Pakistan hits back at US over war threat!
US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said on Wednesday that the United States would do whatever it took to defend American forces in Afghanistan from Pakistan-based militants, indicating that Washington could give a go-ahead to a military operation inside Pakistan.
http://english.irib.ir/subcontinent/news/top-stories/item/80422-pakist an-hits-back-at-us-over-war-threat
Emily Susan Michael Maryam
Friday, 16 September 2011 19:09 _________________ 'Come and see the violence inherent in the system.
Help, help, I'm being repressed!'
“The more you tighten your grip, the more Star Systems will slip through your fingers.”
Uploaded by RussiaToday on Sep 21, 2011
Afghanistan's mourning the death of its former President, who was a key negotiator with the Taliban. Burhanuddin Rabbani was killed by a suicide bomber at his home in the capital Kabul on Tuesday. It's believed the explosives were hidden in the attacker's turban. Rabbani had led peace talks with the insurgents over the last year, and was considered one of the most influential figures in the country.The killing's the latest in a string of high-profile assassinations in Afghanistan, and the second Taliban attack on Kabul in a week. Daoud Sultanzoy, political analyst and former Afghan MP says Rabbani's killing is a major blow to president Karzai peace efforts.
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_________________ 'Come and see the violence inherent in the system.
Help, help, I'm being repressed!'
“The more you tighten your grip, the more Star Systems will slip through your fingers.”
http://www.legitgov.org/US-senator-threatens-Pakistan-war US senator threatens Pakistan with war 26 Sep 2011 A high-profile American senator has said that the United States should consider military action against Pakistan if Islamabad continues to sponsor militant attacks against US troops in Afghanistan. "The sovereign nation of Pakistan is engaging in hostile acts against the United States and our ally Afghanistan that must cease," said Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, who serves on the Senate Armed Services Committee, the Associated Press reported Sunday. Graham warned that Pakistan should choose between supporting the Haqqani militant network and helping the US fight al-Qaeda [al-CIAduh].
http://www.legitgov.org/American-citizen-killed-Kabul-attack Terrorists 'R Us: American citizen killed in Kabul attack 26 Sep 2011 An American citizen has been killed during an overnight attack on a compound believed to house the CIA station in the Afghan capital, Kabul, US embassy spokesman says. "An Afghan employee of the US government carried out the attack and was killed," AP quoted Gavin Sundwall as saying on Monday without giving further information. Citing US officials, the report said that the building where the attack took place is a CIA office -- a facility previously known as the Ariana hotel...
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-09-26/american-killed-at-reported-cia- compound/2942492 'CIA compound' attacked in Kabul 26 Sep 2011 Gunfire was heard from inside a Kabul compound reportedly used by the CIA in what appeared to be the latest in a series of insurgent attacks on targets in the Afghan capital. Afghan interior ministry spokesman Siddiq Siddiqui said police had heard "a couple of minutes" of gunfire from inside the Ariana Hotel compound around 9.15pm (local time) on Sunday. An Afghan government source told the AFP news agency that the Ariana compound was used by the CIA.
http://www.legitgov.org/US-led-soldier-killed-Afghanistan-12 US-led soldier killed in Afghanistan 26 Sep 2011 Another US-led soldier has lost his life in a bomb attack in southern Afghanistan, NATO has said in a statement. The soldier was killed on Monday, the Western military alliance said without giving further details about the nationality of the soldier. The latest death brings to 38 the number of foreign troops killed in the war-torn country so far this month, AP reported.
http://www.legitgov.org/Two-US-led-troops-killed-Afghan-war-2 Two US-led troops killed in Afghan war 25 Sep 2011 At least two foreign soldiers serving with US-led NATO military alliance have been killed in separate incidents in the troubled eastern Afghanistan. The fatalities were caused on Sunday due to the detonation of improvised explosive devices (IED), Xinhua reported, citing a statement by the forces. The alliance withheld further information, including the nationalities of the soldiers.
http://www.rttnews.com/Content/GeneralNews.aspx?Node=B1&Id=1720242 5 NATO Soldiers Killed In Afghanistan 23 Sep 2011 Five members of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) died in separate incidents in Afghanistan on Friday. Two of them were killed in an improvised explosive device (IED) attack in southern Afghanistan, while three others died as a result of "non-battle related injuries" in the western part of the country, ISAF said in separate statements.
http://www.legitgov.org/US-led-forces-kill-19-Afghan-civilians US-led forces kill 19 Afghan civilians 26 Sep 2011 Afghan officials say at least 19 civilians have been killed during a military operation carried out by US-led forces in troubled eastern Afghanistan, Press TV reports. The head of the provincial council of Afghanistan's eastern province of Nuristan said on Monday that the deadly operation had been conducted by foreign forces last Wednesday. Similar operations by US-led troops in eastern provinces of Wardak, Logar and Paktia left at least 12 people dead and injured several others on Sunday.
http://www.legitgov.org/Four-NATO-tankers-destroyed-Pakistan Four NATO tankers destroyed in Pakistan 26 Sep 2011 Militants have destroyed four NATO tankers in Pakistan's southern province of Sindh transporting fuel for US-led forces in neighboring Afghanistan, Press TV reports. Pakistani officials said militants opened fire at a convoy of NATO oil tankers in Shikarpur town in Sindh Province on Monday. The tankers were set ablaze in the assault but no casualties were reported.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-09-19/family-of-killed-afghan-journo-s eeks-asylum-in/2905622 Family of Afghan journo killed by US military seeks asylum in Australia 19 Sep 2011 (AM) TONY EASTLEY: The family of an Afghan journalist, killed in an attack near the main Australian base in Afghanistan, is seeking asylum in Australia. Omed Khpulwak was shot dead by US troops in July. His relatives have refused compensation from the US military, but are seeking sanctuary in Australia, after receiving anonymous [Blackwater?] threats... AHMAD JAWID KHPULWAK: _________________ 'Come and see the violence inherent in the system.
Help, help, I'm being repressed!'
“The more you tighten your grip, the more Star Systems will slip through your fingers.”
