| Old Articles | | Monday, December 14 | | · | U.S. Occupation and the Corrupt, Mafia-state of Hamid Karzai |
| Tuesday, December 01 | | · | American Are Deeply Involved In Afghan Drug Trade |
| Wednesday, November 04 | | · | Why and To What End in Afghanistan |
| Wednesday, October 07 | | · | Why Are We in Afghanistan? |
| Monday, September 14 | | · | Time to Be Impolite About Afghanistan: Protest the Non-War |
| Friday, August 14 | | · | Time to End the War in Afghanistan: Unconditional Negotiations, Now! |
| Tuesday, May 26 | | · | An Acceptable Dictator for Afghanistan? |
| Thursday, April 02 | | · | Surging Further Into the Afghan Abyss |
| Thursday, February 26 | | · | A New Afghanistan Nightmare |
| Tuesday, November 19 | | · | Lies my invader told me |
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War and Terror: The Fundamental Lie of the Afghan War
Thursday, June 12 @ 08:48:06 UTC |  The Bergdahl Swap and Beyond
By Gary Leupp
June 11, 2014 - counterpunch.org
As a general rule, U.S. wars are based on lies. Some of these are soon exposed; the lies about Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction and al-Qaeda links used to justify the invasion and occupation of Iraq were exposed (to anyone paying attention) within a few months, or at least by the end of 2003. The lie that Spaniards mined the USS Maine in Havana Harbor in 1898, used to justify U.S. war and the colonization of Cuba, Puerto Rico, Guam, Hawaii and the Philippines, was exposed much later. The lies about the Gulf of Tonkin Incident of 1964, used to justify the escalation of the Vietnam War, were only exposed in the 80s and 90s. The Big Lie surrounding the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan has not yet been adequately exposed and discussed.
The lie was hinted at, rather than expressed outright. The lie was there that was no distinction between the Taliban and al-Qaeda. “We make no distinction between terrorists and those who harbor them,” declared George W. Bush. This is the heart of the Bush Doctrine. The point was to justify the overthrow of a regime by actively confusing distinctions, encouraging people to see the Taliban as actively in cahoots with al-Qaeda plots, hence enemies of America and “terrorists” by definition.
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War and Terror:
Monday, March 19 @ 23:37:40 UTC | A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford
March 19, 2012 - blackagendareport.com
“What people would agree to allow such armed savages to remain in their country if given a choice?”
The American atrocities in Afghanistan roll on like a drumbeat from hell. With every affront to the human and national dignity of the Afghan people, the corporate media feign shock and quickly conclude that a few bad apples are responsible for U.S. crimes, that it’s all a mistake and misunderstanding, rather than the logical result of a larger crime: America’s attempt to dominate the world by force. But even so, with the highest paid and best trained military in the world – a force equipped with the weapons and communications gear to exercise the highest standards of control known to any military in history – one would think that commanders could keep their troops from making videos of urinating on dead men, or burning holy books, or letting loose homicidal maniacs on helpless villagers.
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War and Terror: The Notion of Permanent Bases in Afghanistan
Sunday, February 20 @ 10:53:53 UTC | Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan
February 18, 2011 - uruknet.info
Afghan resistance statement
Last week, the Head of the American- installed Regime, Karzai, admitted that Americans were planning to have permanent presence and bases in Afghanistan . According to him, the Americans perceive some incessant threats which could not be eliminated until 2014.
Undoubtedly, the Americans showed their muscles, resorted to brutalities, used cutting-edge technology, economy, diplomacy and ploys during the last decade to swallow and digest Afghanistan. But thanks to the help of the Almighty Allah and the bravery of the Afghan Mujahid people, American and the invading coalition forces faced defeat, their stratagems and strategies failed. The situation now has reached a phase that every household of the Afghans opposes the invasion and wants to beat them. Similarly, the people in West and in America, loudly say that America has lost the war of Afghanistan; they do not support this war and want their troops to return back home soon.
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War and Terror: A Shocking Act of Political Violence: Silent Surge in Afghanistan
Monday, January 10 @ 15:34:37 UTC | By Chris Floyd
January 10, 2011 - www.chris-floyd.com
Americans showed their remarkable collective wisdom once again last week, when a shocking act of violence was met with a steady calm across the political spectrum. Indeed, it seemed the entire country was united in a steadfast effort to downplay any disturbing implications of the despicable act and to keep doggedly to business as usual.
We speak of course of Barack Obama's latest "surge" in Afghanistan: his third such escalation of the murderous militarist misadventure in that ravaged land, now heading toward its 10th year of American occupation. Yes, while everyone -- including our leading progressives -- were occupied first with the sight of the orange vulgarian John Boehner waggling the sacred Speaker's gavel then with the latest mass shooting by an American following what George Bush called "the path of action" (i.e., the pursuit of politics by deadly violence) -- the Nobel Peace Laureate was sending 1,400 more troops into the killing fields of Afghanistan.
