Afghan President Hamid Karzai has ruled out signing any Bilateral Security Agreement (BSA) allowing US and foreign troops to stay in the nation beyond 2014 today, saying there are major disagreements with the foreign powers that need to be addressed before the pact could be considered.
“On the security front the entire NATO exercise was one that caused Afghanistan a lot of suffering, a lot of loss of life, and no gains,” Karzai noted, elaborating on comments from his spokesman yesterday.
Karzai went on to say that NATO and the US had repeatedly launched operations in express opposition to his government’s wishes, notably night raids, and was clearly willing to violate Afghan sovereignty whenever it suits them.
The US has expressed hope to have a pact in place by the end of this month, but it seems unlikely that Karzai will back down, and it is likely the US will simply have to wait until the 2014 election and hope Karzai’s successor will be more willing to accept their terms.
No gains? What made him president? I only hope when the US leaves the money leaves as well.
sball, based on the photo of Karzai, perhaps his perpetual imperial 'Green Robe' was only leased with US money — as he is now wearing only a cheap black robe.
So, we get kicked out of another country we invaded and occupied! Oh, but our troops didn´t die in vain. As in Iraq, we were there to win. But we were there to win what? What have we won? How did we leave the infrastructure of Iraq and how will we leave the infrastructure of Afghanistan?
Yes, we can leave with all our money, Sball, but what was that money doing for the Afghan people? Who in Afghanistan cares if we take our money, we are not spending it on them, only on ourselves and private Swiss bank accounts of some of their leaders.
Once again we failed at war, totally failed. We entered declaring that there were only one to two hundred al Qaida at most and now there are thousands upon thousands – they are coming out of the woodwork – we can´t even recognize them to the point that they become our allies against Syria. We destroy country after country, and its people, and then we take our marbles and leave, crying because they don´t want us. It´s getting to where nobody wants us. It´s getting to where nobody respects us.
Walter, you accurately say, "It´s getting to where nobody wants us. It´s getting to where nobody respects us" — but the seminal REASON they don't want or respect the US is that the US is the nominal HQ of the extant (but well disguised) Global Empire, which has 'captured' and now fully "Occupies" our former country (and also includes the countries and "Power Systems" [Chomsky] of; the UK, France, Germany, Israel, NATO, EU, IMF, WTO, et al.)
This Disguised Global Empire (DGE) is a very well disguised, but highly integrated; corporate, financial, militarist, media, (IL)legal, and political Global Empire — which is not, like all historical Empires, based on territorial, ethnic, religious, nationalist, or even ideological factors, but is the first and entirely unique 21st century (post-nation-state) "truly Global Empire" [Milne, Hardt, Peerkins, Eland, Negri, Parenti. et al.] to be based only on 'class' (Ruling-elite) identity and shared pathological "Empire-thinking".
Liberty, democracy, justice, and equality
Over
Violent ('Vichy' disguised dual-party)
Empire,
Alan MacDonald
Wrong. Afghanistan and Iraq were both wildly successful when measured against the actual (as opposed to stated) goals of elite decision makers: 1) profit for weapons manufacturers and military contractors, 2) career advancement for military officers and civilian employees of the National Security State and its PR firms (the media and warmongering think tanks) and 3) pork for incumbents to bring home to their districts and state.
These wars were successful both directly and indirectly by increasing global instability, thus justifying even greater military expenditures.
However, this is self-defeating in the long run.
Karzai must have read my comments yesterday,why would he give the shirt off his back to the occupiers and get nothing in return?……. Great call.