Washington has relinquished control and final say over special operations night raids in Afghanistan to the Kabul government, but U.S. officials are quietly planning to ignore the agreement’s binding clauses.
In order to agree on a security arrangement governing U.S. military presence after U.S. combat troops withdraw in 2014, Kabul has essentially forced the Obama administration to concede two vital sticking points. First, control of Afghan prisons needed to be ceded to the Kabul government, which happened in March.
Second, the U.S. either needed to stop all night raids or, as a compromise, let the Afghan government be in charge of them an have veto-power over them in the case that an Afghan panel refuses to grant a warrant. An agreement on this was reached this week.
But as Pentagon spokesman Capt. John Kirby told reporters on Monday, “In practical terms, not much has changed.” He insisted, despite the official memorandum requiring U.S. forces to obtain a warrant from an Afghan panel, that President Hamid Karzai will not hold “a veto” over U.S. special operations missions conducted Afghanistan.
“It defines it fairly narrowly, and leaves open the possibility of a counterterrorism raid conducted by a CIA paramilitary group or other unit,” said Lisa Curtis, a South Asia specialist at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative Washington think tank. “That’s not to say those operations will occur regularly … but it stands to reason that if the United States had a very high-value target in its sights, it would pursue that target as it needed to.”
While U.S. officials won’t say it explicitly, mindful of the delicate diplomatic process, the agreement will be largely ignored. “If there’s a threat to the homeland, the United States always reserves the ability to act unilaterally,” said Rick “Ozzie” Nelson, senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “The rhetoric may not line up with that, however, because we have the need for an agreement with the Afghan government beyond 2014,” when U.S. combat forces are scheduled to leave.
Of course, what qualifies as a “threat to the homeland” is up to the administration, Joint Special Operations Command and the CIA, who typically have carried out the night raids. Night raids are one of the most hated aspects of the U.S. occupation in Afghanistan, infamously fueling resentment and often ending with the killing or arrest of innocents.
With night raids, the Obama administration has attempted to ease the pain, at least the public relations aspect of it, by training loyal Afghan forces to participate in them with U.S. forces in the hopes that it will help reduce civilian casualties. That this sort of reform was needed, speaks for itself.
The U.S. plan to completely ignore a binding agreement with the government of Afghanistan is characteristic of this administration’s approach to issues in foreign policy: rule of law be damned.
So what use is any agreement with the United States?
There never has been any use for an agreement with the United States except when the terms of that agreement is for the benefit of US plans for world domination.
"WASHINGTON — The Pentagon won’t come right out and say it, but the agreement that governs night raids in Afghanistan is a largely symbolic document that eases United States-Afghan relations, while having little effect on the U.S. military’s ability to nab Taliban insurgents and other high-value targets."
Why this disclaimer…??? Why from Stars and Stripes…?? Perhaps someone ought to ask Karzai what he thinks about the agreement: "having little effect on the U.S. military’s ability to nab Taliban insurgents and other high-value targets." Isn't it a replay of the Iraq agreement when the troops to be withdrawn were "combat" troops, but "other" non-combat troops (armed with the same guns as combat troops} were NOT counted) continued the occupation and raids business as usual……. If some independent publication like Foreign affairs, published this story. it would be one thing … But WHY S&S and why NOW is the question…
Business as usual. Move along now. Nothing to see. Move along!
Sadly true
It's not so much that the US plans to betray Afghanistan as the fact that the US betrays (much like f*ck) everyone that pairs up with them (except for Isreal, of course). The so-called agreement to end the night raids was a sham just like everything the empire does.
The U.S. as signatory to multiule agreements, treaties and conventions regarding treatment of POWs and protection of civilians during a time of war, are constantly in violation. So, what is the use of international law and treaty when a major signatory violates the letter and spirit of the law and said treaties?
The U.S. tortures POWs, conducts night incursions into homes that result in massacre, bombs civilian areas and launches indiscriminate drone missiles that kill countless innocents to include children. So, any deal with the U.S. is likley to be violated, Were there international laws and protections in force, the U.S. would be facing a war crimes tribunal.
change you can believe in….. ha ha ha ha ha ha
Meanwhile, as our military makes the word of Americans a stench in the nostrils of anyone of integrity abroad, destroying our security abroad, back in the homeland we have Homeland Security totally destroying our safety at home by a new purchase of millions of hollow point bullets. A bullet that mushrooms in the body, literally explodes in the body, and exits your body leaving a hole the size of a grapefruit.
Now what have we citizens ever done to our government that it should fear us so, such a killing machine that it should make us dead so? Talk about lethal weapon forbidden in war.
Nothing new here. Remember all the treaties we signed with the American Indians?