Joined: 25 Jul 2005 Posts: 18335 Location: St. Pauls, Bristol, England
Posted: Mon Oct 03, 2011 11:52 am Post subject:
In the run-up to the tenth aniversary of the Afghan invasion a rare listenable edition of Andrew Marr's live radio 4 show Start the Week
Afghanistan and the British Secret Service with Rory Stewart, Frank Ledwidge and Gordon Corera
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b015bt0w
Losing Small Wars by FRANK LEDWIDGE http://www.amazon.co.uk/Losing-Small-Wars-Military-Afghanistan/dp/0300 166710/
It’s ten years since Britain went to war in Afghanistan, more than 380 British service personnel have lost their lives and untold thousands of Afghan civilians, and the conflict is far from over. Frank Ledwidge is a former military intelligence officer, and in his book Losing Small Wars he offers a devastating critique of why the armed forces have fared so badly, both in Afghanistan and Iraq. He insists there’s been an unwillingness at the very top to admit their strategy has failed, and ultimately to be held accountable.
Losing Small Wars: British Military Failure in Iraq and Afghanistan is published by Yale University Press.
The Art of Betrayal by GORDON CORERA http://www.amazon.co.uk/Art-Betrayal-British-Secret-Service/dp/0297860 992/
It didn’t officially exist until 1994, its chiefs were known only as C and wrote in green ink, and like le Carré’s literary depiction, it was a hotbed of intrigue and treachery. Gordon Corera uncovers the history of MI6, from the heady days of the Cold War to the disaster of the ‘dodgy dossier’ on Iraq. From a service riddled with moles during Kim Philby’s defection, to the brief glory of running Gordievsky under the noses of the KGB, to closer ties with the military in the war in Afghanistan, Corera paints a picture of an organisation struggling to sustain its role in a changing world.
The Art of Betrayal: Life and Death in the British Secret Service is published by Weidenfeld & Nicolson.
"He insists there’s been an unwillingness at the very top to admit their strategy has failed, and ultimately to be held accountable. "
This naturally assumes their strategy is as it is publicly stated as opposed to the secret strategy of those at the very top which I (and many here) suggest is based on
a strategy of tension at home and abroad between people of different faiths, beliefs and nationalities
promoting fear and blind loyalty and patriotism
divide and rule, problem-solution-reaction
full spectrum dominance
etc.............
Based on this I would say the strategy is going swimmingly
Joined: 25 Jul 2005 Posts: 18335 Location: St. Pauls, Bristol, England
Posted: Fri Oct 07, 2011 1:13 am Post subject:
Vanity, machismo and greed have blinded us to the folly of Afghanistan
The decade-long retribution exacted on this nation has cost the west dearly – and our old foes laugh at our expense
Ten years of western occupation of Afghanistan led the UN this week to plead that half the country's drought-ridden provinces face winter starvation. The World Food Programme calls for £92m to be urgently dispatched. This is incredible. Afghanistan is the world's greatest recipient of aid, some $20bn in the past decade, plus a hundred times more in military spending. So much cash pours through its doors that $3m a day is said to leave Kabul airport corruptly to buy property in Dubai.
Everything about Afghanistan beggars belief. This week its leader, Hamid Karzai, brazenly signed a military agreement with India, knowing it would enrage his neighbour, Pakistan, and knowing it would increase the assault on his capital by the Haqqani network, reported clients of Islamabad's ISI intelligence agency. Meanwhile, in Washington, the Pentagon is exulting over its new strategy of drone killing, claiming this aerial "counter-terrorism" can replace the "hearts and minds" counter-insurgency. Down in Helmand, visiting British journalists gather to recite the defence ministry's tired catechism: "We are making real progress on the ground."
The opening decade of the 21st century has been marked by two epic failures by the western powers that so recently claimed victory in the cold war; failures of both intellect and leadership. One is the inability to use the limitless resources of modern government to rescue the west's economy from prolonged recession. The other is the use of an attack on America by a crazed Islamist criminal as an excuse for a retaliatory war embracing a wide swath of the Muslim world. The decade-long punishment of Afghanistan for harbouring Osama bin Laden has been an act of biblical retribution. The demand that it also abandons the habits of history and adopt democracy, capitalism and gender equality was imperial arrogance.
What happened in Afghanistan in the autumn of 2001 has spawned an industry of hindsight, with over a hundred titles of wisdom after the event. We learn of the post-9/11 arguments within the Taliban, many of them old CIA allies. We learn of the possible role of Abdul Haq in Kabul, of Pakistan's intelligence double-dealing, and of the Kandahar jirga of October 2001 which came close to evicting Osama bin Laden.
Yet every counsel of caution in dealing with Afghanistan was disregarded in America's rush for vengeance – even the warning of Donald Rumsfeld that America "had no dog in the Afghan fight" and should avoid nation-building after a punitive raid. A great surge of imperial eagerness seemed to overwhelm Washington, London and Nato, as if the whole of western liberalism were craving a role in the world.
The occupation of Afghanistan has been a catalogue of unrelieved folly. America is spending staggering sums on the war, which it is clearly not winning. Congressional studies show virtually no US aid reaches the local economy, most remaining with contractors in the US or going on security or being stolen. Local democracy has failed, as warlords feud with drug lords and tribal vendettas resurface. The "training of the Afghan police and army" has become a dope-befuddled joke.
Britain's part in this has been dire. The thesis that Whitehall and its NGOs could somehow end Afghan corruption was absurd. Clare Short's mission in 2002 to "eradicate the poppy crop" and Kim Howells' spending of £270m "defeating the drugs trade" were beyond satire. I still have before me John Reid's briefing as gung-ho defence secretary in 2006, that Britain's job was "to build a prosperous, democratic, stable and secure Afghanistan", with British troops "not waging war but helping to rebuild". I recall General Sir David Richards at the time assuring me it would all be over soon in Helmand thanks to his "inkspots" strategy. The conclusion drawn in Frank Ledwidge's book, Losing Small Wars, is that the performance of Britain's 16 Air Assault Brigade in Helmand was "nothing short of disastrous … leaving a legacy of destroyed towns, refugees and civilian casualties". Whitehall's compensation payments to Afghan civilians killed and injured by its troops are doubling each year.
