Divorcing the Taliban

By Nida Afaque
ZoneAsia-Pk

The long and short of the war in Afghanistan was to eliminate terrorists and reinstall social equality for the locals so that women can have a greater say, children can acquire education and the young Afghans can find a stable source of income. The decade long war has ripped Afghanistan limb from limb; thousands of people have died, millions have incurred lifelong crippling injuries, social security is non-existent and perpetual state of chaos has taken over the nation.

The politics of withdrawal of coalition forces has seen ups and downs. The Chicago summit underscored the sincerity of the coalition forces in exiting Afghanistan. Months prior and after the summit, NATO forces have been integrating the Afghan security forces in their daily routines. NATO agreed to carry out night raids via Afghan counterparts, stop aerial attacks on Afghan residential buildings and even basic literacy camps have been set up to educate the afghan troops. A dip in Taliban attacks was also recorded.

The past few months have witnessed resurgence in violence from the Taliban. Suicide attacks, gunfire and bombs have occurred near the bases of Coalition forces and the Afghan security forces. Western embassies have not been spared the terror either. The latest attack was at a hotel in a scenic locality of Kabul on the pretext of un-Islamic activities like alcohol consumption. Soon afterwards, a cross-border attack was launched on Pakistani check-post resulting in deaths of 8 soldiers and 17 Pakistani security armed forces personnel were
beheaded after being taken hostage.

These graphic attacks have sent strong messages to coalition forces, afghan forces and even neighboring Pakistan. Taliban have been quite stubborn in working for a peace process but they did cede to form a diplomatic office in Qatar. While coalition forces have repeatedly stressed on their determination to leave the battlefield, some like the French have promised to leave even before the set date.

Unfortunately some serious blunders have been committed by them too which has turned positive reinforcements sour and send the reconciliation process many steps behind. The burning of the Holy Quran was a major incident that brought disapproval from all over the world. Shortly afterwards, a US marine allegedly suffering from PTSD killed 17 afghan civilians. But perhaps the greatest irksome moment for the Taliban are the reports from western media that their power has been weakened.

Indeed, actions speak louder than words and these graphic images are not soon to be erased from the minds of the locals. The targets of these attacks were mainly soldiers and civilians in close proximity to these soldiers, physically and/or figuratively. It is important to realize that these attacks occurred at the same time negotiations were taking place with the coalition forces. Thereby, indicating that the 10 year war has hardened the hearts of the Taliban against foreign invaders. This could also mean that the Taliban would reassert themselves and carry out the same tribal code of ethics they followed back in their term.

Another distressing point is the attitude of the Taliban regarding aid workers and volunteers. Many foreign social workers have been kidnapped for heavy ransom which some believe funds their extremist attacks. A senior British aid worker, Khalil Dale, was even killed when the ransom was not paid. For human right activists this would signal the continuation of violations against women, children and minorities.

The Taliban also symbolize a big question mark for Pakistan’s security. The porous Pak-Afghan border will continue to remain a source of skirmishes and refuge for the militants. Some intelligence reports have claimed alliances between ISI and the afghan Taliban. Assuming that it is the truth, Pakistan’s strategy to gain the Taliban’s vote has failed. TTP, which have been marked as a terrorist group by Pakistan, has been maintaining sanctuaries in Afghanistan probably with the help of the Afghan Taliban. The latter has been terrorizing locals near the border. The TTP already idolizes the Taliban for fighting foreign forces. With a history of terrorist attacks all over Pakistan, if the afghan Taliban decide to use the TTP for their purposes, Pakistan is looking at a serious threat. The Afghan Taliban could use this to harm Pakistani forces. The Afghan Taliban have also started warming up to Indian presence, a blow to their relations with Pakistan.

After these hiccups, Pakistan has to rethink its strategy for dealing with the Taliban. It has suffered immensely from being labeled as “part of the problem”. Domestic concerns are too pressing for Pakistan to be indulging in foreign battles. It’s time to end this insecurity by completely wiping out the presence of terrorists in Pakistan. Non-interventionists would recommend a strategy of negotiation. But the peace deal with the Taliban in Swat has proved how unreliable such accords can be.

The strategy of differentiating between the “good” terrorist and the “bad” terrorist can no longer continue. Discriminatory ethnic and religious movements be those of the Sipah-e-Sahaba or the Lashkar-e-Taiba will all have to end. For such a mass scale operation, foreign powers will be willing to help Pakistan achieve their common goal of regional and global peace. Furthermore, a new holistic strategy to be applicable after the operation has to be formulated, one that encompasses the presence and activities of these groups.

Such an aggressive strategy of uprooting the terrorist elements will also prove dangerous for the country’s politicians, armed forces and other law enforcement personell as always innocent civilians. It will invariably clamp down the nations’ freedom of speech and right to privacy but then nothing comes for free. Sadly, Pakistan has reached a point where a return to normalcy will cost them dearly but a radical operation like this can give it the chance to reestablish the writ of the state and get rid of the boulder blocking its economic and social prosperity.

Nuclear tension in South Asia

By Deepika Jaitley
ZoneAsia-Pk

The cold war between India and Pakistan got accentuated when it was declared by the Washington Post that Pakistan has achieved a nuclear arsenal of over a 100 warheads which has made them the 5th largest Nuclear power, ahead of both France and England. This act of proliferation came about as a result of Pakistan’s retaliation to the inclusion of India as a member of key multilateral export control regimes that allows trade in nuclear and other materials and the unsuccessful ’5th generation stealth fighter’ deal between India and United states.

The recent visit of Barack Obama to India had already got Pakistan concerned over its exclusion from the itinerary of Obama’s short tour of South Asia; even though it is considered to be a front line ally and has bore the brunt of the War on Terror in Afghanistan. Furthermore, the announcement made by the US for its support of the Indian waiver from the Nuclear Suppliers Group, the Missile Technology Control Regime, the Australian Group (which works to reduce the spread of chemical and biological warfare) and the Wassenaar Arrangement, a joint effort by many nations to control the transfer of traditional arms and dual-use technology, has become a major cause of concern for Pakistan.

Read Complete Article Here: http://www.zoneasia-pk.com/ZoneAsia-Pk/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=3489:nuclear-tension-in-south-asia&catid=70:free-talk&Itemid=84

Rumors of Pakistan’s Anti-Aircraft Deployment Against NATO

A Pakistani soldier adjusts a surface-to-air missile

A highly placed Pakistani STRATFOR source on Oct. 6 vehemently denied reports that Pakistan has deployed anti-aircraft missiles along its border with Afghanistan. The reported deployment originated in an Oct. 3 Pakistani TV report on channel SAMAA, where a member of the Pakistani National Assembly claimed that now that the missiles were deployed, “no helicopter will be able to escape after entering Pakistani territory.”

Notably, the apparently sensationalist story never got picked up by Pakistani mainstream media, and the STRATFOR source commenting on the issue adamantly ridiculed the idea of Pakistan making such a bold move against the United States. The source drew a parallel to the Soviet-Afghan war in the 1980s, when Soviet aircraft would regularly bomb Pakistan’s Kurram agency. If the Pakistanis were too afraid to shoot at their Soviet rivals then, he said, Pakistan is most definitely not interested in firing on its U.S. allies now.

The mere fact that rumors of a Pakistani anti-aircraft deployment are being circulated deserves attention. The United States has now hit day seven in Pakistan’s closure of the Torkham border crossing at the Khyber Pass through which pass three-fourths of the supplies for the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan. Throughout the whole affair, militants have attacked scores of fuel tankers on the Pakistani side of the border.

Following the Sept. 30 incident, in which ISAF attack helicopters fired on a Pakistani military post and killed three paramilitary Frontier Corps soldiers, the Pakistani military and government have chosen the ISAF supply line dependency as its main retaliatory weapon of choice against Washington. The United States, not wanting to further undermine the security of its supply lineswhen its forces are concentrated in the region and when Pakistan has already been greatly destabilized, has had to be extremely cautious in dealing with Islamabad on the matter. Meanwhile, Pakistan is using swelling anti-American sentiment in the country as an opportunity to assert its sovereignty and rally Pakistanis around the embattled government.