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War and Terror: General Hypocrisy: Blood on Our Hands?
Monday, August 09 @ 19:31:59 UTC | By Ron Jacobs
August 9, 2010 - counterpunch.org
The hypocrisy is so obvious it's almost not worth mentioning, but when Admiral Mullen stated on July 28, 2010 that Wikileaks founder Julian Assange may "have blood on his hands" because his organization leaked thousands of documents detailing US and NATO atrocities and coverups in Afghanistan I couldn't help but be astounded by Mullen's self-righteous attempt to shift the blame for the murderous debacle in Afghanistan away from the Pentagon and its civilian supporters. Only those who refuse to accept the connection between a doomed policy of Washington in Afghanistan and the soldiers sent to carry it out could deny that it is Mullen, his military cohorts and those who fund them who have blood on their hands, not Assange.
This lot includes Congress and Wall Street, and, unless we do something about it, the people of the United States. The politicians and the military have been given long enough to end the war and occupation of Afghanistan. Indeed, they have been given more than long enough, yet there is no progress. Even if one agrees with the supposed goal of creating some kind of client state in the country, they would have to agree that instead of progress the situation has worsened. For someone who never agreed with Washington's desire to prop up a cooperative regime in Afghanistan, the time to do something to end this war is way past due.
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War and Terror: Afghanistan: a War Correspondent's Viewpoint
Friday, August 06 @ 12:32:11 UTC | A Conversation with Anand Gopal
By Ron Jacobs
August 4, 2010 - counterpunch.org
Anand Gopal is a correspondent who has been covering the war in Afghanistan for several years. He has worked for The Wall Street Journal and The Christian Science Monitor. He is currently working on a book about Afganistan. I met Gopal a couple of years ago and check in with him occasionally to get his viewpoint on the Washington-led occupation and war in South Asia. Most recently, I sent him a few few questions via email. The exchange follows.
--Ron Jacobs
Ron: If you were to compare the situation in Afghanistan in summer 2009 with the current situation, how would you characterize it? For example, is there more fighting or less? Has the nature of the insurgency changed? If so, how?
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War and Terror: Targeted Assassinations: Challenging US Policy
Thursday, August 05 @ 14:03:07 UTC | By Stephen Lendman
August 05, 2010
The WikiLeaks "Afghan War Diaries" provided documented evidence of America's out-of-control lawlessness, including Special Forces death squads (Task Force 373) extrajudicially murdering or capturing suspected Taliban and Al-Qaeda figures, many hundreds or perhaps thousands on a so-called Jpel (joint prioritized effects) list, also willfully killing civilian men, women and children, the London Times Kabul-based Jerome Starkey reporting earlier on these crimes, suppressed in US media accounts, presenting an embedded view of the war, omitting the targeting of Americans until then Director of National Intelligence Dennis C. Blair acknowledged it in February, explaining that:
CIA operatives and Special Forces death squads have been authorized to kill US citizens abroad, suspected of terrorist involvement, Blair saying:
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War and Terror: WikiLeaks "Afghan War Diaries"
Wednesday, July 28 @ 13:58:02 UTC | By Stephen Lendman
July 28, 2010
Calling itself "the intelligence agency of the people," WikiLeaks is "a multi-juristidictional public service designed to protect whistleblowers, journalists and activists who have sensitive material to communicate to the public" that has a right and need to know - to then use responsibly for better government in a free and open society, absent in today's America run by warlords, criminal politicians, and corporate bosses, spurning the rule of law for their own gain.
On July 26, WikiLeaks published "The Afghan War Diaries," its modern day Pentagon Papers, top-secret documents eroding support for the Vietnam War, The New York Times saying they "demonstrated, among other things, that the Johnson Administration had systematically lied, not only to the public but also to Congress, about a subject of transcendent national interest and significance" - what Julian Assange has done on Afghanistan, revealing Bush and Obama administration lies and duplicity about their illegal war of aggression, America's longest. More on that below.
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War and Terror: On the road to defeat in Afghanistan
Saturday, July 17 @ 02:42:52 UTC | By Judith Orr
July 17, 2010 - socialistworker.co.uk
Britain’s role in the Afghan war is in crisis. Commanders are planning to pull troops out of Sangin in Helmand province.
Sangin has seen some of the heaviest loss of life for British soldiers. The politicians and generals are calling it “reconfiguration”, but handing over to the US troops is a recognition of defeat.
At the start of this week 314 British soldiers had died in the war – one third of them in Sangin.