Three hundred and eighty-two British soldiers have died in this war. Can any minister look their families in the eye and claim the loss was worth it? Worth what? Except in garrisoned towns, security in Afghanistan is as bad as ever. British soldiers have been told that they are being withdrawn over the next two years. Since they cannot pretend to have achieved their mission, it makes no sense to leave them in harm's way a moment longer.
The policy now is to "talk to the Taliban", as if it were the German high command on Luneburg Heath. All that is happening is that Karzai's emissaries and Taliban chiefs are seduced into "talks", and then murdered either by their own side or by America's trigger-happy drones. Five of Karzai's negotiators have already been killed, including his brother. The drones are removing one Taliban or al-Qaida leader after another. While it is hard to feel sorry for them, the wrecking of any hierarchy of control replaces a path to peace with renewed vendetta. American policy has turned the tiny cell of Bin Laden's al-Qaida into a global terrorist brand.
What is strange, as Barbara Tuchman wrote, is not the folly of policy as such but its immunity to correction even when known to be folly. Any visitor to Kabul soon learns two things. First that it is senseless to confuse Pashtun nationalism with Taliban insurgency, and that with al-Qaida terrorism. Second, if Nato wants to eradicate a security threat in this part of the world, some accommodation must be made with the mujahideen or, as the Russians found, they will simply win. Accommodation, that is, with their Pakistan sponsors. The only key that unlocks this door is the departure of Nato troops.
As during Vietnam, some wars pass the stage where politicians and generals dare step back and look. Pride, a craving for glory, an aversion to defeat, above all, the institutionalising of the war in its surrounding territory, come to drive strategy. Kabul is occupied by tens of thousands of soldiers, diplomats, NGO officials and contractors. Afghanistan has become a stew of the military/industrial complex, with aid mixed in.
American estimates from Brown University are that some $3.7 trillion will have been spent avenging the 9/11 deaths. Britain's contribution to this stupefying sum is £18.8bn. Whether this spending has prevented another terror attack, whether that would be value for money, or whether the whole venture has been little more than a cruel exercise in vanity, machismo and greed can never be answered, though Bin Laden himself was dealt with quite cheaply. All we know for sure is that revenge has not been sweet, just very expensive.
Uploaded by RussiaToday on Oct 7, 2011
The war in Afghanistan will stretch beyond thirteen years - according to Washington's top military commander there.
What began a decade ago as a mission to get the perpetrators of 9/11, has now transformed into an open-ended hunt for the elusive Taliban. Some former U.S. military officers are disillusioned with the Afghan war. Lieutenant Colonel Karen Kwiatkowski thinks the true aim of the invasion was to create a platform for keeping an eye on - or even invading - other targets.
October 7th marks the ten year anniversary of the commencement of NATO operations in Afghanistan. Although the impending illegal invasion of Iraq in 2003 was enough to drive millions of people worldwide into the streets in protest, there has never been the same widespread resistance to the Afghan war.
This war has been deemed the “right war” and given a broad measure of support from across the political spectrum because it is still linked in the popular imagination with the events of 9/11. Even a cursory interrogation of these assumptions, however, reveals the absurd nature of this pretext for what has been all along an illegal invasion and occupation of a sovereign nation.
On the evening of 9/11, the North Atlantic Council issued a statement offering the assistance of all 18 NATO member states to the United States, calling the attacks “without precedent in the modern era.”
The next day the Council met again, making the extraordinary decision to invoke Article 5 of the Washington Treaty for the first time in NATO’s history. The carefully worded statement contained the important stipulation that Article 5 would only apply if it could be determined that the attacks were directed from abroad, something that NATO Secretary General Robertson noted had not been determined.
On October 2nd, the Council met again to announce that they had dropped the word “if” from their previous declaration on the basis of a report issued by a US State Department official named Frank Taylor. To this day, the evidence presented in Frank Taylor’s briefing is still classified, and the information that Secretary General Robertson called “clear and compelling” information pointing “conclusively” to an al-Qaida role in 9/11 has never been made public. Nor was this evidence ever presented to the FBI, who told investigative journalist Ed Haas in 2006 that there was “no hard evidence” linking Osama to 9/11.
As the documentary record shows, the lip service paid to “finding Osama” was never more than a convenient excuse for the Afghan invasion.
In February of 2001, the Taliban offered to turn bin Laden over to the United States, but the US refused. The offer was repeated in October of 2001, shortly after the bombing started, but again the US rejected it. Bin Laden himself was not even in Afghanistan at the time of the 9/11 attacks, a point later confirmed by CBS News.
Eventually, all pretence was dropped that the invasion of Afghanistan had anything to do with finding Osama bin Laden.
The mystery of this non-pretext for the Afghan invasion, however, makes perfect sense, not if one sees the invasion as retaliation for 9/11, but, exactly the opposite, if one understands 9/11 as in fact the pretext for a previously planned military operation to fulfill previoiusly acknowledged Western geostrategic imperatives.
As National Security Advisor to Carter, Zbigniew Brzezinski oversaw “Operation Cyclone,” a covert US plan for luring the Soviet Union into an unwinnable war in Afghanistan by first fomenting and then actively supporting Islamic fundamentalists in the country. This became the basis for the eventual takeover of the country by the Taliban with active CIA support through their front in the Pakistani Intelligence Services.
In 1997, just four years before the NATO invasion, Brzezinski wrote that “For America, the chief geopolitical prize is Eurasia[...]Now a non-Eurasian power is preeminent in Eurasia — and America’s global primacy is directly dependent on how long and how effectively its preponderance on the Eurasian continent is sustained.”
He pinpointed what he called the “Eurasian balkans,” an area encompassing Afghanistan and its neighbours, as the most geopolitically significant region to control for its gas and oil reserves and mineral deposits. He argued that some form of extended American military intervention in the region would be necessary, warning that a global consensus on its foreign policy imperatives would be impossible “…except in the circumstance of a truly massive and widely perceived direct external threat.”