While it is unclear whether these rumors originated with deliberate leaks from the government or were simply wild speculation by a Pakistani politician, the rumors of anti-aircraft batteries being deployed can serve two main purposes for Islamabad. One is to satisfy its domestic constituency, which has been galvanized by the Sept. 30 event and is calling on the Pakistani leadership to stand up to Washington over the deaths of its soldiers. The second, more significant, purpose is to signal to Washington the danger of pushing Islamabad too far in this war. The United States is not interested in seeing Pakistan increasingly turn from friend to foe, especially when the key to any U.S. exit strategy from the war in Afghanistan lies in Islamabad.

US officials link al Qaeda operative to New York plot

By ADAM GOLDMAN and MATT APUZZO

NEW YORK: Current and former counter-terrorism officials of the United States have linked Adnan Shukrijumah, one of the most wanted persons, to thwarted plot to bomb the subway system in New York City last year, authorities said.

Thus undated handout photo provided by the FBI shows Adnan Shukrijumah. Authorities believe that Shukrijumah met with one of the would-be suicide bombers in a plot to strike the New York subway system last year. Intelligence officials believe Shukrijumah, 34, is one of the top candidates to be al-Qaida’s next head of external operations, the man in charge of planning attacks worldwide. The U.S. has offered up to $5 million for information leading to his capture. (AP Photo/FBI)

The officials said Shukrijumah, top al Qaeda operative, met with one of the would-be suicide bombers in a plot that Attorney General Eric Holder called one of the most dangerous since the 9/11 attacks. In Brooklyn, federal prosecutors have named Shukrijumah in a draft terrorism indictment but the Justice Department was still discussing whether to cite his role.

Some officials feared that the extra attention might hinder efforts to capture him. The involvement of Shukrijumah shows how important the (subway bombing) plot was to al Qaeda’s senior leadership. Intelligence officials believe Shukrijumah is one of the top candidates to become al Qaeda’s next head of external operations, the man in charge of planning attacks worldwide.

The counter-terrorism officials discussed the case on condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to speak about it. Shukrijumah, 34, has eluded the FBI for years. The Saudi-born operative studied at a community college in Florida, but when the FBI showed up to arrest him as a witness to a terrorism case in 2003, he already had left the country. The US is offering $5 million reward for information leading to his capture.

Intelligence officials started unraveling the subway plot last year, when US intelligence intercepted an electronic mail from an account that al Qaeda had used in a recent terrorist plot, officials said. The mail discussed bomb-making techniques and was sent to an address in Denver, setting off alarms within the CIA and the FBI from Islamabad to the US.

Najibullah Zazi and two friends were arrested in September 2009 before, prosecutors said, they could carry out a trio of suicide bombings in Manhattan. Zazi and Zarein Ahmedzay have pleaded guilty and admitted planning to detonate homemade bombs on the subway during rush hour. A third man, Adis Medunjanin, awaits trial. A fourth suspect, known as Ahmed, traded the emails with Zazi, who was frantically trying to perfect his bomb-making recipe, the officials said.

The US wants to bring the Pakistani man to the US for trial on charges that are not yet public. The CIA learned valuable information about al Qaeda and its operations from Ahmed. The officials in Pakistan have also arrested a fifth person, known as Afridi, who worked with Ahmed, the officials said. The FBI and the US attorney’s office in Brooklyn had no comment.

The US officials told The Associated Press about how the men hooked up with al Qaeda. The new account provides a rare glimpse into the recruiting process. The trio’s lengthy odyssey took them from their homes in Queens to the mountainous tribal areas in northwest Pakistan. The prosecutors said the men, motivated by their anger at the war in Afghanistan, travelled to Peshawar in the summer of 2008 to fight against the US forces.

Before splitting up, the men stayed at the house of Zazi’s uncle. Zazi remained in Peshawar while Ahmedzay and Medunjanin headed into Afghanistan where they hoped to join the fight against the Americans, they said. But Ahmedzay and Medunjanin never made it. They were stopped at a roadblock and briefly detained by the police who were suspicious of their Western looks and their US passports.

The two men talked their way out of the bind, however, and the police never contacted the US about it, the officials said. Undeterred, the men regrouped in Peshawar and were recruited to meet an al Qaeda facilitator at local mosque in Peshawar. While al Qaeda was eager to recruit Americans, the group was also deeply suspicious of the trio and wanted to make sure they were not the US spies.

Once they passed that initial test, Ahmed drove them to North Waziristan and delivered them to a rudimentary terrorist camp. The three received weapons training, but al Qaeda had bigger plans for the men than the Afghanistan front line. Salah al-Somali, then the head of external operations, and Rashid Rauf, a British national linked to a 2006 jetliner bomb plot, explained to the three men that they were more useful as bombers in the US.

It was at that camp that the US officials believe Ahmedzay, and perhaps the other two men, met Shukrijumah. In 2004, then attorney general John Ashcroft called Shukrijumah a clear and present danger to the US. Abu Zubaydah told US authorities that Shukrijumah was among the most likely candidates to attack the US or Europe. The trio completed about two weeks of training and left the camp with the promise of returning. But only Zazi made the trip back to Waziristan to take a course on explosives.

In early 2009, Zazi flew to New York and moved to Denver, armed with bomb-making notes. Unlike the Sept 11, 2001, attacks they chose the target, not Osama bin Laden. The emails that tipped off US intelligence triggered “Operation High Rise,” an FBI investigation that had to come together within days. Agents scrambled as Zazi sped toward New York on September 9, armed with about two pounds of the powerful explosive.

He was stopped on the George Washington Bridge, but authorities failed to find the explosive material (TATP) stashed in a bag in the trunk. Spooked after the traffic stop, Zazi gave the TATP to Ahmedzay, who flushed it down the toilet. That week, the FBI raided the homes of all three friends, bringing a swift end to the plot.

Defeating Indo-US Alliance in Afghanistan!

EVERY NATION GETS AN OPPORTUNITY TO DEFINE ITS DESTINY; PAKISTAN BEEN GETTING IT REPEATEDLY

Dr Haider Mehdi

“We don’t have to wait for the verdict of future generations. We know what happened in our own time. We know the suffering this war has caused and will continue to cause.” – Henry Porter in The Observer: On ending the war in Afghanistan

A historical opportunity knocked at Pakistan’s door for it to emerge as the leading world nation in shaping global conflict management and resolution by peaceful and political means. The day was September 13^th, 2001. The caller to Pakistan’s military ruler, General Pervez Musharraf, was General Colin Powell, the then US Secretary of State. Powell wanted Pakistan’s political and military collaboration for an American war on Afghanistan. The Pakistani dictator agreed – mind it, instantly and unilaterally without consulting a single soul. Consequently, because of that flawed judgment, both Pakistan and Afghanistan are faced with massive destruction that has been unleashed on the two nations. On top of that, a US-West geo-political alliance has taken shape in the region with a new political actor calling the shots: India has assumed a strategic partnership with the US-NATO that is exclusively detrimental to Pakistan’s interests and poses an existentialist threat to this country.

Pakistan must be key partner in finding solution in Afghanistan – David Miliband

WASHINGTON, March 11 (APP): Pakistan’s relationship with Afghanistan is close to the core of Islamabad’s national security interests and Pakistan has to be a partner in finding solutions in its western conflict-hit neighbor, British Foreign Secretary David Miliband emphasized Wednesday while also urging Afghans to pursue a political settlement in their country.

Delivering a lecture on how to end the war in Afghanistan, Miliband saw a “vital” opportunity in new expanding US-Pakistan partnership to address Islamabad’s concerns.

“There has been a significant change in Pakistan in the last 18 months under President Zardari’s civilian government. The reality and threat of domestic terrorism has brought new purpose to civilian and military leadership, and new consensus between leaders and led,” he noted at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, near Boston.

As a result of Pakistani actions and coalition’s efforts on the Afghan side, he said it is now realistic to talk of complementary pressure on the Taliban insurgencies on both sides of the border.

Miliband spoke as Pakistani leaders hosted talks with Afghan President Hamid Karzai and as top-level Pakistani political and military leaders prepared to hold a series of meetings in Washington on anti-militancy efforts, broader bilateral relationship and the way forward in Afghanistan.

