Forum Post: While People Are Saying "Victory" In Afghanistan
Posted 11 years ago on Sept. 22, 2012, 6:20 p.m. EST by TrevorMnemonic
(5827)
This content is user submitted and not an official statement
Yesterday the Pentagon announced that “the surge” of 33,000 troops in Afghanistan, from two years ago, is over. 68,000 troops will stay. What will 68,000 troops accomplish that 101,000 troops could not? The Afghan “government” is hopelessly corrupt, immersed in murder, bribery, extortion, bank fraud, electoral fraud, drug trade -- a business of its ‘first family’; stolen weapons, helping to move billions in cash out of the country in boxes and suitcases, to purchase villas at resorts. The US has already “invested” $558.2 billion in taxpayers’ money for the invasion and occupation. Members of the Afghan army and police (or Taliban in stolen uniforms) stealthily shoot and kill unsuspecting US troops at close range. Everything about our presence in Afghanistan is wrong: Picture a carnival of corruption in the lowest circle of Dante’s Inferno. The “surge” is over. Really, should we keep the other 68,000 troops there until 2014? How much more of your tax dollars do you want to send to Afghanistan?
- Dennis Kucinich
We have won nothing.
the lowest circle is frozen solid in ice where not even tears are permitted
American public just does not give a crap.The goverment does as it damn well pleases.And once again it Robs from the middle to give to the rich.As the fat ass middle stands around waving plastic flags made in China.Who the fu-k is DK?
Dennis Kucinich is a House representative that actually works for the people and not the corporations.
The 2000th US Military Death in Afghanistan has just been confirmed. WTF is this all about & can anyone recall Mikael Gorbachev's warnings to The USA in 1989 ?!
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/30/afghanistan-war-death-toll_n_1926668.html ;
http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/us-military-deaths-afghanistan-hit-2000-17358793 ;
http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2012/09/30/afghanistan-deaths-us.html ;
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-19776402 &
http://icasualties.org/OEF/Index.aspx .
The '2000' is 'in theatre', the last link is from a highly authoritative source and incorporates all casualties - including accidents, suicides and who later succumbed to their wounds much later. Of course, almost no one is counting the Afghan dead and injured but sorry 'to drone' on about innocent victims and please see my more substantive comment below for information and context to this Immoral War & Evil Horror !
fiat pax ...
Your truths are colder and harder, dude and consider we're all working class - one way or the other ;-) + DK = http://www.facebook.com/denniskucinich and he's one of the last sane voices left amongst all 'The Politricks' - in The U$ CONgress.
pax ...
Troops plus military contractors may be kept in Afghanistan, as part of US plan to attack Iran.
They are also needed to protect the product, opium.
Hi nomdeguerre, Agree. That would be a good link to bring in.
The Taliban cut opium production in Afghanistan by 90% in mid 2001. By late 2001 the U.S. invaded. By 2007, opium production increased 20 times the pre invasion level. Afghanistan now produces 90% of the worlds opium. All under the watch of U.S. and coalition troops.
http://www.economist.com/node/16432922
Why are U.S. soldiers allowing opium fields to grow under their noses? The Taliban finance this crop and with the profits buy the weapons that kill our soldiers. Does this make any sense?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aj-b3pB6M7s
Marines patrolling through opium fields ( http://rt.com/news/blogs/friendly-fire/changing-us-guard-garden/ ). . . . Hmmm. . . . You don't the profits flow mostly elsewhere than the Taliban?
Thank you jr for links. Here is another related link.
http://www.veteranstoday.com/2012/09/02/breaking-afghanistan-americas-total-lie-war/
The cold hard truth from 'DK' - again !!!
With reference to Afghanistan, "Graveyard of Empires" - but alas also an early grave for so many of its long suffering people, I re-post the following points and observations :
1) Afghanistan is a multi-ethnic country, made up of Aimaks, Baluchis, Hazaras, Kazahks, Kirghis, Pamiris, Tajhiks, Turkmen, Uzbeks and at ~42% of the total population, the largest single group, the Pashtuns / Pukhtoons (dependent on Northern or Southern dialects).
2) The historical Pashtun homeland is divided in two by the Afghan / Pakistan border. This porous "border" is in effect the old "Durand Line", the de facto western territorial limit of the British Empire in the Indian subcontinent. The Pashtuns have NEVER recognised this arbitrary line on someone else's map and no external power or authority has ever been able to define it, let alone patrol or police it.
3) Pashtun society is extremely conservative, deeply traditional, unrelentingly patriarchal and tribal. The Women lead difficult lives far removed from any "Liberal Western Norms". A Pashtun is a member of a family group, a sub-clan, a clan and then a tribe. At over 45 million people globally, they are the world's largest tribally affiliated ethnic group.
4) Ultra-Conservative Sunni Islam (tho' there is one Shia Tribe) and the Lex Talionis, Pre-Islamic honour code "Pashtunwalli", are the law, organisational guidelines and ethical principles by which this proud, fiercely independent and hardy mountain people regulate their society alongside and within their 'Jirga / Shura / Majlis', collective gathering and decision making systems.
