Afghanistan: a war that can't be won

[MikeyDB]

I'm through posting for today (well until later tonight maybe) it's thirty-two and I don't have AC so I'm sitting on a leather chair in a puddle of my own persperation...Gotta go somewhere and cool off...

Nice talking with you all and we'll chat again later I hope.

 

[jimmoyer]

So, when it gets down to it, we're all pretty unsure
what to do, but we certainly know how to criticize
ANYONE DOING something about it.

In fact I know of no good solution, but anyone TRYING
'to do something about it and FAILING is a lot better
than we voyeur news readers.

Also all of us pontificators and critics cannot escape
moral sin by supporting the staying or leaving of Afghanistan.

Some of us believe a greater hell will befall Afghanistan
if the NATO forces leave.

Self Centered Isolationism has the beauty of protecting
your own, but then those who support such lose all
pretense of caring about anyone else.

And your last sentence MikeyDB about noting how
the rebels and criminal governments that steal the
UNICEF and other charity baskets of help cannot be
stopped unless a force comes in to TRY to stop it.

There is a well known psychology known by all the
ancient religions that to fight evil or wrongdoing rubs
off a little on the average crusader and pollutes his
own innocence.

 

[I think not]

Re: RE: Afghanistan: a war that can't be won

ITN

I've only read a little of Thomas Paine but I'd agree with the idea that more information, a sharing of perspectives and indeed a broader overview of just about any controversial issue is medicine to a narrow worldview.

At the risk of inviting futher deprecation and insult, I'll risk saying that I think you've a reasonable overview of what's going on in the world and you strike me as an intelligent kinda guy. Just too bad that instead of merely takling about these kinds of issues that there wasn't something that could bring resolve to these things through action.

I don't think Canada should be involved in Afghanistan and I'm fearful that the current Canadian circus in Ottawa is comprised of folk unable to differentiate among the various dynamics and is hopelessly but willingly bound to the principles of "economics" before all else. Certainly a nation must compete and establish mechanisms and practices that will permit (afford) change. Do you think we might agree that any extreme is poor thinking and the more prudent course is considered introspection?

See now MikeyDB you caught my attention, not for your compliment but for your solid and reasonable opinion. You have every right to oppose your government and mine for that matter. If there is no opposition we merely become sheep. I believe in American [human I should say] ideals and principles, but I'm not an idiot. I realize big business has influence over government, I realize interests are the guiding force behind "liberation and democracy". I also have a moral compass believe it or not. War is ugly in all its forms but I also acknowledge that war is sometimes necessary.

The current administration is by no means a reflection of American values and principles, indeed I believe 3/4 of Congress have lost all there sense of humility, morals and common sense.

A new American Revolution will take place soon, hopefully within my lifetime, not the Civil War version of the 1860's, but a social movement to correct imbalances in society, big business and big government.

We are learning MikeyDB, the only difference between Americans and other countries around the world, is that our society is open for everyone to see, I wish I could say the same for others.

 

[jimdig]

RE: Afghanistan: a war th

basically, the only way to strike at the source of your problem is to visit the root source of the situation and where to get into it

Removed advertising link
CCStaff

 

[Machjo]

As ITN's pointed out, I don't think many (if any) on this forum are denying US atrocities, or that the US did in fact go against the international community when it entered Iraq.

The point is, though, that the title of this thread suggests Afghanistan, not Iraq. So unless there's a clear connection between Iraq and Afghanistan, please present it. Otherwise, let's start another thread about Iraq, and we'll probably suddenly find lots of agreement on all sides.

The reason for all the argument in this thread is that our wires are crossed between Iraq and Afghanistan here. O this thread, I'm discussing Afghanistan, so naturally I won't agree with Mikey who's busy discussing Iraq, 'cause we're discussing apples and oranges.

So might I ask that we limit the topic of this threadd to Afghanistan from now on, so as to avoid confusion.

Thanks in advance.

 

[tamarin]

So what's to be the Canadian position if the 'war' there continues and worsens? How many young Canadians do you sacrifice before you pull out? Afghanistan has a formidable history of outlasting any who intervene. I think we've become too evangelical. Like Assembly of God missionaries, we're busy abroad exporting our own beliefs. Do all countries have to be democratic? Is it the normal condition of man? Looking at Canada's own democracy and the endless compromises necessary to give it the semblance of function, one can't be blamed for wondering if it's even the best system for here.
I believe in ten years, long after we've removed our troops, Afghanistan will still be a lawless state. And whatever we thought to accomplish there a footnote in the history books.