The British foreign secretary argued in favor of a regional cooperrative effort toward Afghanistan’s solution. He said there needs to be a more honest acknowledgement of the different interests and concerns of Afghanistan neighbours, so that efforts can be made to provide reassurances.

“Pakistan is essential here. It holds many of the keys to security and dialogue. It clearly has to be a partner in finding solutions in Afghanistan.”

Of course, Pakistan will only act according to its own sense of its national interest, he remarked.

“That is only natural. Pakistan’s relationship with Afghanistan is close to the core of its national security interests. Pakistan fears the build up of a non-Pashtun Afghan National Army on their doorstep.

It is perpetually worried about India’s relationship with Afghanistan.”

Underscoring Pakistan’s importance to the regional peace and security, the British official noted Pakistan is a country of about 170 million people and growing fast.

“Its own security and economy has been directly damaged by decades of insecurity in Afghanistan. It is a nuclear power. It has had a difficult relationship with the US for a generation. That is the significance of the US Government’s determination to pursue a new security, economic and political relationship. This is a vital opportunity to address Pakistan’s concerns and ours. The Kerry-Lugar

Act is an important down payment in this regard.

“But progress cannot be achieved simply by a more serious, more equal US-Pakistan strategic security understanding, crucial though that is,” Miliband added.

The British foreign secretary called for early and substantive political negotiations between the Afghanistan government and the Taliban and other insurgent groups, saying that military successes will never be enough to end the war.

“The idea of political engagement with those who would directly or indirectly attack our troops is difficult,” Miliband said. “But dialogue is not appeasement, and political space is not the same as veto power or domination.”

“Now is the time for the Afghans to pursue a political settlement with as much vigor and energy as we are pursuing the military and civilian effort,” he said.

According to The Washington Post, Miliband’s remarks went far beyond statements by U.S. officials, who have said talks would be better held after the military balance shifts toward the international coalition and the insurgents have agreed to sever ties with al-Qaeda and lay down their arms Miliband voiced support for a peace “jirga,” scheduled by President Karzai at the end of April.

The jirga, he said, offers a chance to reconfigure political representation in the Afghan government, initially apportioned at a conference organized by the West in Bonn, Germany, after the United States and Afghan allies overthrew the Taliban government in late 2001.

“It was right that the Taliban leaders were excluded from Bonn,” Miliband said. “But other, more significant and legitimate groups were seriously underrepresented, most notably the various Pashtun confederations from which the Taliban draws its strength.”

Although Pashtuns make up about 40 percent of the population, and Karzai is a Pashtun, Afghanistan’s smaller ethnic groups play disproportionate roles in the government and the military.

The Bank of the Fed is Closed…Forever

By Robert Singer

In an effort to explain our escalating financial crisis, an American Nightmare (an Environmental Dream), the pundits are focusing their angst on the 44th POTUS, who might very well go down as the single most inept president in all of American history. (How to Squander the Presidency in One Year, David Michael Green)

Barack Obama is not inept, greedy or stupid and he isn’t one of “us”.

He rose from obscurity to power with his top economics adviser, Zbigniew Brzezinski, the co-founder of David Rockefeller’s Trilateral Commission and he travels in the same circles as other members of the super-secret Skull & Bones Society at Yale University, who pretend to be running for president every four years.

The decision to have Obama preside over the greatest financial calamity since the Great Depression was made five years ago; the November election was a formality. (Why Joseph Biden will be the Next Vice President of the United States)

To believe otherwise, is to ignore the Bradley/Palin effect and the decision by John McCain to wait until his concession speech to shed the image of a nasty “grumpy old man.”

In September 2008, when the Obama campaign seemed to be slumping and their candidate’s long-standing lead in the polls had evaporated, the senator’s supporters openly worried that a potential victory might be slipping away. Then, providence joined the campaign: the failure of the giant investment bank Lehman Brothers followed by a global financial meltdown in the month of October.

And, “speaking of change”, escalating the war in Afghanistan and Iraq and his policies on Guantanamo, state secrets, renditions, executive power, bail-outs and the stimulus packages are for the most part identical to those of George W. Bush.

However, the policies at the Federal Reserve have changed…inexplicably, monumentally and historically:

As of October 2008, the men behind the Federal Reserve, all connected to the House of Rothschild, are no longer giving up what’s left of their real wealth so the middle class can live the American Dream, a nightmare for the planet.

Brian Deese, special assistant to president Obama for economic policy, in his first government position, shuffles back and forth from the West Wing to the Treasury Department rewriting the rules of American “capitalism” as he dismantles the US Housing, Automobile Industry and the American Dream. (The 31-Year-Old in Charge of Dismantling G.M., David E. Sanger)

Deese’s First Rule: Withdraw Credit and Liquidity:

Causing spending to fall even further, forcing companies to cut back on inventory and staff – Creating even more unemployment…263,000 jobs eliminated bringing the total to 39 million Americans who are no longer working or looking for work. (The September Employment Rate is 90%)

And that’s before the recently announced “planned three-year budget freeze on government discretionary spending.”

The Federal Reserve Act of 1913

One of the most important domestic acts in the nation’s history took the power to create money from the people and gave it to the robber barons of our filtered history books in theory for profit.

The Federal Reserve was instrumental in the development of America into a world power.

The United States, in its first decades, was a land of small farms and nearby towns with few cities of any consequence. The young nation seemed far more interested in becoming a successful experiment in democracy, rather than an economic power.

A central bank, necessary for a consumer society, large cities, a common medium of exchange, and a mechanism to regulate that medium were greeted with hostility, since many of the nation’s leaders disdained the urban life.

Anyone who spoke against the “Creature from Jekyll Island” by G. Edward Griffin was silenced.

Presidents Garfield and McKinley, outspoken champions of “sound” money and opponents of a central bank, were suspiciously silenced permanently.

The conflict between rural values and urban reality ended when Woodrow Wilson “unwittingly ruined his country” and signed into law the legislation that put “the growth of the nation . . . and all our activities in the hands of a few scoundrels (men).”

Once those scoundrels got control of the supply of money in the Franklin Roosevelt Administration, they began to buy government securities at the rate of ten million dollars a week for 10 weeks, and created one hundred million dollars in new (checkbook) currency, which alleviated the critical famine of money and credit, and the factories started hiring people again.” (Secrets of the Federal Reserve, Eustace Mullins)

Now those scoundrels remain in control of the supply of money in the Barack Obama Administration, they are making generous interest payments to the banks for “parking” their TARP and other government taxpayer bailout money, which is aggravating the critical famine of money and credit, and the factories started laying people off (263,000 people in September bringing the total to 39 million Americans who are no longer working or looking for work).

One of the more absurd notions that found its way into the history books and the writings of economic experts, is that somehow these Robinhood barons (swindlers and scoundrels of history) were made wealthier by manipulating the Monopoly money they created out of “thin air” used to “alleviated the critical famine of money and credit” so the factories could start hiring people again and finance our consumer society.

In 1910, the men behind the Federal Reserve Rockefeller, Kuhn, Loeb and Morgan, all connected to the Rothschild’s global financial empire, owned or controlled one-sixth of the world’s real wealth-gold, silver and raw materials-not the fiat currency we call money.

And their real wealth, where is it now?

Used up, as in consumed, by the middle class so former members of the Third Estate (serfs and slaves) could have houses, cars, RVs, TVs and DVDs-the affordable things we take for granted which put the planet, according to the GEO4, a massive United Nations Report, at the “unknown points of no return.” (Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité – Providence, Miracle or What Really Happened)

The swindler’s and scoundrel’s wealth, not yours or mine, was eventually “cut, mined and hauled away,” so that Americans could “trash the planet” with that cheap stuff until October 2008.

Money control, Gustav Stolper wrote in “This Age of Fables” is, “the supreme and most comprehensive of all governmental controls and the 1838 quote:

“Permit me to issue and control the money of a nation, and I care not who makes its laws” (Incorrectly attributed to Mayer Amschel Rothschild who died in 1812).

Reflects the “maxim” of the House of Rothschild.