Later that year, a senior delegation from the Taliban came to the United States for meetings with Unocal about securing the rights to secure a gas pipeline from Turkmenistan to Pakistan across Afghanistan. In 2002, it was revealed that the United States had been negotiating with the Taliban to secure those oil interests, and that American negotiators had told the Taliban that they had a choice: “You have a carpet of gold, meaning an oil deal, or a carpet of bombs.” Shortly after the 9/11 attacks, a former Pakistani foreign secretary revealed to the BBC that a senior American official had told him in mid-July of 2001 that military action against Afghanistan would go ahead by the middle of October.
When the Bush administration came into office, its first substantive national security decision directive, NSPD-9, called for “military options against Taliban targets in Afghanistan, including leadership, command-control, air and air defense, ground forces, and logistics” and was presented to the president on September 4, 2001, seven days before 9/11.
What makes the nightmare of this invasion all the more disturbing is that in allowing this invasion to go forward and in offering no significant resistance to the operation itself, the public has effectively allowed the war criminals to set a series of disturbing precedents which future political leaders have used and in the future will no doubt continue to use in justifying their own wars of conquest.
Earlier this week, I talked to Rick Rozoff, director of Stop NATO International, about this very problem.
As worrying as all of these precedents are in the wake of continued NATO aggression and domination in theaters like Libya, the Afghan people themselves continue to be the forgotten victims of this war.
Punished for living within the borders of a country that was accuse at one time of harbouring someone who was alleged without proof to have been responsible for an act of terrorism which the majority of the people don’t even know happened, the Afghans have watched as their cities, their towns, their infrastructure, and of course, their lives have been destroyed by the NATO war machine.
As Michel Chossudovsky of the Centre for Research on Globalization told me earlier this week, the commencement of the NATO-led invasion of Afghanistan ten years ago was by no means the commencement of the destruction of that country in the name of Western geopolitical strategy. In fact, as he argues, there has been a continuous interference in Afghan affairs since the commencement of Operation Cyclone under the Carter Administration in 1979, a 32-year long campaign against Afghanistan that amounts, in effect, to a coordinated policy of genocide against the Afghan people.
Joined: 30 Jul 2006 Posts: 6060 Location: East London
Posted: Wed Oct 12, 2011 5:26 am Post subject: US Veterans & Afghan Oil War
I'm sure somewhere there is at least one thread on the real reason US attacked Afghanistan, but I can't find it, so I've started new thread.
Whilst we've been aware of the links with pipelines for years, this Brasscheck video clip shows US Veterans Against the War have got the message:
Antonia Juhasz has also written a book, which should be a good read, 'The Tyranny of Oil'. _________________ 'And he (the devil) said to him: To thee will I give all this power, and the glory of them; for to me they are delivered, and to whom I will, I give them'. Luke IV 5-7.
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206 NATO troops poisoned in Afghanistan 14 Oct 2011 NATO has confirmed that at least 206 troops working with the US-led military alliance have been poisoned near Mazar Sharif, capital of the northern Afghan province of Balkh, Press TV reports. The NATO-led International Security Assistance Forces (ISAF) said the soldiers fell ill after dining in Camp Marmal near Mazar Sharif late Wednesday, a Press TV correspondent reported on Friday. About 138 of the victims are German while the rest are from other NATO countries engaged in the Afghan war. _________________ 'Come and see the violence inherent in the system.
Help, help, I'm being repressed!'
“The more you tighten your grip, the more Star Systems will slip through your fingers.”
So some lying anonymous military spokesperson says - - -
Sectarian suicide bomber my foot!
Israeli/NATO Nazi special forces a tad more likely.
Afghanistan bombs kill 58 in Kabul and Mazar-i-Sharif
Twin attacks apparently targeting Shia Muslims have killed at least 58 people in Afghanistan.
In the deadliest incident, a suicide bomb struck a shrine packed with worshippers in the capital, Kabul, killing at least 54 people.
Another blast struck near a Shia mosque the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif at about the same time, killing four.
The attacks appear to be of a sectarian nature unprecedented in recent Afghan history, correspondents say.
The US has condemned the attacks, saying it continues to "stand with the Afghan people".
The blasts coincided with the Shia Muslim festival of Ashura - the most important day in the Shia calendar and marked with a public holiday in Afghanistan.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-16046079 _________________ --
'Suppression of truth, human spirit and the holy chord of justice never works long-term. Something the suppressors never get.' David Southwell
http://aangirfan.blogspot.com http://aanirfan.blogspot.com
Martin Van Creveld: Let me quote General Moshe Dayan: "Israel must be like a mad dog, too dangerous to bother."
Martin Van Creveld: I'll quote Henry Kissinger: "In campaigns like this the antiterror forces lose, because they don't win, and the rebels win by not losing."
Thousands of Afghans have stormed a UN compound in Kunduz province, as protests over the recent Koran burning in Bagram rage throughout Afghanistan. By the fifth day of anti-American demonstrations about 30 have been killed and hundreds injured.
Protesters’ attempts to get inside the UN building have left at least three people killed and around 50 injured. According to AFP, police opened fire at the protesters.
Part of a UN compound in the Afghan city of Kunduz has been set alight, the BBC reported.
Meanwhile UN representatives there reported violence all around the city. Protesters set shops ablaze, along with government buildings and cars.
Saturday’s violence around the country has added more victims to the 25 killed in the first four days of protests.
In the capital Kabul two NATO advisors have been killed during a shooting inside the Interior Ministry. The Taliban have issued a statement claiming they were responsible for the killings. A Taliban representative said the shootings had been carried out in response to the Koran-burning incident.
A shooting also took place in Logar province south of Kabul after hundreds of angry protesters clashed with security forces. Two people were wounded, reports Reuters.
In Laghman province, hundreds of protesters tried to attack the governor's house and office. At least 15 people have been injured.
Protests erupted in several other provinces on Saturday as security forces remained on high alert.
Afghan demonstrators carry a wounded man as they protest against Koran desecration in Kunduz on February 25, 2012 (AFP Photo / Gulrahim)
The protest in Kunduz on February 25, 2012 (AFP Photo / Gulrahim)
The Koran burning has inflamed anti-Western sentiment already smoldering over abuses by US-led foreign troops. The incident took place on Monday at the Bagram military base. The Koran and other sacred texts were seized from arrested Afghans and burnt by accident, insists Gen. John Allen, commander of NATO's International Security Assistance Force.
