A new report coming out of the New York Times tonight reveals that President Obama has signed a secret order dramatically expanding the scope of US military operations in Afghanistan in 2015.
Despite claims that the war is “ending” at the end of 2014, the new order will ensure that US ground troops will continue to carry out direct combat operations throughout 2015, and potentially beyond.
Obama had announced back in May that there would no combat role at all in 2015, and that the remaining troops, about 10,000 of them, would be limited to training Afghan forces.
There was said to have been a “heated debate” within the administration about this decision, which led to the secret order changing the policy back toward US troops in direct combat.
The Pentagon was said to have been the driving force behind the decision, with civilian leaders seeking to keep the war limited to “al-Qaeda remnants,” while the Pentagon wanted to get back to direct fighting against the Taliban.
As usual, the debate on US war policy was kept totally out of the public eye, and Americans were led to believe that the end of direct combat was indeed finalized, even though it was not the case.
This just gets worse and worse. The average American just has nothing to say about the direction of his government and the ruling class treats it as though its simply their private preserve to be run with no accountability whatsoever on their part. More than anything else, the ruling class needs to be shorn of their power and that will not be achieved through the franchise.
And "We The People" get to pay for it all with OUR blood and treasure.
If the Taliban believe that there will be a permanent US presence in Afghanistan, they'll come round to seeing that the best way to deal with it is through negotiation. For the first time in History a foreign power will move into Afghanistan and feel comfortable being there. Could we sell you $100 million worth of 'software' to read AQ's secret orders hidden in Al Jezeera taglines?
On the other hand they could keep up that 'low level' insurgency that's stopped Afghanistan being turned into a garden of Eden, or at least something like Pakistan.
This is what happens when the Generals are allowed to forget they work for the President – made much worse by having a weak, cowardly President surrounded by advisors who are either weak, like their boss, or are colluding with the military in a sort of bloodless coup. Either way, the military doesn't give a ratsbehind what the common American thinks or wants. The generals' job is to make war and get medals – I was going to say "earn" medals but remembered from experience that very few of our military actually "earn" them, especially the Officer Corp.
I'll bet that John Boehner won't be "suing the President" over this executive action. The wars grind on and on. It is interminable if not wholly outrageous.
If our Empire were to vacate the Afghan Civil War, just allow the city rich to battle it out with the rural poor, just allow the side most brutal to win all, surely it would bring on an endless state of war between the war lords and drug lords.
On the other hand, if our military could get at the root cause of the problem, everyone striving to enrich themselves upon the misery of those they can enslave, peace would reign over the land and our Empire could have it’s military bases and continue to expand into Russia and China. To wit,
New Constitution
(1) No one shall enrich themselves upon the misery of anyone less educated.
(2) A forth of the land shall always be owned by the uneducated lower half of society.
(3) A forth of the nation’s wealth and a forth of all profit shall be given to the uneducated lower half in the form of a living wage.
This needs rewriting.
(1) No one shall enrich themselves at the expense of others for any reason whatsover!
(2) All of the land and any non-real property asset is to be be owned by the people collectively.
(3) Any dispossession brought about by (2) above shall be considered a blow for morality.
The US is marking time under Obama. Just wait until the pure white lady or Bush III replaces him. Ya'all know it's true doncha!
So, let's summarize things: after over six years in office our Nobel Peace Prize winning President (in his first six months no less!) has not withdrawn US troops completely and permanently from either Afghanistan or Iraq. He has also sneaked "advisors" into Syria and Somalia and probably other places like Chad, Mali and Niger (excluding Ebola related deployments).
This probably misses some new places (Ukraine?).
While the total number of foreign deployed US military forces may be somewhat lower than in 2008, the war making continues unabated. Our "enemies" are still unconquered, even though they all lack air forces, heavy weaponry, trained militaries, modern communications/surveillance equipment, permanent bases,arms factories, hospitals, etc.
Meanwhile, Obama is heralded as a peacemaker by many and the US military is feted with parades and lavish praise at every opportunity. They have won nothing and protected no US citizens (a few of whom have fallen victim to these enemies, but they were civilians of no real worth to the Empire) and budgets for killing are trending up, not down. Policy and war fighting failures are no obstacle to continued worship of Empire and militarism. This is quickly leaking into domestic "policing" (e.g. Ferguson MO).
The Hollywood celebrity crowd and the usual East Coast media elite are still steadfastly loyal to our Peacemaker-in-Chief and there are no calls to rescind his "Peace Prize."
What would Obama have had to do to earn a Nobel War Prize?