However, “money lenders of the Old World” cannot be talking about profits unless you believe The Rothschilds didn’t understand that they were about to give up $500 trillion of real wealth in exchange for $500 trillion pieces of worthless fiat currency.

During the last 100 years, those swindlers and scoundrels were able to distort the structure of relative prices; generate misallocations of labor and capital throughout the economy; rationalize new governmental interventions in the face of the market “instability” manipulate the patterns of and the profits from international trade which resulted in the Industrial Revolution, the Great Depression, the stagflation of the 1970s, the dot-com and the housing market bubbles and unprecedented prosperity for the middle class.

Would we have a financial crisis to go with our environmental crisis if Wilson hadn’t ruined the country when he gave away the people’s right to print their own money and we had our own bank?

No.

North Dakota is the only state in the union to own its own bank. The Bank of North Dakota (BND) was established by the state legislature in 1919 specifically to free farmers and small businessmen from the clutches of out-of-state bankers and railroad men.

The state of North Dakota, one of only two states (along with Montana) expected to meet its budget in 2010. North Dakota was also the only state to actually gain jobs in 2009 while other states were losing them. Since 2000, North Dakota’s GNP has grown 56 percent, personal income has grown 43 percent and wages have grown 34 percent. North Dakota in 2009, had a budget surplus of $1.3 billion, the largest it ever had – in a state with a population of 700,000. (The North Dakota Model for Capitalizing Community Banks, Ellen Brown)

North Dakota, a land of small farms and towns more interested in remaining a successful experiment in democracy rather than an economic power.

At this point, it is advantageous to consider the efforts of writer Andrew Hitchcock:

“The Rothschilds have been in control of the world for a very long time, their tentacles reaching into many aspects of our daily lives, and are the hidden hand behind all the social cataclysms in history: The French and American Revolution, the Civil War, World Wars, the Industrial Revolution, the Federal Reserve (and our consumer society).”

John Sherman, a Rothschild protégé in a letter sent to New York bankers on June 25, 1863 in support of the then proposed National Banking Act, wrote:

“The few who understand the system, will either be so interested in its profits, or so dependent on its favors that there will be no opposition from that class, while on the other hand, the great body of people, mentally incapable of comprehending the tremendous advantages…will bear its burden without complaint, and perhaps without suspecting that the system is inimical to their best interests.” (World War II And Pound, 1940-1945: The Anti-Semite Revealed, Ellen Cardona)

In other words, the “few that understand the system”, without a 20th century environmental perspective of the middle class “trashing the planet”, would not be capable of comprehending a system that would put the planet at the “unknown points of no return” because the environmental damage and pollution was the goal and not the unintended consequences of the Industrial Revolution and our consumer society.

The Federal Reserve isn’t evil because they print our money and make us pay interest on it; they are evil because they are in a metaphysical war with mother-earth (Gaea).

October 2008 marked the last day the “lender of last resort” would give up what’s left of their real wealth, used to con us into shopping for useless toxic stuff, to weaken their opponent, mother-earth. (Ominous Signs Are Aligned: Not A Particularly Good Sign (11-09))

End the war in Afghanistan: Just get out!

By RON JACOBS

Perhaps, there was once a time when most westerners could pretend that the US-led onslaught against the Afghan people was a good thing. Perhaps they convinced themselves that because the government of that country had allowed Osama Bin Laden to live in the mountains there that there was reason enough to attack his neighbors and destroy what remained of their nation. Perhaps, too, westerners (especially US citizens) believed that the true purpose of the US-led military mission in Afghanistan was to capture Bin Laden and destroy his terror network.

Yes, perhaps there was a time when the facade of justice and righteous revenge provided enough of a moral veneer to the US war in Afghanistan that even intelligent westerners could live with the death and destruction occurring in their name. However, that time is long past. The war has gone on for more than eight years without any sign of cessation. Indeed, since Barack Obama took up residence in the White House, the casualties in that war have spiked. There are at least 40,000 more US troops in the country since that date last January and another thirty or forty thousand more getting ready to go there. In addition, the number of mercenaries has similarly increased. The reasons provided for this escalation range from going after terrorists to creating a civil society. As I write, another offensive against Afghans is being prepared. It primary purpose is to install a governor appointed by the US-created government in Kabul. No matter what the reason, it is painfully clear that those of us expecting a truthful explanation for Washington’s presence in Afghanistan will not receive it from those who continue to send troops and weaponry over there. Nor will they receive it from those in Congress that continue to fund this lethal endeavor.

Yet, the antiwar movement-which should know better-remains virtually silent. A day of bi coastal demonstrations is planned for March 20, 2010, but otherwise there is not even a whisper of protest. Students go to classes while their generational cohorts in uniform face the prospect of death and killing. Antiwar organizations send out the occasional email or call for action, but there is no action. Congressmen and women ignore the letters and faxes constituents send them asking that they refuse to vote for the next war-funding legislation. Furthermore, these legislators refuse to make the connection between the destruction of the US economy and the trillion dollars spent to kill Afghans and Iraqis the past eight years. The media rarely covers the war except to promote the glory of the men and women sent to do America’s dirty work. There is no critical debate in the mainstream media. Opponents of Washington’s imperial program-rarely acknowledged in the mainstream media at any time-are now completely ignored.

Into this dismal void steps a crucial and accessible text by David Wildman and Phyllis Bennis titled Ending the US War in Afghanistan: A Primer. As up-to-date as a printed text could possibly be, this pocket-sized book is an unambiguous call to end the US-led war in Afghanistan. Written in a question and answer format, the authors cover the recent history of US involvement in that country from the late 1970s arming of the fundamentalist holy warriors in Washington’s proxy war against the Soviet Union to the recent faux elections in Fall 2009. The geopolitical meaning of Afghanistan in Washington’s strategy for empire is explained and so is the role of Unocal and pipelines. The writers challenge the myth that Washington’s occupation and war have made life better for the majority of Afghanistan’s female population. In fact, they challenge the assumption that this was ever even a goal of Washington when the war was begun.

The recent much-ballyhooed switch from a counterterrorism strategy to a counterinsurgency approach is discussed and dissected. The Pentagon’s plans to provide humanitarian aid is described in all of its deception. The supposed division of budgeted funds into eighty per cent reconstruction and twenty per cent military is shown to be a fraud. The authors write that after all is said and done, the percentages look more like this: 90-95% military and 5-10% actually going to reconstruction. Even then much of the reconstruction is military in nature. The idea that an occupying army that continues to bomb villages, kick in the doors of people’s homes, and arrest their sons and husbands will ever win the hearts and minds of the Afghan people is soundly rejected in these pages.

Furthermore, it is the authors’ contention that there will never be real progress toward a genuine peace in Afghanistan until the US and other members of the International Security Armed Force (ISAF) withdraw their forces. Those interested in organizing to end this war (and the occupation of Iraq) should pay special attention to the final forty pages of Ending the US War in Afghanistan: A Primer. These pages are where the shortcomings of the antiwar movement are discussed. Primary amongst these failings was the anti-Bush focus of the antiwar movement of 2002-2008. Another false move was the assumption by way too many of those who protested Bush’s war that the Empire’s policy would change under Barack Obama. Bennis and Wildman write that the dynamics between the antiwar forces and the current administration might be slightly different, which could increase the movement’s ability to affect policy. Of course, we will never know this unless we create a movement that is as larger or larger than the aforementioned one. Perhaps the key phrase in this section is this: “the moment Congress perceives that the political cost of funding the war has risen above the (political) cost of ending the war, they will do what has become politically expedient-and cutting the war funding will become an urgent political necessity.” To make this happen is a huge task, but it is the one we must undertake. Once Again, Get the Hell Out! Ending the War in Afghanistan.

Bikini vs. Burka: The Debauchery of Women

by Henry Makow Ph.D.

On my wall, I have a picture of a Muslim woman shrouded in a burka. Beside it is a picture of an American beauty contestant, wearing nothing but a bikini.

One woman is totally hidden from the public; the other is totally exposed. These two extremes say a great deal about the clash of so-called “civilizations.”

The role of woman is at the heart of any culture. Apart from stealing Arab oil, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are about stripping Muslims of their religion and culture, exchanging the burka for a bikini.