 

[Machjo]

Re: RE: Afghanistan: a war that can't be won

So what's to be the Canadian position if the 'war' there continues and worsens?
Whatever it takes.

How many young Canadians do you sacrifice before you pull out?
However many as it takes.

Afghanistan has a formidable history of outlasting any who intervene.
Historical intervention had a habbit of being made up of independent mavericks. This time, we have an alliance; we're not alone.

I think we've become too evangelical.

What? This is a UN mandate to provide protection for the population, not evangelise.

Like Assembly of God missionaries, we're busy abroad exporting our own beliefs.
What? Providing protection to the general public isn't the same as exporting our beliefs.

Do all countries have to be democratic?
What does that have to do with anything. Canada is there on a UN mandate requesting Canada to provide protection for civilian populations. Canada is not there to try to transform Afghanistan in our image.. or at least, if it is, then it shouln't be as that well beyond the provisions of the mandate.

Is it the normal condition of man?
Hey, democracy has got its flaws too.

Looking at Canada's own democracy and the endless compromises necessary to give it the semblance of function, one can't be blamed for wondering if it's even the best system for here.
What does that have to do with anything? Canda's mandate is nothing more than to protect civilian populations and bring stability to the nation.

I believe in ten years, long after we've removed our troops, Afghanistan will still be a lawless state.

Now that's optimism!

And whatever we thought to accomplish there a footnote in the history books.

Optimism at its best.

 

[Claudius]

Machjo delivers all the good points before I could. Good post.

I'll have to elaborate with new ones.


Afghanistan has a formidable history of outlasting any who intervene.

People often point out that Afghanistan 'drove out the Soviets' but forget that the Soviets would probably still be there if it weren't for foreign aid and fighters from Arab and Western nations. This is forgotten until it's time to use it in a point about the West 'creating' the Taliban which is even more false, imo.

"How many young Canadians do you sacrifice before you pull out?

This isn't WW1 when we drained country of our youngest and most innocent to dive in a meat grinder. All of the troops involved are more than willing to be there, and in fact most any could've stayed home with excuses as simple as "my family really needs me right now". We aren't 'sacrificing young Canadians. They are there because they want to be.

"Like Assembly of God missionaries, we're busy abroad exporting our own beliefs." " Do all countries have to be democratic? "

No one can force democracy. The people have to want it. No one pointed a rifle at anyone and forced them to vote. Although there were many of threatened them with violence if they did vote. They voted themselves. No one made them. No one can force them not to rise and strike at the current elected government. We can't import our beliefs on them. If that were the case we would be trying to dismantle the Warlord system as well, or discouraging their laws.

When armed forces are used to protect food shipments, are we forcing them to eat? Pointing our rifles at them and demanding they "eat this sandwich"?

"I believe in ten years, long after we've removed our troops, Afghanistan will still be a lawless state.

That sounds a lot like: "They could never be stable because they never have been". "They will always be 'lawless' because they always have been". These statements seem to make sense on the surface, but are not actually rational or logical, imo, when you break them down to their nutshell.
India is democratic. They're not lawless. Pakistan is democratic. They're not lawless either. Why can these nations do it but not Afghanistan? India has had a long history of being dirt poor, way over populated and religiously divided. Look at them now.


.

 

[MikeyDB]

Protecting Afghanistan’s people.

8,587AFGHAN TROOPS KILLED
and 25,761 SERIOUSLY INJURED July 2004

3,485 AFGHAN CIVILIANS KILLED
and 6,273 SERIOUSLY INJURED July 2004

Afghani casualties and deaths is a subject western media organizations rely on the U.S. military for, for the information (if any) that makes it to TV or print media.

In combination, these 12,000 troops and civilians killed compares to the population of a fairly large Canadian community. We are prepared it seems to remember that Canadian and U.S. troops killed in action are also fathers and brothers but some kind of prejudice intervenes in our understanding when it comes to allowing that these nearly 9000 Afghani troops were exactly the same thing.

32,034 seriously injured Afghanis while significant in itself, fails to convey what this means to the families and the future of these families and to the nation of Afghanistan.

Missing limbs, compromised vision hearing and speech, to say nothing of the psychological impact on not only these folk personally but on the population as a whole as-effect can at best only be estimated.

I can’t understand how any Canadian can feel “good” about Afghani women and children maimed and killed by Canadian deployed arms and service personnel.