He told media the texts had been confiscated from detainee center's library as they seemed to have "extremist inscriptions" on some of the pages. US troops suspected that those books were being used in order to “facilitate extremist communications." Gen. Allen stressed that the materials were gathered for disposal and inadvertently given to troops for burning.
Earlier on Thursday, President Obama sent an official letter of apology to President Karzai. "I convey my deepest sympathies and ask you and the people to accept my deepest apologies,” the letter read.
NATO officials made their apologies immediately after the incident, but this did not prevent riots breaking out the country.
After the Koran-burning incident not only ordinary Afghans but also US-trained soldiers and policemen are protesting against the US military presence in the country, Ahmed Quraishi, the president of the Paknationalists Forum, told RT. He believes that this development is “tremendously important” from a strategic point of view.
Joined: 25 Jul 2005 Posts: 18335 Location: St. Pauls, Bristol, England
Posted: Wed Mar 14, 2012 7:16 pm Post subject:
He's being flown out of the country the US has just anounced - so can not face any justice. Just like a paperclip war criminal being 'spirited away' by the OSS at the end of World War Two.
No justice, no peace is the American way to spead chaos and evil.
TonyGosling wrote:
Thank you America for bringing freedom for Afghan women from the oppressive Taliban - and drugs for the cartels
16 dead after rampage by rogue US soldier
From:AFP March 11, 2012 11:19PM
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/dead-after-rampage-by-rogue -us-soldier/story-e6frg6so-1226296500601
AN AFP reporter counted 16 bodies in three Afghan houses after a rogue US soldier walked out of his base in southern Afghanistan and began shooting civilians early today.
"I visited three houses and counted 16 bodies including those of children, women and elderly men," the reporter said.
NATO's International Security Assistance Force said it had arrested a soldier "in connection to an incident that resulted in Afghan casualties in Kandahar province", without giving a figure for the dead or wounded.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai today backed claims that more than one person had conducted the massacre of 16 civilians which US forces have blamed on a single soldier.
At a meeting with relatives of the nine children, four men and three women who were slain Mr Karzai said villagers’ accounts of the atrocity were "widely different from the scenario depicted by US military officials.
The president pointed to a villager at the meeting and said: "In his family people were killed in four rooms and then they were brought together in one room and set on fire. That one man cannot do."
He also blasted the US for refusing to share information from its investigation into the outrage, which was conducted in two separate villages.
A government delegation sent to Kandahar to investigate had "not received the expected co-operation of the United States," he said, adding that he would raise the issue with the occupying army "very loudly."
Back at the presidential palace in Kabul Mr Karzai said the ever-escalating civilian death toll by Nato occupiers was intolerable and repeated calls made a day earlier for total withdrawal from rural areas.
"This has been going on for too long," he said. "You have heard me before. It is the end of the rope here. This form of activity, this behaviour cannot be tolerated. It is past, past, past the time."
The United Nations has found that 2011 was the bloodiest year yet in Afghanistan, with over 3,000 civilian deaths.
The president said he had received a phone call from his US counterpart Barack Obama asking if he meant what he said about withdrawing from the countryside and that he had replied: "Yes, I announced this."
But the US military said it did not believe he meant it should withdraw from such areas immediately and refused to comment on his criticism of its investigation into the Kandahar massacre. Mr Karzai has limited leverage with the
occupying powers who enthroned him in 2004 and who gauge that his government has little chance of remaining in office once they are gone.
A Turkish military helicopter crashed into a house near Kabul yesterday, killing 12 soldiers on board and two children who were in the building. _________________ 'Come and see the violence inherent in the system.
Help, help, I'm being repressed!'
“The more you tighten your grip, the more Star Systems will slip through your fingers.”
Just had to be 11.3 again ... Jacques de Molay immolation and Giuseppe Mazzini's death. The day that the skull of Jacques de Molay is said to breathe fire ...
An Afghan woman is interviewed next to the body of a child killed by coalition forces in Kandahar province on March 11, 2012 (Reuters / Ahmad Nadeem)
The Afghan Army Chief of Staff says the slaughter of 16 civilians, including nine children, in Kandahar province was a premeditated assassination carried out by a number of servicemen, RIA Novosti reports, citing Afghan media.
Lt. General Sher Mohammad Karimi’s harsh condemnation of the March 11 mass murder flies in the face the version of events posited by the NATO-led security mission.
The Top command of the ISAF (International Security Assistance Force) insists that the butchery was carried out by just one man – Staff Sgt. Robert Bales – who went on a killing spree for unknown reasons.
Lt. Gen. Karimi met with Afghan President Hamid Karzai and relatives of the victims on Friday in Kabul.
Saying he had personally visited the villages where the slaughter took place, the General stressed he had repeatedly demanded to meet with the suspect Robert Bales but was turned down cold.
President Karzai has also announced that the conclusions of numerous commissions investigating the crime scenes show the murders was carried out by multiple assailants.
He further stressed the American investigation team refused to sufficiently co-operate with the Afghan side.
The Afghan parliamentary investigation team has reported that anywhere from 15 to 20 US troops could have taken part in the massacre.
The relatives of the victims told President Karzai that the counterinsurgency operation had received air support. They also claim the killers were brought in by military helicopters.
International affairs commentator Rick Rozoff told RT if one takes the methodical nature of the killings into account, “one person could hardly have perpetrated this crime.”
He said there is undoubtedly a clear distinction between so-called collateral damaged and targeted killings:
“This is a very deliberate action, and for the US to try to portray it as anything else is disingenuous,” Rozoff said.
“This killing on Sunday [March 11] is particularly egregious, particularly atrocious because it is a cold-blooded, calculated effort – evoking images of massacres like My Lai in Vietnam [in 1968],” Rick Rozoff concluded.
Staff Sgt. Robert Bales was arrested in Afghanistan and brought to Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, where he is currently staying in solitary confinement. His family has been moved onto the base for their security.
The spokesperson for the NATO-led coalition in Afghanistan Brigadier General Carsten Jacobson promised on Monday that the Afghan people would receive justice.