I am not an expert on the condition of Muslim women and I love feminine beauty too much to advocate the burka here. But I am defending some of the values that the burka represents for me.

For me, the burka represents a woman’s consecration to her husband and family. Only they see her.It affirms the privacy, exclusivity and importance of the domestic sphere.

The Muslim woman’s focus is her home, the “nest” where her children are born and reared. She is the “home” maker, the taproot that sustains the spiritual life of the family, nurturing and training her children, providing refuge and support to her husband.

In contrast, the bikinied American beauty queen struts practically naked in front of millions on TV. A feminist, she belongs to herself. In practice, paradoxically, she is public property. She belongs to no one and everyone. She shops her body to the highest bidder. She is auctioning herself all of the time.

In America, the cultural measure of a woman’s value is her sex appeal. (As this asset depreciates quickly, she is neurotically obsessed with appearance and plagued by weight problems.)

As an adolescent, her role model is Britney Spears, a singer whose act approximates a strip tease. From Britney, she learns that she will be loved only if she gives sex. Thus, she learns to “hook up” furtively rather than to demand patient courtship, love and marriage. As a result, dozens of males know her before her husband does. She loses her innocence, which is a part of her charm. She becomes hardened and calculating. Unable to love, she is unfit to receive her husband’s seed.

The feminine personality is founded on the emotional relationship between mother and baby. It is based on nurturing and self-sacrifice. Masculine nature is founded on the relationship between hunter and prey. It is based on aggression and reason.

Feminism deceives women to believe femininity has resulted in “oppression” and they should adopt male behavior instead. The result: a confused and aggressive woman with a large chip on her shoulder, unfit to become a wife or mother.

This is the goal of the NWO social engineers: undermine sexual identity and destroy the family, create social and personal dysfunction, and reduce population. In the “brave new world,” women are not supposed to be mothers and progenitors of the race. They are meant to be neutered, autonomous sex objects.

Liberating women is often given as an excuse for the war in Afghanistan. Liberating them to what? To Britney Spears? To low-rise “see-my-thong” pants? To the mutual masturbation that passes for sexuality in America? If they really cared about women, maybe they’d end the war.

Parenthood is the pinnacle of human development. It is the stage when we finally graduate from self-indulgence and become God’s surrogates: creating and nurturing new life. The New World Order does not want us to reach this level of maturity. Pornography is the substitute for marriage. We are to remain single: stunted, sex-starved and self-obsessed.

We are not meant to have a permanent “private” life. We are meant to remain lonely and isolated, in a state of perpetual courtship, dependent on consumer products for our identity.

This is especially destructive for woman. Her sexual attraction is a function of her fertility. As fertility declines, so does her sex appeal. If a woman devotes her prime years to becoming “independent,” she is not likely to find a permanent mate.

Her long-term personal fulfillment and happiness lies in making marriage and family her first priority.

Feminism is another cruel New World Order hoax that has debauched American women and despoiled Western civilization. It has ruined millions of lives and represents a lethal threat to Islam.

I am not advocating the burka but rather some of the values that it represents, specifically a woman’s consecration to her future husband and family, and the modesty and dignity this entails.

The burka and the bikini represent two extremes. The answer lies somewhere in the middle.

What lies beneath the war in Afghanistan

By ERIC MARGOLIS, SUN MEDIA

Truth is war’s first casualty. The Afghan war’s biggest untruth is, “we’ve got to fight terrorists over there so we don’t have to fight them at home.”

Many North Americans still buy this lie because they believe the 9/11 attacks came directly from the Afghanistan-based al-Qaida and Taliban movements.

False. The 9/11 attacks were planned in Germany and Spain, and conducted mainly by U.S.-based Saudis to punish America for supporting Israel.

Taliban, a militant religious, anti-Communist movement of Pashtun tribesmen, was totally surprised by 9/11. Taliban received U.S. aid until May, 2001. The CIA was planning to use Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaida to stir up Muslim Uighurs against Chinese rule, and Taliban against Russia’s Central Asian allies.

Al-Qaida only numbered 300 members. Most have been killed. A handful escaped to Pakistan. Only a few remain in Afghanistan. Yet President Barack Obama insists 68,000 or more U.S. troops must stay in Afghanistan to fight al-Qaida and prevent extremists from re-acquiring “terrorist training camps.”

This claim, like Saddam Hussein’s non-existent weapons of mass destruction, is a handy slogan to market war to the public. Today, half of Afghanistan is under Taliban control. Anti-American militants could more easily use Somalia, Indonesia, Bangladesh, North and West Africa, or Sudan. They don’t need remote Afghanistan. The 9/11 attacks were planned in apartments, not camps.

The United States should not be waging war on Taliban. However backwards and oafish its Pashtun tribesmen, they have no desire or interest in attacking America. Even less, Canada.

Taliban are the sons of the U.S.-backed mujahidin who defeated the Soviets in the 1980s. As I have been saying since 9/11, Taliban never was America’s enemy. Instead of invading Afghanistan in 2001, the U.S. should have paid Taliban to uproot al-Qaida.

The Pashtun tribes want to end foreign occupation and drive out the Afghan Communists, who now dominate the U.S.-installed Kabul regime. But the U.S. has blundered into a full-scale war not just with Taliban, but with most of Afghanistan’s fierce Pashtun tribes, who comprise over half the population.

Obama is wrestling with widening the war. After eight years of military operations costing $236 billion US, the U.S. commander in Afghanistan just warned of the threat of “failure,” a.k.a. defeat. Canada has so far wasted $16 billion Cdn. on the war. Western occupation forces will be doomed if the Afghan resistance ever gets modern anti-aircraft and anti-tank missiles.

The U.S. is sinking ever deeper into the South Asian morass. Washington is trying to arm-twist Pakistan into being more obedient and widening the war against its own independent-minded Pashtun tribes — wrongly called “Taliban.”

Washington’s incredibly ham-handed efforts to use $7.5 billion US to bribe Pakistan’s feeble, corrupt government and army, take control of military promotions, and get a grip on Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal, have Pakistan’s soldiers on the verge of revolt.

Obama has been under intense pressure from flag-waving Republicans, much of the media, and the hawkish national security establishment to expand the war. Israel’s supporters, including many Congressional Democrats, want to see the U.S. seize Pakistan’s nuclear arms and expand the Afghan war into Iran.

Obama should admit Taliban is not and never was a threat to the West; that the wildly exaggerated al-Qaida has been mostly eradicated; and that the U.S.-led war in Afghanistan is causing more damage to U.S. interests in the Muslim world — now 25% of all humanity — than Bin Laden and his few rag-tag allies. The bombing in Madrid and London, and conspiracy in Toronto, were all horribly wrongheaded protests by young Muslims against the Afghan war.

We are not going to change the way Afghans treat their women by waging war on them, or bring democracy through rigged elections.

I wish Obama would just declare victory in Afghanistan, withdraw western forces, and hand over security to a multi-national stabilization force from Muslim nations. Good presidents, like good generals, know when to retreat.

ERIC.MARGOLIS@SUNMEDIA.CA

Most Afghans optimistic about the future, poll finds

By Katherine Tiedemann

Event notice: New America Foundation counterterrorism fellow Brian Fishman will be speaking today at 2:30pm in Washington, DC on “Making the Next Bin Laden.” Details here .

At the polls

Newly released annual polling in Afghanistan conducted in the country’s 34 provinces in December 2009 from BBC/ABC/ARD suggests that Afghans are more optimistic about the future; 70 percent believe the country is headed in the right direction, up from 40 percent a year ago (BBC). 83 percent of those surveyed have a favorable opinion of Afghan President Hamid Karzai, while the U.S. military forces in Afghanistan are supported by 68 percent of Afghans and the Taliban by 10 percent; 72 percent of Afghans support the more than 30,000 additional U.S. and NATO troops being sent to the country. The full polling results are available here (BBC-pdf).

