31 “green-on-blue” attacks so far in 2012, including 9 in an 11 day span earlier this month, has NATO panicking and the Karzai government seeking answers, or at least excuses. As usual when Afghanistan needs to explain something, they’re blaming Pakistan.
Top Karzai advisers were quoted as saying that Pakistan is “recruiting young Afghans to enlist in the army and police” and then eventually launch attacks on occupation forces. They said Iran is also suspected of doing the same.
At virtually the same time, President Karzai was in the middle of a telephone conversation with Pakistan’s latest Prime Minister, Raja Pervez Ashraf, and promising to do everything he could to improve ties.
The tensions between the Afghan and Pakistan governments are almost entirely a function of the worsening security situation in both nations, with the Afghan government always blaming Pakistan and the Pakistani government blaming the assorted forces occupying Afghanistan.
Finally someone states the truth: "The Pakistani government blaming the assorted forces occupying Afghanistan." Who else could it be but the occupying forces? All attacks on the occupying forces are caused by the occupying forces themselves, because they simply shouldn´t be there. Thank you Pakistani Government for straightening Gen. Allen and President Karzai out.
I get the impression that Karzai actually thinks he has a mandate to rule. All these “green-on-blue” attacks have nothing to do with his governing…all the people love him…you know…he has their best interest at heart…you know…just like our government has our best interest at heart.
Karzai is our energy industry's man in Afghanistan. For years he has been the key to the Administration's delusion that we will be able to control Afghanistan's hugely valuable pipeline route and mineral resources via Karzai's puppet government and our military occupation, even if his government right now will fall when we leave, unless it somehow gains the support of the Taliban.
At the same time, it appears that the Administration has been trying to negotiate clandestinely with the Taliban for the same deals and would probably push Karzai aside if it had assurance it could get what it wanted from the Taliban. It is deluded however if it thinks it can do so by buying off a few Taliban leaders.
Pakistan may or may not be aiding the Taliban- certainly they were our proxy with the Taliban, not only during the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, but throughout until 9/11, and Pakistan now sees the U.S. as trying to co-opt it by increasing Indian influence in Afghanistan through closer relations with the Karzai government.
The U.S. has been foolish in not recognizing and dealing with Pakistan's core interests in a meaningful way. It is only natural that Pakistan would try to counter Indian influence by aiding Karzai's opponents. Moreover Pakistan needs energy and infrastructure investment, not only military aid, and is being forced to seek it from China, Russia and Iran. Finally, it has been locked in an over six decades long conflict with India over Kashmir that has kept relations between the two countries tense and sometimes at war. Our policies have failed to effectively address these problems.
Instead we use drones that violate Pakistani airspace and kill Pakistani civilians while targeting what we think are the Taliban. If we continue to kill Pakistanis and Taliban, how can we expect the support of Pakistan and its people or of the Taliban and the Afghan people?
In the end, the real cost of the resources our multinationals covet and are seeking to control, when factoring in the military costs and other externalities, will be a multiple of the extraction costs, and will result in more dead innocent civilians, freedom fighters and U.S. soldiers, all of who are cannon fodder for our multinationals and military industrial complex. Is it worth it? Shouldn't those who stand to benefit be the ones in the trenches who risk losing their lives?