News of Bales' transfer to an American detention facility sparked fury among Afghan lawmakers. They demanded the suspect face a public trial in Afghanistan. Upon hearing the suspect had been whisked out of the country, hundreds of Afghans took to the street in protest.
John Henry Browne, the lawyer for Bales, says his client’s case is not a criminal one. Browne expressed surprise his client had been deployed to Afghanistan despite suffering head trauma and other wounds on a previous tour in Iraq.
The attorney also doubts his client could have committed the crime while intoxicated. He said combat fatigue is the most likely factor driving American soldiers to carry out criminal acts in Afghanistan.
Browne confirmed Bales may face the death penalty.
U.S. armoured vehicles are parked outside a US base in Panjwai district Kandahar province, March 11, 2012 (Reuters / Ahmad Nadeem)
An Afghan parliamentary investigation team has implicated up to 20 US troops in the massacre of 16 civilians in Kandahar early on Sunday morning. It contradicts NATO's account that insists one rogue soldier was behind the slaughter.
The team of Afghan lawmakers has spent two days collating reports from witnesses, survivors and inhabitants of the villages where the tragedy took place.
“We are convinced that one soldier cannot kill so many people in two villages within one hour at the same time, and the 16 civilians, most of them children and women, have been killed by the two groups,” investigator Hamizai Lali told Afghan News.
Lali also said their investigations led them to believe 15 to 20 US soldiers had been involved in the killings. He appealed to the international community to ensure that the responsible parties were brought to justice, stressing the Afghan parliament would not rest until the killers were prosecuted.
"If the international community does not play its role in punishing the perpetrators, the Wolesi Jirga [parliament] would declare foreign troops as occupying forces,” he said.
The head of the Afghan parliamentary investigation, Sayed Ishaq Gillani, told the BBC that witnesses report seeing helicopters dropping chaff during the attack, a measure used to hide targets from ground attack.
Gillani added that locals suspect the massacre was revenge for attacks carried out last week on US forces that left several injured.
In response to the massacre Afghan PM Hamid Karzai called for US troops to quit Afghan villages and confine themselves to their military bases across the country. Furthermore, the Taliban announced that talks with US forces would be suspended.
Meanwhile the US military has detained one soldier in connection with the massacre and transferred him to Kuwait amid outcry for a public trial in Afghanistan. Currently, the soldier is being flown to Kansas base, AFP reported.
US authorities are currently conducting an investigation into the motives behind the attack, but maintain that the soldier’s trial must be dealt with by the US legal system.
It is believed that the soldier may have had alcohol problems and been suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder.
Staff Sgt. Robert Bales (L), one of the soldiers accused of involvement in the recent massacre of Afghan civilians, at the National Training Center in Fort Irwin, California, August 23, 2011
Sun Mar 18, 2012 6:11AM GMT
An Afghan parliamentary investigation team says the massacre of at least 16 civilians by American soldiers in Kandahar province was planned in retaliation for an earlier attack on US forces.
The head of the Afghan parliamentary investigation, Sayed Ishaq Gillani, said the locals suspect that the slaughter of the Afghan civilians was carried out in revenge for an attack which destroyed an American tank last week.
Earlier on Monday, the Afghan tribal leaders of Kandahar province also said that the carnage was in retaliation against the bomb attack on the US tank in the Zangabad region in Panjwaii district in the province of Kandahar.
Following the blast, the American forces summoned local Afghans and tribal leaders of the region and vowed a bloody revenge on their children and wives, the Kandahar tribal leaders added.
The new findings came in the wake of an earlier report by the team, which suggested that the American troopers also raped two female victims of the massacre before killing them.
The investigation mission also implicated up to 20 US soldiers in the carnage. “We are convinced that one soldier cannot kill so many people in two villages within one hour at the same time, and the 16 civilians, most of them children and women, have been killed by the two groups,” investigator Hamizai Lali said.
Sergeant Robert Bales, one of the soldiers accused of involvement in the massacre of Afghan civilians, was flown from a temporary military prison in Kuwait to a maximum security cell in Fort Leavenworth in the US state of Kansas. The transfer of the US soldier outraged the Afghan people, who demanded the public trial of the perpetrators of the heinous act in their country.
Earlier on Friday, Afghanistan’s President Hamid Karzai criticized the United States for not cooperating with the Afghan fact-finding team and said the killing of the civilians by foreign forces in Afghanistan “has been going on for too long.”
On March 11, a group of US soldiers went from house to house in Kandahar’s Panjwaii district and gunned down Afghan civilians inside their homes, killing at least 16 people, mostly women and children, and injuring several others.
AO/MA/HJL
. _________________ The Medium is the Massage - Marshall McLuhan.
Joined: 25 Jul 2005 Posts: 18335 Location: St. Pauls, Bristol, England
Posted: Wed Mar 28, 2012 10:44 pm Post subject:
The Massacre of the Afghan 17 and the Obama Cover-Up:
http://truthjihadradio.blogspot.co.uk/2012/03/james-petras-massacre-of -afghan-17-and.html "This massacre is just one of several hundred committed by US armed forces according to the Afghan president, Hamid Karzai. It could ruin the Obama presidency, by putting him on trial for conspiracy to obstruct justice and arguably send him to jail for war crimes."
"When the extreme measures have run their course there will be nothing to fall back on and nothing can save the president of a collapsing empire from the revolt of its citizens and soldiers."
James Petras is a Bartle Professor (Emeritus) of Sociology at Binghamton University, New York. He is the author of 64 books published in 29 languages, and over 560 articles in professional journals, including the American Sociological Review, British Journal of Sociology, Social Research, Journal of Contemporary Asia, and Journal of Peasant Studies. He has published over 2000 articles.
so is Channel news X a Western propaganda machine?
this guy thinks so
Quote:
Indians are smart people. They are now part of BRIC. Afghanistan will be part of BRIC when NATO departs. Pakistan is benefiting and will benefit greatly from BRIC. There is absolulty no reason for tension between Pakistan and India. All these will be solved in the near future.
or
Quote:
india is the biggest tool for the so called west. India would lick the feet of any invader who come to destroy that region. They were in cahoots with the russians, and now with the US. even though US was not paying much attention to India trying to butter up US, but now since US after loosing all hope in Afghanistan and Pakistan, is trying to please india a bit. and then india wonder why it is disliked throughout asia
_________________ 'Come and see the violence inherent in the system.
Help, help, I'm being repressed!'