Karzai submitted a second round of picks for his cabinet on Saturday, after the Afghan Parliament roundly rejected 17 of his 24 original choices, though lawmakers indicated that Karzai faces another uphill battle in getting his choices confirmed as the new nominees have been criticized for lacking necessary credentials, being too close to warlords, or were selected for supporting Karzai (AP, BBC, Globe and Mail, LAT, NYT). Three women were included, after the only woman nominated in the first round was rejected; a full list is available here (AP).

Casualties

A defense correspondent for the Sunday Mirror tabloid newspaper has become the first British reporter to die covering the war in Afghanistan after his vehicle drove over a roadside bomb on Saturday in Helmand province during a patrol with U.S. Marines (AFP, Reuters, NYT, AP, Guardian, Telegraph, Mirror, AJE, BBC, WSJ). Rupert Hamer is the second Western journalist to be killed in Afghanistan in ten days; Canadian reporter Michelle Lang of the Calgary Herald died in neighboring Kandahar province from a roadside bomb on December 30.

Three U.S. soldiers were killed earlier today while fighting insurgent forces in volatile southern Afghanistan, bringing the total number of U.S. troops killed in the country in 2010 to 10 (AP, AFP, Pajhwok). NATO forces seized more than 5,300 pounds of processed opium in a search of a “suspicious vehicle” in Kandahar on Friday, and the commander of all Marines in southern Afghanistan Brigadier General Larry Nicholson told the AP that Marjah, just west of the provincial capital of Helmand province, is “where we’re going next” to fight the Taliban (AFP, AP).

Top U.S. and NATO commander in Afghanistan General Stanley McChrystal said in an interview with ABC that the additional U.S. troops being sent to the country has “changed the way we operate” and cautioned that although “we’ve made progress, it’s not a completed mission” (ABC, AP).

Media appearances

The Jordanian doctor and al Qaeda double agent believed to be behind the Dec. 30 suicide attack at a CIA base in Khost, Afghanistan, which killed seven CIA operatives and a Jordanian spy, appeared in a video aired over the weekend alongside Pakistani Taliban chief Hakimullah Mehsud, underlining the connections between the Taliban and al Qaeda (CNN, Aaj, NYT, McClatchy, BBC, Wash Post). Humam Khalil Abu Mulal al-Balawi was shown vowing revenge for Hakimullah’s predecessor, Baitullah Mehsud, who was killed by a U.S.-operated drone in August 2009.

The Washington Post has today’s must-read describing how al-Balawi detonated his explosives “just before” he was going to be searched at Forward Operating Base Chapman (Wash Post). And on Sunday, CIA director Leon Panetta protested public commentary about the attack “suggesting that those who gave their lives somehow brought it upon themselves because of “poor tradecraft.” That’s like saying Marines who die in a firefight brought it upon themselves because they have poor war-fighting skills” (Wash Post).

The Afghan government agreed on Saturday to assume responsibility for the management of the U.S.-run military prison at Bagram air base, which houses more than 700 detainees captured by U.S. forces (NYT, AJE, AP). Initially, the Afghan Ministry of Defense will run Bagram, and eventually transition control to the Ministry of Justice, possibly by the end of year.

Drone watching

Christopher Drew has another fascinating read today describing the deluge of data generated by U.S.-operated drones in Afghanistan and Iraq, writing that Air Force drones gathered 24 years’ worth of video over the two countries last year, three times as much as in 2007 (NYT). And a handful of suspected militants were killed by the sixth reported drone strike in Pakistan this year in the Ismail Khel village in the Datta Khel region of North Waziristan on Saturday (AP, AFP, CNN, Geo, Times of India). Another reported drone strike targeted the town of Tappi in North Waziristan on Friday (AFP, AP, CNN, Geo).

Dozens of people have been killed in a wave of targeted attacks since the beginning of the year in Karachi, Pakistan’s largest city, among rival political groups that “some say is aimed at destabilizing the country’s ruling coalition” (AP, Dawn, Daily Times). There were 86 targeted killings in Karachi in 2008, and 152 in 2009.

Pakistani police have detained five female would-be suicide bombers in Islamabad and the Swat Valley in Pakistan, and one of the girls told members of the media that she had been trained by Maulana Fazlullah, the leader of the Pakistani Taliban in Swat (Pajhwok). And Sarah Kershaw reviews a “range of patterns” that has emerged from the study of the psychology of terrorism (NYT).

Barnes and Noble Kabul

The government of Denmark is funding the construction of three bookstores in Kabul that will have the capacity to store up to 15 million books (Pajhwok). The facilities are scheduled to be completed within a year.

Luck must go

Zafar Hilaly

India has also commenced the process of taking on board Kashmiri groups fighting for independence in discussions on the future of Kashmir. These are nascent but welcome steps. Nevertheless, they are not enough. India should restart the composite dialogue process

Even the most foolish must know by now that the greater the turmoil, the higher the casualties, the more intense the indignation, the larger the media coverage, the deeper is the satisfaction that terrorists derive from their actions. And, as happens so often, an unwitting accomplice of the terrorists is their enemy. Today it is America and tomorrow perhaps India too. Only the Israelis have done better than America in antagonising an entire religion, nay civilisation.

Seeking revenge, rather than justice, the US has waged war on Iraq, Afghanistan and Somalia and is about to do so in Pakistan and perhaps Yemen. In its search for a handful of terrorists, the US has destroyed countries and caused the death and dislocation of millions. Not content, Washington is preparing to wreak havoc in Pakistan. Harassed and on the run, Al Qaeda terrorists are the quarry, and so is the leadership of the Taliban – an assortment of hitherto defeated, demoralised and unpopular antediluvian fundos that have prospered, gained respect and, to a large extent, become popular as a result of a lethal mix of American folly and Afghan xenophobia.

The misguided crusade begun by the doltish Bush against militant Islam continues under the stewardship of the opportunistic Obama. Soon America may be joined by India. The latter’s fanciful doctrines, such as ‘Cold Start’ and ‘Three Front War’, are reminiscent of Cheney’s ‘One Percent’ and the Petraeus’s ‘Surge’ theories. Spawned in the military classrooms of India’s indolent soldiers, they are being trotted out for airing as lynchpins of Indian military strategy. Presumably, the Indian establishment will indulge these military fantasies if another attack is mounted by terrorists whose provenance is traced to Pakistan. This only provides further incentive to the lashkars and jaishes, which seek to profit from the turmoil, to launch yet another attack on India. Encouraging a war that the enemy craves for is surely the height of folly.

America’s war in Afghanistan is not going well. Robert Taber summed up why America will lose in Afghanistan, “The guerrilla fights the war of the flea, and his military enemy suffers the dog’s disadvantages: too much to defend, too small, ubiquitous, and agile an enemy to come to grips with.” The same fate awaits an Indian incursion into Pakistan. At best, Pakistan may be destroyed but never defeated. The true war would only begin once the fighting is over. Indian gains on the battlefield will be lost in the blood lust that would ensue as entire religions and populations collide. And this would happen even if a nuclear conflict is avoided.

The US and India would do better to heed to the desire of their respective populations which, in the case of the former, shows a steady erosion of support for the war in Afghanistan and a decisive shift in favour of an American withdrawal and in case of the latter, was revealed by what a recent poll conducted by two media houses of India and Pakistan discovered. Only a tiny minority, 17 percent in India and 8 percent in Pakistan, it discovered, are opposed to the idea of consigning their hostility to the dustbin of history. An overwhelming 66 percent of those polled in India and 72 percent in Pakistan said that they desire a peaceful relationship between the two countries.

These encouraging results were supported by the observations of an eminent Indian doctor holidaying in Indonesia whose contacts with most segments of Indian society are intense. “Indians do not buy their government’s line that the regime in Pakistan or the people were involved in the attack on Mumbai. They favour greater people-to-people contacts and are appalled at what the public in Pakistan were being subjected to at the hands of the terrorists. They genuinely wish that Pakistan is able to tide over the crisis and defeat terrorism. They feel that India must help where it can,” he wrote.

