I have often used these pages to complain about the billions of dollars and countless lives that we continue to lose in Afghanistan and Iraq – while our states and schools shutdown vital programs for lack of funds. This is particularly annoying with a president of Afghanistan who has repeatedly stated that he wished he had gone with the Taliban and views the United States as an equal threat to his country. Now, Afghan President Hamid Karzai has actually begged the United States to halt all further operations on its soil. One would have thought that U.S. officials would have expressed relief and ordered a rapid pullout. Instead, we are saying that the desire of the Afghan people to have us stop operations is of no import — we will continue to protect them whether they want protection or not.
In his latest statement, Karzai pleaded “I ask NATO and US, with honor and humbleness and not with arrogance, to stop its operations on our soil.” That is somehow too ambiguous for the Obama Administration, which will not allow the Afghans to determine whether they continue to need our help.
According to polls, the only populace as opposed to our operations as the Afghan people is the American people. Of course, that appears to matter even less than the Afghan people’s will.
Source: Washington Post
Jonathan Turley
I still say the best way to put the brakes on at least some of the madness, is for the American people to come together (yeah, that’ll happen) and demand the following foreign policy change:
“No military troops may be sent into another country, unless children of the President; the Vice President; the Joint Chiefs; the Cabinet and 51% of the Congress, accompany them.
Those who do not have children may not vote.”
I also believe instituting another policy would seriously impact our government’s glee for gunfire: that any family who loses a warrior on foreign soil will be reimbursed $10,000,000 from the operational budget of the branch of service he or she serves.
I’ve simply never understood why an otherwise reasonably intelligent society, allows strangers to send their offspring to war, while so many of their own attend private schools in Chevy Chase.
Does anybody honestly believe if the Bush girls or the Obama girls were attending classes with flak jackets on, at Kandahar Air Base, that this wouldn’t be a very fast campaign?
I’m guessing we wouldn;t be there at all.
Patric,
for the most part I agree with you, but Bush did disregard what the Generals told him about the numbers he would need in Iraq. I am guessing it was a purely political decision that Rummy and Count Cheney led the way on.
Mike S.,
Well said. These “experts” are like Cheney in many cases. Very quick to send us to war, but they don’t or haven’t ever served. Bill Kristol comes to mind also.
“But fair is fair, and the fact is, laying the sheer stubbornness of U.S. foreign policy on a single President is short-sighted.”
Patric,
Oh how true is your statement! Since WWII there has been
a consensus on foreign and military relations among the Pentagon, a coalition of experts, “wise” legislators and
their toadying political insider pundits like Walter Lippman, Evans & Novak and lately David Broder. When we talk of bipartisanship it is foreign relations where the term was developed as a buzzword denoting this consensus.
They consider themselves to be the ultimate patriots and really believed/believe that their wisdom has kept America strong. They have been right, charitably, 20% of the time and where they have been wrong death and disaster have followed in the wake of their bi-partisan
folderol.
Iran (killing Mosadech, installing the Shah), the failure to recognize the needed Chinese revolution and thus ensuring a USSR/Red China axis), Korea (installing a dictatorial government), Cuba (by maintaining the pig Batista leading to a revolution made unecessarily anti-American) Viet Nam, Grenada, Panama, Iraq I & II and the occupation of Afghanistan, are all examples of the short sightedness and failure of these “experts” policies.
Each President from Truman on, has found himself locked-in and kow-towing to these self-serving blunderers. The
Consensus themselves are owned by the Plutocratic and Corporate interests of the MI Complex and many themselves are of the Plutocratic Class. I surmise that JFK, having been trained in the use of power by an iconoclastic sociopathic father, actually tried to assert that he was in charge and his disobedience, conceived as traitorous, led to his removal. This consensus, really an ongoing cabal, with an apprentice system runs, our foreign policy and sees itself as the progenitors of American World Hegomony. The blood of Americans and other people of other nations are on their hands.
Gyges,
“Stamford,
I have to disagree. Afghanistan was a war we won pretty quickly. It’s the occupation we can’t win.”
Excellent point and one that I’ve forgotten … it’s been so long …
I wholeheartedly supported McFlightsuit’s invasion of Afghanistan; did a huge double take when he took away troops and resources in Afghanistan to cure his hard-on for Saddam in Iraq.
I think this has just gone on far, far too long. Hell, the Soviets finally figured out after nine years that their war was unwinnable.
How much more do we have to sacrifice? How many times must we accept Karzai’s giving us the finger before we finally say “enough?”
Rafflaw –
We can only guess who’s in the big tee-pee of decision-makers, but I’m guessing once this “war” was approved by congress, the entire show is run by the Joint Chiefs of staff. Very few of our Presidents possessed any real military experience, and from what I can determine from my limited perspective, I seriously doubt either Obama, (or Bush) ignore what the guys wearing the stripes recommend. I’m betting they acquiesce to the lifetime warriors.
(read: Gitmo, as a small example)
Patric,
If we are Rome 2.0, who is playing the fiddle right now??
Mike, Frank, Stamford, Rafflaw & Jill:
I couldn’t have said it better, so I won’t try.
But fair is fair, and the fact is, laying the sheer stubbornness of U.S. foreign policy on a single President is short-sighted.
Which other administration can we point to, who would even have come close to throwing up their hands and saying. “Oh, okay. We’re outta here.” I can’t think of one.
The fact is, the United States has never demonstrated the humility to mind its own business, nor admit it’s mistakes, and the only apologies to be heard are by aging former statesmen on a book tour.