Canadians never felt the “need” to send troops to Belfast and the terrorism of the IRA didn’t command sufficient attention for the U.N. to issue a “mandate”….why not?

The world essentially stood by during the Rwanda genocide…why?

Samantha Power's chilling summary in the September 2001 issue of The Atlantic of her three year investigation into how the U.S. passed up countless opportunities to intervene in the 1994 Rwanda genocide in which 800,000 Tutsis and politically moderate Hutus were murdered.

http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/power.htm

“In reality the United States did much more than fail to send troops. It led a successful effort to remove most of the UN peacekeepers who were already in Rwanda. It aggressively worked to block the subsequent authorization of UN reinforcements. It refused to use its technology to jam radio broadcasts that were a crucial instrument in the coordination and perpetuation of the genocide. And even as, on average, 8,000 Rwandans were being butchered each day, U.S. officials shunned the term "genocide," for fear of being obliged to act. The United States in fact did virtually nothing "to try to limit what occurred." Indeed, staying out of Rwanda was an explicit U.S. policy objective.”

Did the Afghan people practice terrorism against Canadians?

NO

Are the Afghan people guilty of supporting the training camps of Osama Bin Laden?

Perhaps the dynamics at play in considering that question and the answer are complex and difficult to answer with any degree of certainty.

Have the people of the United States and Canada been complicit in support of other international terrorists?

YES

(1) Noriega, considered "outstanding" at the SOA, is on the CIA payroll (to the tune of up to $100,000 a year) from the mid-?60s to the mid-?80s.
(2) His drug trafficking, though known, is no obstacle to his chumminess with George Bush (CIA director and "Vice" President) during the ?70s and early ?80s.
(3) His true crime is being an independent leader of Panama, just before the US is obliged to return the stolen Panama Canal Zone on January 1st, 1990.
(4) So after publicly demonizing his longtime friend and employee, Bush slaughters thousands of Panamanians and installs a puppet government, in the nick of time, on December 20th, 1989.
(5) Let?s not call any more presidents "wimps", ok? It just pisses ?em off.
http://www-personal.umich.edu/~lormand/poli/soa/panama.htm
YES
“In 1975, Suharto ordered the invasion of East Timor, a small country that had declared its independence from Portugal just days before the invasion. The Indonesian military occupation of East Timor has claimed the lives of at least 200,000 people. That makes one third of the population -- the greatest genocide in per capita terms since the Holocaust.”
The Archive has worked for many years to open U.S. government files on Indonesia and East Timor. In December 2001, the Archive posted newly declassified documents showing that Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and President Gerald Ford gave the green light to Indonesia's 1975 invasion of East Timor, the beginning of a 24-year occupation in which more than 100,000 Timorese died (Readers are invited to refer to this earlier briefing book for historical background on East Timor and Indonesia's 1975 invasion).
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB174/index.htm

Goose-step along with the American’s if you like, but the blood of these hundreds of thousands killed in Rwanda while America facilitated genocide and while Afghanis die fighting yet another occupying nations forces, is on our hands.

Canada will be remembered for its complicity in murder and as sycophant to American industry, to say nothing of its tacit approval for hundreds of thousands killed in various locations around the world in the name of America.

 

[tamarin]

Good posts- both of you! And you're parsing my post- I'd never have the patience! But the old saw seems to hold you spellbound: this time's it's different!
Is it?
Granted, Canada is acting on principle and it is acting within the purview of the UN. It's trying to walk the walk. As the Star put it recently (June 30) our country has placed troops in the mountainous redoubt accepting that they are "risking their lives defending democracy and thwarting terror."
The Afghan mission is not peacekeeping, it's peacemaking. And that takes muscle and sacrifice. What little can be gleaned is salient. Afghanistan outside its key coalition-held towns is firmly in the grip of warlords or the Taliban. The Afghans are quickly going back to their old pre-Taliban days. Opium in king, women ruthlessly suppressed, dog fighting is the choice of community sports and crime is rampant. The prisons are bulging.
But we're there because this time it's different.
To stabilize Afghanistan is a longterm project. As a poster above mentioned, the Red Army couldn't do it and it was a far more heartless enterprise than our own, willing to do anything it wished to achieve objectives.
We don't know know what the world will be like in five years let alone two. Afghanistan can't be tamed in the short term. I doubt we have time enough or resolve to stay there if far more menacing events arise in Asia. Russia and China seemed to have slipped off the screen precisely when we should be paying them undivided attention.