Of course, the next al Qaeda sortie from Pakistan may drown such friendly sentiments, at least that is what the terrorists count on. Manmohan Singh, who has dragged his feet in engaging with Pakistan after Mumbai, may find himself compelled to let the desire for revenge replace reasoned judgment. America too may seize on the additional pressure another Mumbai would exert on Pakistan’s brittle regime to obtain Islamabad’s concurrence for American forces to fan out looking for jihadists in Pakistan. That, of course, would be a recipe for disaster. A Pakistan invaded, weakened, divided and even defeated might bring temporary relief, but eventually permanent ruin to India. There seems no reason for India to play fortune’s fool. India and Pakistan can determine their own fate although time is not on their side.

Following their unsuccessful attempt to blow up Margaret Thatcher and other members of the British Cabinet at a hotel in Britain in 1984, the Irish Republican Army called the police to say, “Today we were unlucky. But remember we only have to be lucky once. You will have to be lucky always.” The Nigerian student Omer Farooq Abdulmuttallab caught trying to blow up an American airliner over the Atlantic might have said the same thing, and so too other suicide bombers prevented by luck or good intelligence from reaching their targets. But luck, like chance, is a fickle friend. Eventually it runs out.

Manmohan Singh has begun what could prove to be the first step in a long process of the demilitarisation of Kashmir by withdrawing 30,000 Indian forces from Indian Kashmir. Pakistan has reciprocated by transferring an equal number of her forces to the Western border with Afghanistan. Sensibly, India has also commenced the process of taking on board Kashmiri groups fighting for independence in discussions on the future of Kashmir. These are nascent but welcome steps. Nevertheless, they are not enough. India should restart the composite dialogue process, conclude a number of agreements that await signature and begin once again the process of building confidence.

Because how far India and Pakistan are down the path of peace will determine their response to the next terrorist attack. Hopefully, negotiations would have advanced far enough to ensure that they can make their own ‘luck’ and not let the terrorists do so. In fact, the object should be to banish luck as a determining factor in relations. That surely is also the mandate that their respective peoples have given to two democratically elected governments. It is not ordained that the poisonous, clinging ivy of the terrorist should smother and suffocate the tree of peace. “We may become the makers of our fate when we have ceased to pose as its prophets,” rightly said Karl Popper.

The writer is a former ambassador

‘The US military is exhausted’

By Sarah Lazare

The US army is overstretched and exhausted, says peace campaigner Sarah Lazare [AFP]

The call for over 30,000 more troops to be sent to Afghanistan is a travesty for the people of that country who have already suffered eight brutal years of occupation.

It is also a harsh blow to the US soldiers facing imminent deployment.

As Barack Obama, the US president, gears up for a further escalation that will bring the total number of troops in Afghanistan to over 100,000, he faces a military force that has been exhausted and overextended by fighting two wars.

Many from within the ranks are openly declaring that they have had enough, allying with anti-war veterans and activists in calling for an end to the US-led wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, with some active duty soldiers publicly refusing to deploy.

This growing movement of military refusers is a voice of sanity in a country slipping deeper into unending war.

The architects of this war would be well-advised to listen to the concerns of the soldiers and veterans tasked with carrying out their war policies on the ground.

“They shifted me from one war to the next” Eddie Falcon, Iraq and Afghanistan veteran

Many of those being deployed have already faced multiple deployments to combat zones: the 101st Airborne Division, which will be deployed to Afghanistan in early 2010, faces its fifth combat tour since 2002.

“They are just going to start moving the soldiers who already served in Iraq to Afghanistan, just like they shifted me from one war to the next,” said Eddie Falcon, a member of Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW), who served in Iraq and Afghanistan.

“Soldiers are going to start coming back with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), missing limbs, problems with alcohol, and depression.”

Many of these troops are still suffering the mental and physical fallout from previous deployments.

Rates of PTSD and traumatic brain injury among troops deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan have been disproportionately high, with a third of returning troops reporting mental problems and 18.5 per cent of all returning service members battling either PTSD or depression, according to a study by the Rand Corporation.

Marine suicides doubled between 2006 and 2007, and army suicides are at the highest rate since records were kept in 1980.

Resistance in the ranks

US army soldiers are refusing to serve at the highest rate since 1980, with an 80 per cent increase in desertions since the invasion of Iraq in 2003, according to the Associated Press.

These troops refuse deployment for a variety of reasons: some because they ethically oppose the wars, some because they have had a negative experience with the military, and some because they cannot psychologically survive another deployment, having fallen victim to what has been termed “Broken Joe” syndrome.

Over 150 GIs have publicly refused service and spoken out against the wars, all risking prison and some serving long sentences, and an estimated 250 US war resisters are currently taking refuge in Canada.

This resistance includes two Fort Hood, Texas, soldiers, Victor Agosto and Travis Bishop, who publicly resisted deployment to Afghanistan this year, facing prison sentences as a result, with Bishop still currently detained.

“There is no way I will deploy to Afghanistan,” wrote Agosto, upon refusing his service last May. “The occupation is immoral and unjust.”

The war in Afghanistan is losing support in the US [AFP]

Within the US military, GI resisters and anti-war veterans have organised through broad networks of veteran and civilian alliances, as well as through IVAW, comprised of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans.

This organisation, which is over 1,700 strong, with members across the world, including active-duty members on military bases, is opposed to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and openly supports GI resistance.

“Iraq Veterans Against the War calls on Obama to end the war in Afghanistan (and Iraq) by withdrawing troops immediately and unconditionally,” wrote Jose Vasquez, the executive director of IVAW, in a December 2 open letter.

“It’s not time for our brothers and sisters in arms to go to Afghanistan. It’s time for them to come home.”

No clear progress

GI coffee houses have sprung up at several military bases around the country. In the tradition of the GI coffee houses of the Vietnam war era, these cafes provide a space where active duty troops can speak freely and access resources about military refusal, PTSD, and veteran and GI movements against the war.

“Here at Fort Lewis, we’ve lost 20 soldiers from the most recent round of deployments,” said Seth Menzel, an Iraq combat veteran and founding organiser of Coffee Strong, a GI coffee house at the sprawling Washington army base.

“We’ve seen resistance to deployment, mainly based on the fact that soldiers have been deployed so many times they don’t have the patience to do it again.”

As the occupation of Afghanistan passes its eighth year, with no clear progress, goals that remain elusive, and a high civilian death count, this war is coming to resemble the Iraq war that has been roundly condemned by world and US public opinion.

The never-ending nature of this conflict belies the real project of establishing US dominance in the Middle East and control of the region’s resources, at the expense of the Afghan civilians and US soldiers being placed in harm’s way.

The voices of refusal coming from within the US military send a powerful message that soldiers will not be fodder for an unjust and unnecessary war. By withdrawing their labour from a war that depends on their consent, these soldiers have the power to help bring this war to an end, as did their predecessors in the GI resistance movement against the Vietnam war.

And the longer the war in Afghanistan drags on – the more lives that are lost and destroyed – the more resistance we will see coming from within the ranks.

Sarah Lazare is an anti-militarist and GI resistance organiser with Dialogues Against Militarism and Courage to Resist. She is interested in connecting struggles for justice at home with global movements against war and empire.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial policy.

Kudos for ‘stuffy’ Canada

by Eric Margolis

Some things we learned in 2009:

The global recession that began in America in 2008 was triggered by run amok speculation, failure of government supervision, and massive fraud by accounting and credit rating agencies. The global banking system was within hours of total collapse.

America’s and Britain’s economies were artificially juiced up and distorted by the narcotic of cheap, easy credit. Both are now experiencing painful withdrawal from credit addiction. It’s an ugly sight. Their leaders still call for more massive debt to supposedly cure the disaster caused by too much debt. “Stuffy,” cautious Canada emerged with flying colours.

The financial fraud that ignited the worst recession since the 1930s began under the Clinton administration, then ran rampant during George W. Bush’s two terms. Federal regulators, the media, Congress and U.S. presidents were suborned by Wall Street. Finance became America’s leading industry. Parasitism replaced production.

Millions are out of work. America is crushed by trillions in debt. U.S. global power has taken a staggering beating. Yet the perpetrators of this biggest crime in modern U.S. history and the politicians that allowed it to occur remain unpunished. Wall Street churns obscene, government-financed profits while small investors lost billions. The big money houses should have been broken up by federal trust busters.

