Defeat a "real possibility" in Afghanistan: Ashdown

[bemildred]

Source: Reuters Canada

LONDON (Reuters) - NATO is in disarray and the West faces defeat in Afghanistan unless it overhauls its counter-insurgency and reconstruction strategy, Britain's Paddy Ashdown wrote in an article published on Wednesday.

Ashdown, who was rejected last month by Afghan President Hamid Karzai for the post of senior U.N. envoy to the country, called in the Financial Times for renewed efforts to win Taliban moderates away from the insurgency.

"With fighting in Afghanistan now entering its seventh year, no agreed international strategy, public support on both sides of the Atlantic crumbling, NATO in disarray and widening insecurity in Afghanistan, defeat is now a real possibility...

"We have not lost in Afghanistan ... But we will lose if we do not start doing things differently," he warned.

Read more: http://ca.reuters.com/article/topNews/idCAL1388095920080213?rpc=401

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Defeat was always the way to bet, Paddy.

[msongs]

1. Once again Bush proves to be a failure at everthing he does - this time Poppy cannot save him nt

[Alcibiades]

2. Thinking like this is why the terrorists win!

So long as we think we are winning, and will win, we will win! Facts that don't support this conclusion are simply treasonous. Waterboard Paddy Ashdown!

[bemildred]

4. Or it we still think we are winning, then we don't think we are losers yet. nt

[Alcibiades]

5. Or if we think we've already won

we can just have everyone pack their bags and come home.

[Xipe Totec]

3. A little bit of historical perspective

Like the Mongol minority, many, if not most, rural Pashtuns are long distance migrants. They are called Koochis -- a Turkish word meaning people who migrate long distances back and forth.

If America starts a massive attack on Afghanistan to punish and overthrow the Taliban, chances are that armed Koochis will start a massive, long-distance migration south into Pakistan. This alone could easily destabilize the entire subcontinent much as what the great conqueror Babur and his armies did when they moved south from Afghanistan to found the great Mogul Dynasty in India in the 1500s.

- Franz Schurmann, September 28, 2001

http://www.uscrusade.com/usterror/280920015.htm

[GliderGuider]

6. and that * arselicker Stephen Harper wants us there 'till at least 2011

And Stephane Dion (leader of the Liberal Party and Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition) is looking for sloppy seconds.

Liberal `compromise' is really a retreat to Harper's position

Until yesterday, Dion had been demanding that the government end Canada's current combat role in Kandahar by February 2009. Now, like Harper, the Liberals say Canadian troops should remain there until 2011.

[coalition_unwilling]

7. News flash: "We" have already "lost" in Afghanistan (whatever

the 'we' and 'lost' mean). We have failed to achieve our strategic objectives, Taliban now controls vast swaths of Afghan territory, opium production near all-time highs, Karzai not much more than (heavily protected by mercenaries) mayor of Kabul.

It's now more a question of how much suffering we will inflict on the Afghan population and how many more casualties we and NATO will experience.

When the Taliban tried to surrender at Mazar-e-Sharif, they were massacred by goons affiliated with Dostum's faction of the Northern Alliance. So is it any wonder that they are resisting? (N.B. You only "win" when the other side lays down its arms. You don't win when the other side retreats back into the hillsides whence it came to live to fight another day. That's actually a textbook definition of an "irredentist" war.)

[cliss]

8. Help me out here ~

why are we in Afghanistan?

I forgot.
We're spending ~ how much?
We're battling ~ who again?

[whosinpower]

9. I remember

"We" are in afghanistan because the taliban(who were in power at that time) refused to give up Osama bin forgotten.

Shortly after the US invaded - George turned his oil greedy eyes over to Iraq....got NATO involved....and essentially pulled out to fight the oil war. "WE" being the NATO allies are over there right now trying to clean up the mess that George started and ultimately decided that Osama really wasn't that important after all. Funny how oil clouds the eyes......