“The more you tighten your grip, the more Star Systems will slip through your fingers.”
Multiple coordinated blasts rock diplomatic enclave in Afghan capital
Press TV, 15 April 2012
Taliban militants have launched multiple coordinated attacks in the diplomatic enclave in Afghanistan’s capital city, Kabul, and three other cities, Press TV reports.
Several heavy bomb explosions and gunfire were heard on Sunday, setting off building warning alarms at the US, British, and German embassies.
The Taliban have reportedly dubbed the attacks the start of their ‘spring offensive.’
Although the German Embassy has sustained damage, no reports of staff injuries have been made.
All foreign embassies in Kabul, the NATO headquarters, and the presidential palace are on lockdown following the attacks.
Rockets were also fired at the Afghan parliament building and the Russian Embassy in another part of the city.
Afghan police say the assailants tried to enter the parliament but were driven back.
The militants also stormed the Star Hotel near Hamid Karzai’s residence in the capital.
Roadside bombs and improvised explosive devices (IEDs) are by far the most lethal weapon Taliban militants use against Afghan forces, foreign troops, and civilians.
Overall, 3,021 civilians died in violence related to the war and 4,507 were wounded in 2011.
Despite the presence of some 130,000 US-led forces in Afghanistan, insecurity continues to rise across the Asian country.
It was the biggest ever attack by the insurgents on capital Kabul, in terms of the number of suicide attackers employed. It was also one of the most audacious and well coordinated attacks in recent times. On 15 April 2012, simultaneous attacks on the Afghan capital and three other eastern provinces – Nangarhar, Logar and Paktia – left 51 people dead. Counted among the dead were four civilians, 11 members of the security forces and 36 insurgents.2 The Taliban announced the launch of its spring offensive and Afghanistan, which had registered some days of peace and tranquillity, has braced itself for another season of bloody violence.
The assaults began simultaneously at 1:45pm, and residents were quick to discern nearly identical patterns of attack – light gunfire, followed by explosions and protracted fire fights with Afghan security forces, with the militants in several cases fighting from vacant buildings or unfinished construction sites near their main targets.
Afghanistan
The spectacular attacks that took almost 18 hours to quell once again brought to the fore the fragility of transition process based on arbitrary time tables. Coming ahead of the Chicago Summit in May this year, the insurgents have sent a loud and clear message. By targeting the diplomatic enclave in Kabul’s green zone, specifically using enormous fire power, the insurgents managed to underline what President Hamid Karzai later highlighted as ‘intelligence failure, especially that of the NATO’.3 In face of a retreating coalition army and waning international interest, the insurgents are indeed well poised to carry out such attacks in future. The Taliban spokesman who described the onslaught as the opening of the Taliban’s spring offensive said, “This is a message to those foreign commanders who claim that the Taliban lost momentum. We just showed that we are here and we will launch and stage attacks whenever we want.”4
A Fragile Transition
In the past year, United States (US) President Barack Obama’s announcements of pulling American troops out of Afghanistan have met with several challenges. After recent weeks marred by the attacks on NATO units, riots after American military personnel burned copies of the Holy Quran and the killing of 17 Afghan civilians by an American sergeant, the US relinquished its right to carry out night raids and handed over the main coalition prison to the Afghan government in a bid to move ahead with the convoluted strategic partnership agreement before the Chicago Summit. However, with the beginning of the so-called ‘spring offensive’; attempts at demonstrating some progress in the Afghan war by the US administration have once again been thrown into a quandary.
In recent times, individual and uncoordinated attempts at negotiations with the Taliban have emerged as the principal conflict management strategy for the US. A political office came up in Qatar in January this year. Some desperate moves were made to release imprisoned Taliban commanders from the detention centre at Guantanamo bay, failure of which led the Taliban to suspend the peace talks in March. Efforts, however, have continued to keep the fledgling peace process going, both by the US and the Karzai administration. On 14 April 2012, a day before the attack, Salahuddin Rabbani, the son of slain Burhanuddin Rabbani was chosen to lead the 70-member High Peace Council (HPC). The HPC is charged with reaching out to Taliban insurgents. The attacks, the very next day, shows a complete disdain from the insurgents’ side towards the process of negotiations.
Capability of ANSF
Though the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSFs) were able to successfully neutralize the insurgents, concerns abound on their capability of gathering adequate intelligence on the planning and execution of such well coordinated multiple sieges. The fact that the insurgents could slip into the protected city evading several security check points with a huge stockpile of weapons and penetrate the most secure inner circle of Kabul’s ring of steel – the Wazir Akbar Khan district – is also a matter of deep worry. NATO commended Afghan security forces for effectively defending the city and ultimately quelling the attack. But Afghan forces did receive some back-up from helicopters and NATO Special Forces. The NATO’s praise for the ANSF is understandable, for on such success that the exit strategy is predicated.5
Afghan officials pointed at the handiwork of Haqqani network, by underlining the pattern of the attacks and area of operations. The Haqqani network was directly involved in one of the last major attacks in Kabul, an assault on the American Embassy in September 2011, and that too involved militants raining down rocket and gunfire from an unfinished building nearby.6 The Taliban, however, have indicated that their commander for eastern front, Haji Lala, was behind the attack.7 Haji Lala is Taliban’s shadow governor for Kabul and is known to be based in the Pakistani city of Peshawar. The coalescence of insurgent factions and movement of armed opposition closer to provinces to Kabul is indicative of things to come this summer.
Strategic Assets or Spoilers?