Like Rome 3,000 years ago, we make EVERYTHING our business.
Until we collapse under the sheer weight of out own hubris.
Blouise, I did not speak out against the war in Afghanistan as I did the one in Iraq because of the extreme cruelty of the taliban.
I supported the CIA’s war in Afghanistan shortly after 9/11. I did not support their war in Iraq.
Karzai has remained in office because the CIA supports him. I wonder what the message really is and to whom is it addressed?
SM,
I agree, but I don’t believe anything Karzai says.
Rafflaw, The taliban will have a lot of heads but we should leave anyway.
I agree that the sooner we are out of Afghanistan the better. I am not sure I would believe anything Karzai says. He may want us out in order that he can steal more from his own countrymen. Whatever criminal enterprise he has going, I say let him have it. When we leave the Taliban will have his head in no time.
Getting out would: 1. stop the killing of civilians, 2. stop the killing of our people, 3. save taxpayers 107 billion dollars in just this year alone. On the other hand, staying in, 1. allows contractors like Halliburton and Blackwater to reap gobs of money, allows the CIA to run a black budget drug operation, 3. gives the US that pipeline and 4. gives the US access to a lot of new mineral wealth that our ruling elite can exploit.
Given these choices you can see why we will stay the course.
HELLO!!!!
KARZAI WANTS MERC’S OUT OF AFGHANISTAN
12 posts – Last post: Aug 8, 2010
Discussion about KARZAI WANTS MERC’S OUT OF AFGHANISTAN at the … we’ve chosen to fill Iraq up with mercs as the US gov’t troops pull out. …
Karzai wants NATO aid teams out of Afghanistan | The Columbus Dispatch
Feb 9, 2011 … Karzai wants NATO aid teams out of Afghanistan … U.S. officials also have acknowledged that the process of vetting projects and tracking .
Karzai wants the U.S. to cut military operations in Afghanistan – CNN
Nov 14, 2010 … Karzai wants the U.S. to cut military operations in Afghanistan … begin taking troops out of Afghanistan around the middle of next year, …
articles.cnn.com/…/afghanistan.karzai_1_president-hamid-karzai-r
Karzai Wants us Contractors Out of Afghanistan |
Aug 23, 2010 … Afghan President Hamid Karzai urged us taxpayers on Sunday to stop paying for outside security contractors in Afghanistan that he said were …
http://www.thelangreport.com/…/karzai-wants-u-s-contractors
Karzai wants private security firms out of Afghanistan
Aug 17, 2010 … Karzai wants private security firms out of Afghanistan … U.S. military supports Karzai’s intention to phase out private security
Karzai: US Should Cut Back Afghan Military Operations | News | English
Nov 14, 2010 … A prominent U.S. newspaper says Afghanistan’s president wants the … Holbrooke: US Combat Troops to be Phased Out of Afghanistan by 2014 …
http://www.voanews.com/…/Karzai-Wants-US-to-Cut-Back-Afghan-M
Its a marriage gone bad and one partner can not deal with it.
Stamford,
I have to disagree. Afghanistan was a war we won pretty quickly. It’s the occupation we can’t win.
On the other hand, there’s a feeling among policy makers, and the voting populace at large, we’ve got this burden. We inherited it from Europe. You see, we and we alone are capable of shepherding these lesser cultures and making sure that they use their resources to our, er their, best advantage.
Reading Burmese Days is a little like looking a mirror anymore.
This is the only issue I agree with Karzai on – getting us the hell out of Vietnam, I mean Afghanistan. Karzai shown he has no interest whatsoever in doing what he’s supposed to be doing – leading his country. Let his own people take care of him.
It’s high time we let the Afghan people take charge in what direction they want to go.
It’s high time we stop nation building in Afghanistan – we need to rebuild our own nation.
Pumping tens of billions of dollars, and spilling countless pints of blood will not change the end result – Afghanistan is not a war we can win.
We lost any chance of a positive outcome in Afghanistan when we allowed Boy Blunder and His Super Friends to invade Iraq. The men and women we sent there have served in vain to our national shame. We will leave eventually & the Taliban will be back soon after, unless the narco-mob can buy them off.
And we destroyed Iraq for no good end. Pissed away trillions of dollars and killed 10s of thousands of people for greed & hubris.
It is long past time we admitted our errors and got the hell out.
Washington’s wise old men of foreign policy, despite their age, share a common senility. The worst part of these fools dicta is the hubris that they alone have the wisdom. They know little and they are constantly wrong. This has been the case since WWII, when the OSS, about to be disbanded, came up with a new role (CIA) to help fight the bogeyman of Communism. The USSR was following in the historic Russian traditions of using Potemkin Villages and our wise old men seeking power and money to be funneled to the MI Complex gratefully accepted the mythology of the Russian threat.
I believe our reaction to Communism actually gave it credence and sustained it by making it seem more of a threat than it was. Add that to the idiotic policy of propping up rabid dictatorships led by supposed anti-communists and we created the bogeymen that the MI Complex and the military needed to increase their share of the budget pie.
Now, despite the fact that Afghanistan is probably the most dfficult country to conquer, given its unbelievable
topology, our remaining there makes it a killing field for our troops and a matter of no importance to our own national security. Once their President, who we thought was our guy given his oil background, has called for us to cease operations, the intelligent person would comply.
Unfortunately the foreign policy senility runs rampant and our President buys into it at a terrible cost to our country.
Well…Now I suppose its time to step of the action….they can either stay and then we all pay the consequence or leave and we pay the consequence….damn decisions….