Gunmen in Afghan uniforms shot and killed three US special operations forces in southern Afghanistan, marking the 28th killed by so-called green-on-blue attacks this year.
The US troops were lured to their deaths by an Afghan police commander who invited them to dinner Thursday night. The Taliban claimed responsibility and said the gunman had defected to the insurgency.
The failure of the US mission in Afghanistan – to build up and train a centralized state and security apparatus – is illustrated clearly in the constant killing of US soldiers by their Afghan counterparts. Much of the security force has been infiltrated by the Taliban or Pakistani agents.
The fractured nature of the armed population in the country is likely to translate to civil war once the US occupation is drawn down. “Mark my words, the moment the Americans leave, the civil war will begin,” one Afghan told Dexter Filkins in a recent New Yorker piece. “This country will be divided into twenty-five or thirty fiefdoms, each with its own government.”
The U.S. has begun to recognize that the war is a total failure and the Obama administration is scrambling for a partial withdrawal by 2014. As Dexter Filkins wrote recently in theNew Yorker, reiterating the establishment view: “After eleven years, nearly two thousand Americans killed, sixteen thousand Americans wounded, nearly four hundred billion dollars spent, and more than twelve thousand Afghan civilians dead since 2007, the war in Afghanistan has come to this: the United States is leaving, mission not accomplished.”
David Rothkopf, CEO and editor at large of Foreign Policy magazine, has written that President Obama was reluctant to recommit to the Afghan war with a surge in troopsfrom the beginning, but that he did it anyways because he “could not afford to look weak” or “come under political attack from the right.” So, thousands of coalition soldiers and tens of thousands of Afghans have been killed because Obama was afraid to be called a wimp.
Get our guys out of there!
But mate… the job's not finished yet.
Yeah… they have better things to do like killing Iranians and Syrians.
From the moment an American president is elected, he examines every decision, every action, through the lens of his — and his party's — ambition to get reelected. This is a huge source of weakness in the political system, and in the US Presidency, arguably the single most powerful office in the world. It is not the personal emotional unpleasantness that is the problem (except for genuinely "small" men like "W" Bush), but the fear of a perceived political downside: the possible or probable loss of power. A truly courageous person would rise to the occasion and risk — thus demonstrating his strength and courage — what is most important to him personally and professionally — that position of power — to do the right thing for the people he represents, and serves, and is pledged above all to protect. Obama, smart as he is, just didn't have the courage or character to pull it off, and do the right thing.
The right thing would have been, on the instant of his having taken the oath of office, to order the immediate withdrawal of all US forces from Iraq and Afghanistan, to have his attorney general arrest all the Bush principals and their enablers, and try them for war crimes, arrest all those in congress who voted for the AUMF or follow-on funding for the Iraq war and try them for war crimes, and arrest every member of the US officer corps who participated in Iraq and try them for war crimes.
That would have taken some serious stones, which Obama clearly lacked, and absent having grown a set since, still lacks. We really need the wisdom and courage of a Betty White in the prophetically(?) named White House.
"Huh? Why Betty White?", you ask.
The Wisdom of Betty White:
“Why do people say "grow some balls"? Balls are weak and sensitive. If you wanna be tough, grow a vagina. Those things can take a pounding”
Then we would have a system of true accountability …all the way to the top. And future leaders would be put on notice that they better friggin understand what is legal and what is not, before voting "yea" or "nay".
Ron Paul said that one of the first things he'd have done as Prez was to issue an executive order rescinding all previous executive orders. Now THAT isn't something the MIC "machine" appreciates.
The Afghaniscam. A cock-up from the beginning and one brutally bloody quagmire near it's end. However, seems the heroin trade is booming. By design?
How's that "surge" coming along now?
You comea my house and eat lead. Extra maya with that? How about some nice Obama sauce?
Of course the heroin trade is by design.. Aside from the vast profits….it weakens Russia………..!!!
From the interview of Zbigniew Brzezinski to Le Nouvel Observateur (France), Jan 15-21, 1998, p. 76
Question: When the Soviets justified their intervention by asserting that they intended to fight against secret involvement of the United States in Afghanistan, people didn't believe them. However, there was a basis of truth. You don't regret anything today?
Brzezinski: Regret what? That secret operation was an excellent idea. It had the effect of drawing the Russians into the Afghan trap and you want me to regret it? The day that the Soviets officially crossed the border, I wrote to President Carter, in substance: We now have the opportunity of giving to the USSR its Vietnam war. Indeed, for almost 10 years, Moscow had to carry on a war unsupportable by the government, a conflict that brought about the demoralization and finally the breakup of the Soviet empire.
Question: And neither do you regret having supported the Islamic fundamentalists, having given arms and advice to future terrorists?
Brzezinski: What is most important to the history of the world? The Taliban or the collapse of the Soviet empire? Some stirred-up Moslems or the liberation of Central Europe and the end of the cold war?
The role of the CIA and the US politicians in stirring unrest in Afghanistan is undeniable. Russian and American lives were sacrificed because old pukes like Zbig Brzez were playing the "Grand Chess Game" in the mountains of Afghanistan. Yes, the USSR got its Vietnam, but the US now is getting its second Vietnam!
Was it worth it?!
Great news, successful operation against INVADORS !!!! well-done. Afgans should keep up good work until every invader is out of Afghanistan. peter czech
Bring them home, NOW!
A decade of blood and treasure has achieved nothing.
The Afghan Happy-Meal Menu:
1. Entrée of FreeDumb Fries
2. RPG-Chaser
3. IED Surprise
4. A hot lead salad
Bon Appetit, Yanki !
"…. Mission not accomplished"?? Do we really know what the mission was? A lot of people made a lot of money at tax payers expense. Perhaps, that was the real purpose.
The title of this piece should be, “Afghan patriot kills occupiers.
"President Obama was reluctant to recommit to the Afghan war with a surge in troopsfrom the beginning"
Do I sense a start of retconning, repainting and backpedaling?
I remember quite clearly that the Prez wanted to concentrate on "the war that matters" (i.e. not Iraq). If he had just told everyone that "none of the war matter" that would have been accepted.
Now it's "He was against it but was forced to stay because of public opinion and political adversaries?" In order to not "look weak"? To have the political leeway to do what? Push through New Deal III, Obamacare and upgrade the US Staatsicherheit? F*ck that.