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War and Terror: Echoes of Vietnam: Washington's False Promise in Afghanistan
Thursday, June 17 @ 20:15:41 UTC | By Ron Jacobs
June 17, 2010 - counterpunch.org
One of the predominant rationales put forth by US civilian and military officials regarding the nature of the insurgency categorized as the Taliban in Afghanistan is that their support is derived from coercion. Pronouncements from these officials stating this belief as objective truth are obediently parroted in media reports and repeated by politicians. Yet, according to US Army General McChrystal, there is not enough support among Afghans for his proposed pacification effort in the Kandahar region of Afghanistan. “When you go to protect people, the people have to want you to protect them," are the words McChrystal used when asked about why he was delaying the proposed operation. In other words, the Afghans do not see the US military as its protector and want nothing to do with them and their plans.
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War and Terror: Afghanistan: The Longest Lost War
Wednesday, June 16 @ 23:54:22 UTC | By James Petras
June 16, 2010 - globalresearch.ca
Despite almost a decade of warfare, including an invasion and occupation, the US military and its allies and client state armed forces are losing the war in Afghanistan. Outside of the central districts of a few cities and the military fortresses, the Afghan national resistance forces, in all of their complex local, regional and national alliances, are in control, of territory, people and administration.
The prolonged unending war has become a major drain on the morale of the US armed forces and undermined civilian support in the US, limiting the capacity of the White House to launch new imperial wars. The annual multi-billion dollar military expenditures, are exacerbating the out-of-control budget deficit and forcing harsh unpopular cuts on social programs, at all levels of government. There is no end in sight, as the Obama regime keeps increasing the number of troops by the tens of thousands and military expenditures by the dozens of billions but the resistance advances, both military and politically.
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War and Terror:
Thursday, May 20 @ 18:46:37 UTC | By Ramzy Baroud
May 20, 2010
Clad in his usual attire of a colorful, striped robe, Afghan President Hamid Karazai appeared more like an emperor as he began his fourth day in Washington. Accompanying him on a somber visit to the Arlington National Cemetery were US Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Mike Mullen and top US (and NATO) commander in Afghanistan Stanley A. McChrystal - the very men responsible for the war and occupation of his own country.
The well-choreographed and clearly-rehearsed visit seemed set on giving the impression that the relationship between Karzai and these men was that of an independent, confident leader seeking the support of a benevolent superpower.
But what were Karazai’s real reasons for visiting Washington?
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War and Terror: The Latest Official Report on Afghanistan
Sunday, May 09 @ 00:01:11 UTC | "Progress Toward Security and Stability?"
By Gary Leupp
May 08, 2010 - smirkingchimp.com
If you're trying to explain to friends and family why you oppose the war in Afghanistan, you can find much useful information in the latest "Report on Progress Toward Security and Stability in Afghanistan."
The National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2008 requires that the Defense Department, State Department, Director of National Intelligence, Attorney General, Administrator of the Drug Enforcement Administration, Administrator of the United States Agency for International Development, Secretary of Agriculture, and Secretary of the Treasury all sign off on this "Report on Progress" delivered to the Congress every 180 days.
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War and Terror: The Arrogance of Empire, Detailed
Monday, January 18 @ 08:05:04 UTC | By Ron Jacobs
January 18, 2010 - dissidentvoice.org
In the first week of 2010, five US soldiers were killed in Afghanistan. The last week of 2009 saw the deaths of eight CIA agents there. Several more Afghan civilians were killed during this period, including the apparent executions of several young boys by persons either in the US military or working with them. In addition, insurgent forces targeted a Karzai government in official in eastern Khost and launched rockets at the site of a future US consulate in Herat. It was reported on January 6, 2010 that the Obama administration was sending 1,000 more US civilian experts to the country to help in so-called reconstruction projects. This news was greeted with skepticism from Afghans both in and out of the government. The Afghan ambassador to the United Nations noted that few Afghans trusted these so-called reconstruction endeavors and that the US might do better if they hired Afghans to do the rebuilding instead of shipping in US citizens to “create parallel structures that would ruin (the Afghan government’s) efforts.” The ambassador must be quite aware that the history of US reconstruction in either Afghanistan or Iraqis is a legacy of corruption, poor construction, and failed endeavors that benefited no one but the foreign companies that garnered the contracts.
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War and Terror: Are US Forces Executing Kids in Afghanistan?
Monday, January 04 @ 19:27:37 UTC | Americans Don't Even Know to Ask
By Dave Lindorff
January 04, 2010 - thiscantbehappening.net
The Taliban suicide attack that killed a group of CIA agents in Afghanistan on a base that was directing US drone aircraft used to attack Taliban leaders was big news in the US over the past week, with the airwaves and front pages filled with sympathetic stories referring to the fact that the female station chief, who was among those killed, was the “mother of three children.”
But the apparent mass murder of Afghan school children, including one as young as 11 years old, by a US-led group of troops, was pretty much blacked out in the American media. Especially blacked out was word from UN investigators that the students had not just been killed but executed, many of them after having first been rousted from their bedroom and handcuffed.
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