 

[MikeyDB]

Tamarin

It may just be my interpretation, but I sense a thread of "Oh what the Hell....it's just something happening somewhere on the other side of the planet.." in your post.

If we limit our focus to Afghanistan (as forum protocol demands) the available information is sketchy at best. Even though it's tough to get hard data out of the region that hasn't been "massaged" for western consumption, I don't think we can completely ignore that this action is part of a larger newly-defined "purpose" emanating principly from the United States.

You may call it peace-making if you like, but I'd like to hear your take on why it's important to make "peace" in Afghanistan while it was significantly less-so in East Timor or Rwanda or a half-dozen other places I could name????

 

[Claudius]

You may call it peace-making if you like, but I'd like to hear your take on why it's important to make "peace" in Afghanistan while it was significantly less-so in East Timor or Rwanda or a half-dozen other places I could name????

Mike. I’ve been reading your posts: they’re good.

Would you not use the same argument with the names re-arranged if we were in one of those places instead of Afghanistan? Would it not then be "Why are we in East Timor when we could be helping the Afghans?"

I'd certainly grant you the point that the West (starting actually with Belgium since it was their mess to begin with), was shamed by their lack of attention to Rwanda in particular. One of the reasons there was such an outcry over it is because it is almost certain that this genocide could've been stopped. All a small international or even UN battalion or 2 would've had to do would be to shoot a few of the mob to show they were serious, as opposed to what did happen; the mob learned quickly the UN would not fire back and the army wasn't going to stop them. The army wasn't going to help them either, so a little fire power to protect some safe zones or a refugee route out of the country would never have changed the political outcome of what we see there today but the 500000-800000 massacred would’ve been saved.

I can't help and point out that if this did happen, if we (the West) did intervene we most certainly would've had to kill some of the mob but those 500000-800000 dead would be hypothetical now, and the anti-war crowd (whatever that's supposed to mean) would've shouted that down forever on the basis that those 'hypothetical' masses of bodies would've been a poor rationale for killing 5, (500? 5000?) of the 'innocent' mob.


.

 

[MikeyDB]

Hi Tamarin... OK I'm confused...
Hi Claudius too...

Thanks for the kudos but believe me you’re one of the few (perhaps) that doesn’t whine about the length and syntax (too tough..I need a dictionary etc..).

I don’t live in a somnambulist’s fog and acknowledge that as a species our behaviour with each other is at times completely reprehensible. The point I was trying to make with respect to my references to Rwanda and East Timor was counterpoint to the opinion that the Canadian “mission” in Afghanistan is predicated on humanitarian or “higher principles” and not simply support for the American industrial complex.

Our thirst for gasoline and the product of sweatshops scooped up at bargain prices in WalMart and Zellers etc. is behind what drives that American industrial complex. There’s no nice way to say it.

We aggressively support the bloody communist regime in China through the same mechanism. Products from India, Indonesia and two-dozen other nations where “big-bucks” are made by corporations enslaving women and children living subsistence existences with NO QUALITY OF LIFE whatever are eagerly purchased without a second thought by us Oh-So Morally Superior Canadians.

It’s a lie and a lie that has simply come home to bite us.

 

[Colpy]

You may call it peace-making if you like, but I'd like to hear your take on why it's important to make "peace" in Afghanistan while it was significantly less-so in East Timor or Rwanda or a half-dozen other places I could name????

Mike. I’ve been reading your posts: they’re good.

Would you not use the same argument with the names re-arranged if we were in one of those places instead of Afghanistan? Would it not then be "Why are we in East Timor when we could be helping the Afghans?"

I'd certainly grant you the point that the West (starting actually with Belgium since it was their mess to begin with), was shamed by their lack of attention to Rwanda in particular. One of the reasons there was such an outcry over it is because it is almost certain that this genocide could've been stopped. All a small international or even UN battalion or 2 would've had to do would be to shoot a few of the mob to show they were serious, as opposed to what did happen; the mob learned quickly the UN would not fire back and the army wasn't going to stop them. The army wasn't going to help them either, so a little fire power to protect some safe zones or a refugee route out of the country would never have changed the political outcome of what we see there today but the 500000-800000 massacred would’ve been saved.

I can't help and point out that if this did happen, if we (the West) did intervene we most certainly would've had to kill some of the mob but those 500000-800000 dead would be hypothetical now, and the anti-war crowd (whatever that's supposed to mean) would've shouted that down forever on the basis that those 'hypothetical' masses of bodies would've been a poor rationale for killing 5, (500? 5000?) of the 'innocent' mob.