5) The phrase "Revenge is a dish best served cold", is the English approximation and appropriation of the Pashtun original. Another Pashtun dictum is: "Me against my brothers; me and my brothers against my cousins; me, my brothers and my cousins against the world". Pashtun males are considered adult at 13 years of age and are honour bound to defend "Zan, Zhar, Zamin" - Women, Wealth and Land. Notions of loyalty and duty to kith and kin, honour, respect, shame, "not losing face" and "dying on one's feet rather than living on one's knees" are central to their world view and modus vivendi.
6) The word "Taliban" simply translates as "Students", as they were originally recruited, equipped and organised with the enthusiastic help, encouragement and funding of the Saudis, ISI, MI6 & CIA from the Madrasas (religious schools) in the numerous Pashtun refugee camps, during and after the war to oust the Soviet armed forces and the devastating civil war that followed it. Their grandfathers and fathers were then of course, known and eulogised as the Anti-Communist "Mujahideen". The word "Taliban" is now nothing other than a obfuscatory, propagandist and subversive "meme" for what is in actuality, under various names and guises - 'The Pashtun National Resistance Movement'.
7) The peoples of present day Afghanistan, whether Pashtun or otherwise, are the time served world champions of guerilla warfare and insurgency. No army or empire has ever been able to totally defeat, dominate or subjugate them. (Alexander the Great's) Greek, Scythian, Hepthalite, Bactrian, Persian, Mongol, Arab, Turkic, British and Russian armies have all been severely mauled and bloodied at some time or other and have had to retreat, pay tribute to or come to an accommodation with, these fierce and warlike peoples.
8) The Americans - despite their Massive Military Superiority, are the latest to learn these same painful lessons. This time however, the whole world is (quite intentionally?) further driven towards a "Clash of Civilisations", as advocated by Samuel Huntington, Benny Morris, William Safire, Thomas Friedman, Charles Krauthammer, Donald, Robert & Fred Kagan, Norman & John Podhoretz, Richard & Daniel Pipes, Bill Kristol, Richard Perle , Paul Bremer & many Neo-Con ; Paleo-Imperialist others.
9) This PNAC / NeoCon ambition, aspiration and world view stimulates and is mirrored by (as predicted by 'The Probability Gamers' in Herzliya and Langley!) the grand "End Time" schematic of a few thousand Jihadis worldwide, whose fanaticism and fury ; rage and resistance is fuelled, stoked and provoked by the Scientific Uber-Violence and Imperial Jackboot of the "Coalition of the Complicit", under the aegis and "Blood Spattered Banner of the Usurped States of Amnesiacs".
10) What the Warmongering US, "National Security" / Military / Industrial / Corporate / Banking cliques did NOT seem to know of the Buddhist Vietnamese - in that they were a fiercely independent people, who had fought the Mongol, Khmer, Chinese, Japanese and French Imperiums before they defeated the USA - so do they NOW seem NOT to know of the Muslim Afghans.
~
Thus consider, perhaps an Unending War is just what is Really Wanted by the Dark Forces of the 'Bankster-US/MIC' Nexus. After all, 9/!! was the declared raison d'etre for the Illegal and Immoral War on Afghanistan but as that attack clearly had nothing to do with Afghans or Afghanistan, then ... ?
Empire and 'WARFARE' abroad and austerity and 'UNFAIR' at home - this hate, horror, hubris and hypocrisy can NOT go on and on !!!
Dennis Kucinich Speaks 'Truth To Power' re. Drones: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cn64okZlNDY !!
fiat lux ; fiat pax ; fiat justitia ruat caelum !
By Chris Hedges : "The Maimed : On Eleven Years of War in Afghanistan" :
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/the_maimed_20121007/ &
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article32691.htm [Alt.Link, Bolder Font]
"It is because we know evil that we resist. It is because we know violence that we are nonviolent. And we know that it is not about us; war taught us that. It is about the other, lying by the side of the road. It is about reaching down in defiance of creeds and oaths, in defiance of religion and nationality, and lifting our enemy up. All acts of healing and love—and the defiance of war is an affirmation of love—allow us to shout out to the vast powers of the universe that, however broken we are, we are not yet helpless, however much we despair we are not yet without hope, however weak we may feel, we will always, always, always resist. And it is in this act of resistance that we find our salvation."
fiat lux et fiat pax ...
What does "support the troops" mean to you?
https://www.facebook.com/a.revolt.digital.anarchy/photos/a.160085937342214.42860.156473571036784/984376404913159/?type=1&theater
At Milestone, US Military Deaths Dwarfed by Afghan Dead
"As 2,000th American soldier killed in Afghanistan makes headlines, estimates put Afghan civilian dead at over 20,000." Also see : http://icasualties.org/oef/ .
too sad for latin ...
That is very sad, indeed, and, the 20,000 civilian deaths is abominable. :(