Irrespective of the involvement of particular persons or groups, the attack in a way could also signify the demonstration of control by the Taliban and, at a different but related level, the displeasure of the insurgents’ Pakistani hosts for being sidelined in the peace talks. Pakistan, which had opted to stay away from the Bonn Conference hosted by Germany in December 2011 as a mark of protest against the US attack on Salala post in Mohmand Agency on 26 November that year, has decided to take part in the upcoming Chicago summit.8 However, heightened tensions between the US and Pakistan – over the issues of the Abbotabad raid last summer, closure of the NATO supply routes and the recent announcement of a $10 million bounty for information leading to the arrest of Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) leader Hafiz Muhammad Saeed – continue to simmer. Pakistan’s Parliament last week unanimously voted to forbid the US from conducting drone strikes inside Pakistani territory. There are some signs that the civilian leadership is changing tracks.9 But at the same time, there are still indications that there will be attempts by the Pakistani establishment at holding on to their strategic assets to influence the intended outcome in Afghanistan. Any movement towards talks or negotiations in the past have evoked violent backlash in one form or other. The recent attack could have been part of the same trend.
What Lies Ahead?
Post-15 April 2012, Kabul may not be turning into an epicentre of insurgent activity. It has remained relatively safe, accounting for less than one percent of violent episodes nationwide.10 However, the relative safety of the national capital, in no way, marks the success of the stabilisation efforts in Afghanistan. The Taliban-led insurgency, in spite of the claims of the military about its weakening impact, remains a potent adversary capable of striking at will with huge demonstrative effect.
That poses challenges both to the stabilisation of Afghanistan and the transition plans for the present US administration. In a time when President Karzai has announced an early election time table11, thereby complicating the already muddled transition process, further deterioration of security can be the worst possible development. As the summer sets in, the likelihood of targeted high profile killings, combined with spectacular attacks, would erode the public confidence. With the looming political uncertainty, whispers of a civil war, the insurgents are well positioned to fill in the vacuum. Ahead of the Chicago summit in May, there is, thus, a need for a realistic assessment on the ‘conditions and needs on the ground’ to which the security transition timetables of the coalition forces should be linked.
Notes:
1. Dr Shanthie Mariet D’Souza is a Research Fellow at the Institute of South Asian Studies (ISAS), an autonomous Institute at the National University of Singapore (NUS). She can be reached at isassmd@nus.edu.sg. The views expressed in this paper are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the institute, where this article first appeared.
2. “Afghan leader Karzai blames attacks on Nato ‘failure’”, BBC (16 April 2012), http://www.bbc.co.uk/n ews/world-asia-17727036. Accessed on 16 April 2012.
3. ibid.
4. Alissa J. Rubin, Graham Bowley and Sangar Rahimi, “Complex Attack by Taliban Sends Message to the West”, The New York Times, (15 April 2012), http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/16/world/asia/attacks-near- embassies-in-kabul.html?_r=1&nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20120416&p agewanted=all. Accessed on 16 April 2012.
5. Bilal Sarwary, Analysis: What Kabul attacks say about Afghan security, BBC News, Kabul, 16 April 2012, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-17725266. Accessed on 16 April 2012.
6. Alissa j. Rubin, Graham Bowley and Sangar Rahimi, “Complex Attack by Taliban Sends Message to the West”, The New York Times (15 April 2012), http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/16/world/asia/attacks-near- embassies-in-kabul.html?_r=1&nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20120416&p agewanted=all. Accessed on 16 April 2012.
7 “Taliban Commanders Say Kabul Attacks Show New Strategy”, Daily Beast (15 April 2012), http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/04/15/taliban-commanders-sa y-kabul-attacks-show-new- strategy.html. Accessed on 16 April 2012.
8. Muhammad Saleh Zaafir, Zaradri to attend Nato summit next month in Chicago, 15 April 2012, http://www.thenews.com.pk/Todays-News-7-103102-Zaradri-to-attend-Nato- summit-next-month-in- Chicago. Accessed on 16 April 2012.
9. With Pakistan’s economy in poor shape — growth was 2.4 percent in 2011 and there is little foreign investment or aid — its business community has convinced the military that expansion can come only through increased trade with India. Pakistan’s government has agreed to remove restrictions on the import of most goods from India by year’s end. Vali Nasr, Pakistan Spring Emerging From Winter of Discontent, Bloomberg, (16 April 2012), http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-04-15/pakistan-spring-emerging-from - winter-of-discontent.html. Accessed on 16 April 2012.
10. IAN LIVINGSTON AND MICHAEL E. O’HANLON, The State of Afghanistan, The New York Times, 13 April 2012, http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/14/opinion/making-sense-of-trends-in-af ghanistan.html? smid=fb-share. Accessed on 14 April 2012.
11 Karzai considers changing Afghan election timetable, Radio Australia News, 12 April 2012, http://www.radioaustralianews.net.au/stories/201204/3476232.htm. Accessed on 13 April 2012.
About the author:
Joined: 25 Jul 2005 Posts: 18335 Location: St. Pauls, Bristol, England
Posted: Sat Jul 14, 2012 8:01 pm Post subject:
A wedding in the eyes of anyone of faith is the most beautiful and sacred occasion known to humanity.
I would bet my bottom dollar that this is a NATO bomb, either fired from a drone, helicopter, or pre-planted and hidden in the area.
It is NOT a suicide bomber.
That is more BS just to throw what by now must be utter fools off the scent.
An example of how desperately sick and evil the Biblical Christianity & Judaism & Koranic Islam Killers are, whose wages we pay.
Joined: 25 Jul 2005 Posts: 18335 Location: St. Pauls, Bristol, England
Posted: Wed Jul 18, 2012 8:16 pm Post subject:
SABOTAGE: Almost two dozen NATO supply trucks have been destroyed in a bomb attack in Afghanistan. A device planted on a fuel tanker detonated, engulfing others nearby. The vehicles were transporting fuel into the country from neighboring Uzbekistan. The attack comes after Pakistan lifted a blockade on NATO supply routes into Afghanistan in a move that provoked anger across the country.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k6IuNL8miGA
The US military has been conducting cyber-attacks against its perceived opponents in Afghanistan, according to one of its generals. Marine Corps Lieutenant General Richard Mills made the unusually explicit acknowledgment at a conference in Baltimore last week, The Associated Press reported on Friday. At the conference, he explained how US commanders regard cyber weapons as an important part of their arsenal.
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