- Pacific
THE WAR IN AFGHANISTAN
Jon Rappoport
SEPTEMBER 20, 2010. You may recall that the decision to launch the current 18-month
surge in military action came after President Obama engaged in a six-month appraisal of
the situation. Obama explored the matter from top to bottom. He consulted with
military advisors. He dragged out every possible option.
So what are we doing in Afghanistan again?
Let's review.
Shortly after 9/11, Bush ordered the US invasion. Supposedly, the goal was to find
Osama Bin Laden and also knock out Al Qaeda training camps.
Rapidly, those objectives became entangled with overpowering the Taliban, the strongest
military and political force in the country. The Taliban was cooperating with Al
Qaeda: That was the rationale.
Bush's mission, according to press reports and White House press releases, was a partial
success. Although Bin Laden was never found, Al Qaeda enclaves were destroyed.
And the Taliban was pushed into relative obscurity.
A US handpicked Afghan president was elected with the goal of unifying the country.
Fast forward to Obama. Predictably, the Taliban had come out of the woodwork and was
asserting its supremacy once again. Al Qaeda encampments were operating out of the
no-man's land between Afghanistan and Pakistan and inside Pakistan, where according to
some experts, they always had been.
The decision to go back into Afghanistan with more troops was based on the idea that the
people and tribes and clans and villages of the country could be extricated from Taliban
control if US troops took on an overt role as helpers and builders. Villages would
be cooperatively strengthened and made more independent, etc.
This proposition presented several obstacles. Tribes and clans in Afghanistan have
been warring with each other for centuries. Afghanistan was never a true
nation. Disentangling locals from the Taliban would demand thousands of
micro-managed operations. Of course, once US troops left, as Obama promised they
would, after 18 months, the Taliban would reappear and resume their coercive
conquests. Finally, the new central government of the country, a corrupt bunch, was
viewed by most of the population as a remote power having no relevance or connection to
their own concerns or lives.
To date, there is no sign that any of these obstacles have been overcome decisively.
What reason do we have to believe they will be?
And why, again, did Obama think he could gain significant ground in Afghanistan? How
was this a war whose goals could be met?
Training up an Afghan army has proved to be an extremely difficult feat. Soldiers
desert, they steal supplies, they feel only a faint obligation to police their own
country. So when US forces come home, what will be left behind?
What was and is Obama thinking?
In August, Afghan President Karzai issued an invitation to hold new discussions with
President Obama about the course of the war. Karzai stated that the war should not
be about villages; it should be about shutting down Taliban terrorist attacks.
Karzai also remarked that civilian casualties caused by foreign troops continue to be a
major source of resentment among the Afghan population.
In other words, by Karzai's estimate, the war is a failure. Whatever good will is
being engendered by the "village-building" efforts of US troops is being
undermined by the civilian casualties.
No matter what platitudes one might want to ascribe to war, it always involves destroying
civilians. We can wish that it should not be so, but then we are talking about
something other than war. Surely, Obama and his generals understood this going
in. Restrictive rules of military engagement don't eliminate bringing harm to
civilians, and these rules also open US soldiers to grave danger.
Perhaps Obama's real objective in Afghanistan has been to avoid the embarrassment of
watching a US-created central government topple into the dust. If so, that's a scant
and cruel motive for war-especially since the Karzai crowd seems entirely capable of
bringing itself down.
Or perhaps the US is in Afghanistan because certain people are hoping to control the
oil/natural gas pipeline across the country, if it is eventually built. Or because
of the estimated trillion-dollar mineral deposits which have been known about for some
time. Or because the opium poppy business is worth many billions. We can
speculate on these and other motives-establishing, for example, US military platforms
close to Russia and Iran-but meanwhile, the US administration is no closer to achieving
its vaguely stated goals for the war than it was when Obama took office.
The human and financial costs for this quagmire are very steep. And no amount of
high-flying noble rhetoric coming out of the White House will curtail those costs or, as
far as the eye can see, bring America closer to national security. (Jon Rappoport) www.nomorefakenews.com (Jon Rappoport is
the author of the LOGIC AND ANALYSIS course for home schoolers. For inquiries:
qjrconsulting@gmail.com)
"To Achieve World
Government it is necessary to remove from the minds of men their individualism,
their loyalty to family traditions and national identification" Brock Chisholm - Director of the World Health Organization
"A society whose citizens refuse to see and investigate the facts, who refuse to
believe that their government and their media will routinely lie to them and fabricate a
reality contrary to verifiable facts, is a society that chooses and deserves the Police
State Dictatorship it's going to
get." Ian Williams Goddard
The fact is that "political correctness" is all about creating uniformity. Individualism is one of the biggest obstacles in the way of the New World Order. They want a public that is predictable and conditioned to do as it's told without asking questions.
"The two enemies of the people are criminals and government, so let us tie the second down with the chains of the Constitution so the second will not become the legalized version of the first." Thomas Jefferson
Knowledge is the key to good health!