President Barack Obama does not walk on water. To worldwide disappointment, his foreign policy is floundering. Obama’s promise to solve the Mideast mess, America’s largest overseas headache, was scorned by Israel, which refused to stop colonizing Palestinian land. Israel made Obama look like a weakling and amateur, and clearly not in command of U.S. Mideast policy.

Those who hoped the U.S. would change course under Obama to play a positive, co-operative, non-imperial role in world affairs were profoundly dismayed.

We see continued occupation of Iraq, the expanded, trillion-dollar war in Afghanistan, military operations in Somalia, West Africa, and now Yemen. The White House stonewalled on releasing torture documents, failed to prosecute the Bush-era’s torturers and kidnappers, and refused to end domestic surveillance. And there have been continued violations of the Geneva Convention.

Military spending has risen from $667 billion US under Bush to $734 billion under Nobel Peace Prize laureate Obama. Add $49.8 billion more for intelligence. The U.S. is bankrupt and living on credit from China.

But Washington’s national security juggernaut keeps rolling on.

Pakistan is fast becoming a huge, very dangerous problem. Its isolated, corrupt, U.S.-backed government in Islamabad is crumbling. The Afghan war is spreading into Pakistan’s Pashtun tribal zones.

The Pentagon can’t wage war in Afghanistan without total Pakistani cooperation. But 95% of Pakistanis oppose the U.S.-led war. Their nation of 168 million seems about to erupt into truly dangerous chaos while India considers deeper intervention in Afghanistan.

Washington’s $15 billion effort to buy its way out of trouble in Pakistan won’t work. Obama has truly stuck his head in the proverbial hornet’s nest. He could have withdrawn it, but chose, instead, to go deeper. The president has only himself and his neocon advisors to blame.

What he and we should have learned is that waging wars without clear strategic or political purpose in the middle of nowhere is a fool’s errand, and a very dangerous, expensive one. Afghanistan, graveyard of empires, may also become the graveyard of Obama’s presidency.

As worldwide concern over environmental pollution grows, our dirtiest secret — the pain and terror we inflict on animals — is beginning to be exposed thanks to animal rights groups.

Over fifty billion animals are slaughtered annually around the globe; 10 billion in the U.S., and 650 million in Canada. Most suffer terribly in industrial pens and hideously cruel slaughter factories hidden from public view. Our mistreatment of animals and factory farming will be one of the next big issues facing the world’s conscience. Shamefully, Canada is a major abuser of animals through sealing, trapping, hunting and factory farming.

The European Union leads the world in humane treatment of animals. We should emulate their civilized lead.

Obama’s Conflict-ridden Afghan Plan

Shamsa Ashfaq

According to a recent US Government Accountability Office audit report, nearly 13,000 attacks were recorded in Afghanistan between January and the end of August 2009. There was an average of 100 attacks a day on international forces, Afghan security forces and ordinary civilians, which makes the figure 2.5 times higher this year than that of 2008. During 2005, approximately 2,400 attacks were reported in Afghanistan. The most recent data available, as of August 2009, showed the highest rate of Taliban-initiated attacks making Afghanistan’ssecurity situation worse. Worth observing is the fact that violence skyrocketed in Afghanistan after the arrival of 21,000 troops reinforcements to stabilize the country in last August. Irrespective of this fact, top US military command Gen. Stanley McChrystal recommended additional placement of 40,000 additional troops to carry out an effective counter-insurgency campaign in Afghanistan. There are already some 68,000 US troops deployed in Afghanistan, contributing to a coalition force of more than 100,000. And more surprisingly, President Obama and his war cabinet has agreed to send up to 30,000 fresh troops to Afghanistan without realizing that the insurgency in Afghanistan can be blunted but not defeated outright by force.

On 1st December 2009, President Obama announced the deployment of 30,000 US troops to defeat the Taliban and Al-Qaeda extremists in Afghanistan by May 2010 and set a July 2011 deadline for an exit of American troops from the violence-torn country. The reinforcements that would be sent into Afghanistan at the fastest pace possible will now raise the total US force to 98,000. Beginning in July,US troops will begin their transition out of Afghanistan, handing over responsibility for security to newly trained Afghan soldiers and police. However, the pace and end date of withdrawal of US forces from Afghanistan would depend on the situation on the ground and cannot be predicted. Interestingly, a new survey by Gallup organizations showed only 35 percent of Americans surveyed has approved Obama’s handling of the war while 55 percent disapproved.

If truth be told, rising combat deaths and military costs have sapped public support for the eight-year old war and Obama’s troop increase has prompted protests from left-leaning leaders of his democratic party, the republicans and some outside critics. The critics are certain to argue that the strategy lacks a convincing civilian and political dimension. They worry about the fact that the strategy shift, which is deploying of 30,000 additionalUS troops into the Pushtun heartland, will break their fighting capabilities faster than the presence of American intruders will boost Taliban recruiting among 6 million Pushtun men.

Democratic Senator Russell Feingold of Wisconsin said a surge of US forces to Afghanistan would be a serious mistake that could further destabilize Pakistan. There is no denying the fact that the additional US troop’s deployment in the southern regions of Afghanistan such as the Taliban-infested Helmand province would encourage the militants to seek refuge in Pakistan’s tribal areas across the border and further unsettle conditions in its Baluchistan province.

In views of Democratic Congressman James McGovern of Massachusetts, sending tens of thousands of more troops to Afghanistan would only make it much harder for United States to extricate itself from the problems there. According to Medea Benjamin, an American politician and renowned anti-war activist, “Sending 30,000 more troops is really a political decision to make Obama look tough onsecurity , to try to quiet some elements of the right in this country. But, in terms of a war strategy, it really does not make any sense”. Also the US ambassador to Kabul, Karl Eikenberry, had sent memos to Washington expressing deep concern over the deployment of more troops to the country because of the graft issue.

Edward Corcoran, a senior fellow at Global Security Organization, has coined the current effort to provide large numbers of additional troops and solve the problem in short order as misguided for a number of reasons. It appears that the large numbers of foreign troops only validate the Taliban claim of occupation and will inevitably result in more incidents not only inflaming local sensitivities and supporting fundamentalist recruitment but also draining the support of the American public. Also, unable to provide significant economic, social and political improvements, additional troops will have no longer impact, instead it will further invigorate the Taliban and confirm the transient nature of American support.

In an article published in The Washington Post, Eugene Robinson has written that “as he decides to escalate war in Afghanistan, Obama must have kept in mind the geopolitical calculation that has human consequences. Sending more troops means more coffins arriving at Dover, more funerals at Arlington, more stress and hardship for military families. It would be wrong to demand such sacrifices in the absence of military goals that are clear, achievable and worthwhile”. Medics and air force pilots at main US base, Bagram Air Field, in Afghanistan have also started gearing up for the grim reality of the new US war Strategy which is likely escalation in the number of causalities in an increasingly bloody battlefield. Oscillating between the options of counter-terrorism and counterinsurgency would in the ultimate analysis come to naught, as neither can reasonably hope to deliver. There are no quick fixes but to immediately forge a coordinated response to all problems and to top it show the strategic resolve to see it through.

A large army alone is no guarantor of stability in Afghanistan, especially if the domestic forces and the central government that controls them are driven by factionalism and ethnic tensions. Unemployment is estimated at around 40 percent, while access to electricity is among the lowest in the world. Afghans have an average life expectancy of just 43 years and some of the highest rates of illiteracy in the world. Ninety percent of women in rural areas cannot read. However, the US military buildup, due to be phased over few months, will cost $30 Bn. By some calculations, the cost of each extra American soldier per year, up to $1 million, could build 20 schools in Afghanistan. Each and every meal prepared for US soldiers in Afghanistan costs about 28 dollars a head, more than most Afghans earn in a month. In this stark backdrop, still USAID, is budgeting for around $2 Bn only in annual development aid to Afghanistan as compared to spending on the military operation in Afghanistan, which will cost nearly $95 Bn this fiscal year.

The ground realities of Afghan war manifest the fact that unless the political, economic and diplomatic legs of the plan are solid, disproportionally strengthening the military leg could prove counterproductive. And it is evident that unless the US changes both its current policies and present attitudes, failure in Afghanistan is still inevitable.