.

BINGO!

There's the rub.

If the west formed a force to go into Darfur to help out, they would have to kill Janjaweed, Osama has already declared Sudan the place of the next great Jihad, within 6 months we would be murdering imperialists there only to persecute Islam.

 

[Colpy]

Re: RE: Afghanistan: a war that can't be won

Tamarin

It may just be my interpretation, but I sense a thread of "Oh what the Hell....it's just something happening somewhere on the other side of the planet.." in your post.

If we limit our focus to Afghanistan (as forum protocol demands) the available information is sketchy at best. Even though it's tough to get hard data out of the region that hasn't been "massaged" for western consumption, I don't think we can completely ignore that this action is part of a larger newly-defined "purpose" emanating principly from the United States.

You may call it peace-making if you like, but I'd like to hear your take on why it's important to make "peace" in Afghanistan while it was significantly less-so in East Timor or Rwanda or a half-dozen other places I could name????

That is very simple.

Afghanistan harboured and aided terrorist groups that attacked North America. It was a training camp and safe house for those who attacked our continent, they killed Canadians.

None of the other half-dozen situations came close to threatening us.

If we leave Afghanistan to the Taliban it won't be long before the training camps are drawing new terror recuits from the radical Islamic schools in Pakistan.

Now, you isolationists need to make up your mind. Do we act internationally only in self-defense, or only as a result of the "responsibility to protect", only in self-interest, or simply not al all?

It seems all you do is cry about what we ARE doing, or about what we FAILED to do.

I get the feeling that had we completely reversed our actions and become involved in Rwanda and East Timor, and now in the Sudan, you would be crying about our involvement there, and wondering why we weren't doing something about the REAL threat in Afghanistan.

 

[MikeyDB]

Colpy

And no doubt you're pleased that America has operated the School of the Americas to train terrorists and graduates have spread to the four corners of the planet?

How about we send troops into Washington DC???

 

[I think not]

Re: RE: Afghanistan: a war that can't be won

Colpy

And no doubt you're pleased that America has operated the School of the Americas to train terrorists and graduates have spread to the four corners of the planet?

How about we send troops into Washington DC???

And then you wonder why nobody takes the fringe left seriously other than the meek. The School of the Americas is a military training facility in Georgia. They train MILITARY personnel from Latin American countries. Why would Latin American countries send their military to be trained as terrorists. This includes Chavez's Venezuela btw. Have an answer? Or do you need to look it up first?

 

[Colpy]

Re: RE: Afghanistan: a war that can't be won

Colpy

And no doubt you're pleased that America has operated the School of the Americas to train terrorists and graduates have spread to the four corners of the planet?

How about we send troops into Washington DC???

I think ITN answered the question about the School of the Americas very well.

BTW, at no time have I said the USA was perfect. Far from it. I would have prefered it if Clinton had not blocked aid to Rwanda, but that was much MORE the fault of the UN, who prevented D'Allaire from taking action from Day 1 on.

I never heard of a terrorist trained in the USA.

 

[MikeyDB]

I’m reacting a little bit I suppose to the charge by Colpy that I represent the “isolationist” view of international political dynamics.

“Now, you isolationists need to make up your mind. Do we act internationally only in self-defence, or only as a result of the "responsibility to protect", only in self-interest, or simply not al all?”

I’m not an isolationist in any sense of the term. The salient issue as I see it (well one of them at least) is WHAT WE DO WHEN WE DECIDE TO ACT OR NOT ACT!

It would be retrograde to suggest that isolationism embraces the notion that we simply stand and watch as a tsunami kills hundreds of thousands and leaves millions homeless and thankfully we don’t do that. Where consideration is demanded with generous application of reasoned debate and careful introspection (insofar as identifying the motive underlying our decision to participate) is when we opt to bomb shoot and incinerate men women and children for some “good” reason!

We ought not to simply follow the lead of our neighbors to the south!

A system of government that’s prepared to terrorize and kill its own citizens (Ruby Ridge, Waco, Philadelphia) isn’t a model to be embraced!

To suggest that criminals of any nation or nationality ought not be dealt-with is ludicrous.

Yes whether you’re black yellow green or orange, killing anyone in the name of “ethnic cleansing” is abhorrent and deserving of the full weight of lawful consequences for this behaviour.

 

[MikeyDB]

Colpy

You've never heard of Manuel Noriega?