Wednesday 27th of November 2024
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liar, liar .....

liar, liar .....

The US military has conceded that a raid this week by troops under its command in Afghanistan killed a group of civilians who were defending their home, not militants as it had earlier reported.

The killing of civilians by foreign forces is the biggest source of tension between the Afghan government and its Western backers. While NATO has tightened its procedures, the latest incident shows the problem is far from solved.

Some 2,100 civilians were killed in Afghanistan last year, a third of them by Afghan and international troops, the United Nations says.

Violence in Afghanistan has reached its highest level since the 2001 U.S.-led invasion, despite a growing number of foreign troops, and has spread from the south and east to the outskirts of the capital, Kabul.

http://www.truthout.org/041009D

back at the printing presses …..

US president Barack Obama is seeking $83.4bn (£56.8bn) for US military and diplomatic operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, pressing for special troop funding that he opposed two years ago when he was a senator and George Bush was president.

Obama's request, including money to send thousands more troops into Afghanistan, would push the costs of the two wars to almost $1tn since the 9/11 terror attacks against the US in 2001, according to the Congressional Research Service. The additional money would cover operations into the latter months of this year.

"This funding will do two things: it will prolong our occupation of Iraq through at least the end of 2011, and it will deepen and expand our military presence in Afghanistan indefinitely," said Democratic anti-war Representative Lynn Woolsey. "Instead of attempting to find military solutions to the problems we face in Iraq and Afghanistan, President Obama must fundamentally change the mission in both countries to focus on promoting reconciliation, economic development, humanitarian aid and regional diplomatic efforts."

Obama was a harsh critic of the Iraq war as a presidential candidate, which attracted support from the Democratic party's liberal base and helped him secure the party's nomination. He opposed two infusions of war money in 2007 after Bush used a veto to force Congress to remove a withdrawal timeline from the $99bn measure.

http://www.truthout.org/041009L

meanwhile …..

The war in Afghanistan has dominated annual United States-Australia security talkfest & a decision on a further Australian troop commitment to the conflict is likely ''within weeks''.

Minister of Foreign Affairs, Stephen Smith, & Minister of Defence, Joel Fitzgibbon, held discussions with US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, & Defence Secretary Robert Gates, at the Australian-United States Ministerial Meeting in Washington on Thursday.

Speaking at the post-meeting press conference, Smith referred to ''an international consensus to pursue a greater military contribution'' in Afghanistan.

''We had a discussion about what, if anything, more Australia could do in the civil reconstruction or training area, in military contribution & also, importantly, any temporary contribution we could make for the [Afghanistan] election in August of this year.''

Smith said ''No decisions were made, no requests made & no commitments given, but it was a very helpful discussion.'' Smith said he & Fitzgibbon would report to Prime Minister Kevin Rudd & cabinet & a decision would be taken ''in a matter of weeks''. Mr Gates said the decision was Australia's alone but ''we & the Afghans can use all the help we can get''.

“Civil reconstruction; training; a ‘temporary contribution to the Afghanistan election or a military contribution?” More twists & turns than Harry Houdini …. not a word as to how Australia’s national interest is being served by our continuing to be involved in another failed yankee imperialist adventure ….. is the prevarication out of nervousness about the Australian public’s lack of enthusiasm for the war?

Australia has about 1100 troops operating in the dangerous southern province of Oruzgan, the largest contingent of non-NATO forces in Afghanistan. Ten Australian soldiers have been killed since the 2001 invasion.

Yet, while Rudd has made clear his belief that Australia should be in Afghanistan long-term, Australians are increasingly less convinced that this is a “good” war.

Polling by the Lowy Institute, a Sydney-based conservative think tank, revealed that 56% of Australians were “opposed to military involvement” in Afghanistan in 2008. On March 24, Newspoll said that 65% of Australians disagree with sending more troops.

However, Rudd, like all our warrior politicians, safe in the rear, is not to be put off. Before winning government he talked up the Afghanistan conflict as the “good” war, while Iraq was the “bad war”.

The nervousness about the Afghanistan war simmering among strong supporters of the US-Australia alliance is clearly spelled out by Hugh White, a visiting fellow at the Lowy Institute and professor of strategic studies at the Australian National University.

For some years White has argued against sending more troops to Afghanistan. In the February 16 Australian he said that even with “a lot more troops”, the chances of “success” are very low, while the “risks” (ie. deaths) were “relatively high”.

White also disputes the argument that Afghanistan is somehow “critical to Australia’s security”. He says that the war is not the “central front in the war on terror”.

from the common sense side of the world .....

"No one will say this publicly, but the true fact is we are all talking about our exit strategy from Afghanistan. We are getting out. It may take a couple of years, but we are all looking to get out."

Thus did a "senior European diplomat" confide to The New York Times during Obama's trip to Strasbourg.

Europe is bailing out on us. Afghanistan is to be America's war.

During what the Times called a "fractious meeting," NATO agreed to send 3,000 troops to provide security during the elections and 2,000 to train Afghan police. Thin gruel beside Obama's commitment to double U.S. troop levels to 68,000.

Why won't Europe fight?

Because Europe sees no threat from Afghanistan and no vital interest in a faraway country where NATO Europeans have not fought since the British Empire folded its tent long ago.

Al-Qaida did not attack Europe out of Afghanistan. America was attacked. Because, said Osama bin Laden in his "declaration of war," America was occupying the sacred soil of Saudi Arabia, choking Muslim Iraq to death and providing Israel with the weapons to repress the Palestinians.

As Europe has no troops in Saudi Arabia, is exiting Iraq and backs a Palestinian state, Europeans figure, they are less likely to be attacked than if they are fighting and killing Muslims in Afghanistan.

Madrid and London were targeted for terror attacks, they believe, because Spain and Britain were George W. Bush's strongest allies in Iraq. Britain, with a large Pakistani population, must be especially sensitive to U.S. Predator strikes in Pakistan.

Moreover, Europeans have had their fill of war.

In World War I alone, France, Germany and Russia each lost far more men killed than we have lost in all our wars put together. British losses in World War I were greater than America's losses, North and South, in the Civil War. Her losses in World War II, from a nation with but a third of our population, were equal to ours. Where America ended that war as a superpower and leader of the Free World, Britain ended it bankrupt, broken, bereft of empire, sinking into socialism.

All of Europe's empires are gone. All her great navies are gone. All her million-man armies are history. Her populations are all aging, shrinking and dying, as millions pour in from former colonies in the Third World to repopulate and Islamize the mother countries.

Because of Europe's new "diversity," any war fought in a Muslim land will inflame a large segment of Europe's urban population.

Finally, NATO Europe knows there is no price to pay for malingering in NATO's war in Afghanistan.

Europeans know America will take up the slack and do nothing about their refusal to send combat brigades.

For Europeans had us figured out a long time ago.

They sense that we need them more than they need us.

http://www.creators.com/opinion/pat-buchanan.html

a good war .....

An Afghan army colonel whose wife and children died in a US-led raid demanded action against the troops responsible Friday as President Hamid Karzai condemned the killings.

The operation in the eastern province of Khost around midnight Wednesday killed the wife of Afghan National Army artillery commander Awal Khan, two of his children and a brother.

 

The troops, who had been hunting a militant linked to radical Islamist groups, also shot a pregnant woman and killed her unborn baby, which had almost come to term, Khan and a provincial health official said. The woman survived the shooting.

The mounting civilian death toll from military operations is one of the main sources of tension between Afghan authorities and the US and NATO-led forces in Afghanistan.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20090410/wl_sthasia_afp/afghanistanunrestcivilianlead