/25/2009 @ 11:51pm
"They would have done some damage, but not kill millions of Americans, possibly thousands nation wide."
The Japanese were so brainwashed that parents threw their little children and babies off cliffs onto harsh rocks to kill them in order to "save" them from the Americans when the Americans approached.
The Japanese emperor ordered that the Japanese commit mass suicide after killing as many Americans as possible.
The assault on Japan would have cost millions of Japanese lives, according to our military commanders at the time. It would have cost hundreds of thousands of American lives.
By the way, even after one atomic bombing, the Japanese STILL refused to surrender and vowed to fight on and defeat us.
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/25/2009 @ 11:56pm
"Please list one of those polls rightwingnutcase."
Shingo, I just listed three, though you evidently overlooked them.
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/25/2009 @ 11:58pm
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/25/2009 @ 11:23pm | ignore this person | warn this person
When you put on that uniform you can feel it. It's a warming sensation. The realization that you just fell in behind millions of men and boys that died to defend their country. A country where the dignity of human life, the freedom of people, and mandate to take responsibility for your own actions and the actions of those around you are literally written into the Constitution, and by extension into the oath. You don't think, "I will do anything to defend this country." You realize that you have just taken on the gruesome responsibility of placing yourself between those good ideals and the people who would destroy them. It is your job to be a living demonstration that American servicemen will behave with honor, and that no matter where you are in the world, that you can be counted on to defend those ideals, and practice those ideals in the face of any foe, and under any circumstances. We are literally told these words. I think you would benefit from an excercise. I want you to go stand in the middle of the closest National Cemetery to you, and speak out loud the following statements. -"We are going to bomb civilians by remote control based on a shaky tip from a tribal warlord that a person suspected of having some involvement in a terrorism plot may be present. We know that we will be killing children and their families, and that is what you would have wanted. You performed your duties with courage and honor, and died defending our country from evil empires that threatened the existence of the free world. The babies and wives and mothers and fathers that you left behind will understand that we have to kill unarmed civilians because we are to lazy and cowardly to fight like men."
Posted by Milhaus at 10/26/2009 @ 12:01am
Shingo, I just listed three, though you evidently overlooked them.
Posted by rightwingnutcase at 10/25/2009 @ 11:58pm
Sorry my bad.
Well, it looks like the polls are shifting, according to think link which I got from your markhumphrys web site.
"People in Afghanistan have far less confidence in the direction their country is taking than four years ago, a new BBC/ABC opinion poll suggests." http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7872353.stm
"The approval rating for the central government in Kabul is still high - but is steadily falling.
Support for the presence of foreign troops is also strong but declining, compared with previous polls.
But the public is still very much opposed to the Taleban, seeing them as the country's biggest threat.
Most do not want to see the militants return. "
Posted by Shingo at 10/26/2009 @ 12:13am
Posted by Milhaus at 10/26/2009 @ 12:01am
That's probably a bit harsh, though there is a lot of truth to it. The reality is that people who get rush from wearing a uniform are simply being overcome by their primitive tribal instincts.
Posted by Shingo at 10/26/2009 @ 12:17am