The other war, Karzai and ("esteemed") Mullah Omar

[ProSense]

December 6, 2001:

Q Ari, what's your understanding of the deal that's been struck to hand over Kandahar? And is it acceptable to the President to allow Mullah Omar to stay in Kandahar and live under the protection of the local authorities?

MR. FLEISCHER: Secretary Rumsfeld just concluded a briefing in which he addressed that question. I have nothing to add, beyond what the Secretary said. The situation on the ground remains fluid. As for Mullah Omar, the President has made it plain that those who harbor terrorists need to be brought to justice. That statement directly applies to Mullah Omar.

December 9, 2001:

CHENEY: The people of Afghanistan feel a great sense of liberation, having the opportunity to get out from under the heavy hand of the Taliban.

And at the same time I think there's a real sense of outrage on the part of many Afghans about what Mullah Omar and Osama bin Laden brought down on the heads of the Afghan people.

The fact that they did become a sanctuary for terrorist, of course, has been devastating from the standpoint of what we've had to do to go rout them out. And they blame Mullah Omar and Osama bin Laden for that. So they're eager to wrap them up.

RUSSERT: If either are captured alive, we will insist that they be turned over to the American authorities?

CHENEY: Yes.

RUSSERT: No international court?

CHENEY: No. We made it very clear we want Osama bin Laden and Mullah Omar and their senior leadership. And if they're taken alive we expect to take custody of them.

Six Years Later:

Karzai offers Taliban government office

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) - President Hamid Karzai offered Saturday to meet personally with Taliban leader Mullah Omar for peace talks and give the militants a high position in a government ministry as a way to end the rising insurgency in Afghanistan.

Update (the next day, 9/30), just so we're clear on how completely and utterly the war in Afghanistan has been lost:

After the president of Afghanistan begs this terrorist leader, hat in hand, to please accept a role in the government, he is turned down:

Taliban reject overture from Afghanistan's government

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (AP) - The Taliban will "never" negotiate with the Afghan authorities until U.S. and NATO forces leave the country, a spokesman for the group said Sunday, again rebuffing an overture for peace talks from President Hamid Karzai.

Karzai had said Saturday that he would be willing to meet personally with the Taliban leader, Mullah Omar, and give militants a position in the government in exchange for peace.

"If I find their address, there is no need for them to come to me, I'll personally go there and get in touch with them," Karzai said. "Esteemed Mullah, sir, and esteemed Hekmatyar, sir, why are you destroying the country?" he said...

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[Solly Mack]

1. amazing

[babylonsister]

2. Recommend! nt

[blm]

3. Thanks, Pro. You deserve a permanent position on Greatest Page for your

powerful posts.

[scarletwoman]

4. I think the U.S. and NATO forces SHOULD get out of Afghanistan. Karzai & the Taliban need to be able

to talk, it's criminally stupid to just keep dropping bombs on people expecting that things will some day magically work out. Death and chaos do not lead to good outcomes. Get the foreign occupiers out and let the Afghan people chart their own course.

sw

[sandnsea]

6. No that is just wrong

The Taliban harbored the terrorists who attacked us, we have every right to be there. We should end the war in Iraq, put the troops in Afghansitan, get that country turned around. Fighting Taliban extremists is no different than fighting Nazi extremists.

[scarletwoman]

8. Bullshit. The Taliban even offered to take Bin Laden into custody after 9/11.

All they asked for was to be given the evidence against him -- the famous "White Paper" that Secretary of State Colin Powell had promised would be provided within weeks. (which never happened, of course -- he was put in his place right quick after that foolish outburst)

The Taliban have their own agenda that has nothing to do with Bin Laden, they simply want what any insurgency wants, political power in their own country.

And excuse me, but Taliban=Nazis, wtf??? That's just plain idiotic -- not to mention, a gross violation of Godwin's Law.

We have no "right" to be there whatsoever. We blew the capture of Bin Laden when we had the chance. Al Qaeda has become a worldwide brand name & franchise that can be claimed by any group of hotheads wanting to blow up shit in whatever country they happen to be in. So hanging around Afghanistan, firing missiles into mud huts, makes no sense whatsoever, those old training camps are long gone.

We're only there as part of the global resource war.

sw

[ProSense]

9. Well, here is the problem:

Karzai can't have it both ways. If he wants the U.S. to leave, then ask them to leave!

U.S., Taliban bargained over bin Laden, documents show

Taliban Won't Hand Over Bin Laden

Taliban official says Osama bin Laden is alive

They can still hand him over!

[scarletwoman]

10. Yes, if Karzai wants the U.S. to leave, he must ask , & I posted my opinion that it was a good idea.

He probably won't ask, unfortunately, because he knows we won't leave if asked, anyway. The Empire has his balls in a vice.

And no, the Taliban can't hand Bin Laden over because they don't have him, it's not 2001 anymore. Besides, we never took up our side of the bargain they offered.

sw

[sandnsea]

14. Well you believe the Taliban

I really don't have anything to say to people who believe the Taliban.

In the current capacity, we aren't succeeding in doing anything constructive because we have an idiot in charge. That is completely different than not having a mission in Afghanistan, if we had a President who had an effective strategy in carrying that mission out. Which should be enough troops to create stability and a real rebuilding effort, which should have been done by now, if we'd had competent leadership. Yes, THIS bunch is only there as part of the oil war - but that isn't the same thing as saying any US President would do the same.

[scarletwoman]

16. It has nothing to do with "believing" the Taliban! You're throwing up a red herring.

As long as Afghanistan is occupied by foreign forces, it will be impossible for the Afghan people to put their own society back together.

Karzai SHOULD meet with the Taliban and get some negotiations going, the people of Afghanistan could really use some peace -- and peace is never going to come from foreign soldiers dropping bombs on villages.

sw

[sandnsea]

17. You want to negotiate with them

No red herring. It's what you believe. No, we shouldn't be dropping bombs. It is possible to support a smarter policy without turning chunks of the country over to the likes of the Taliban, or continue to enable the war lords in others.

[scarletwoman]

18. No, I didn't say that *I* want to negotiate w/ the Taliban, I said that KARZAI trying to negotiate

with them was a good idea, in my opinion. They are HIS countrymen, after all, they are going to somehow have to be included at some point. What's Karzai's alternative, genocide of the Pashtuns?

I mean, I realize that the very notion -- that governments of supposedly sovereign states should pursue negotiations with different political factions within their country as they see -- is utterly abhorrent to imperialists and their apologists.

Too bad.

I think it is unacceptably paternalistic and white supremacist to assume that the inheritors of an ancient nation, who have fought off one invasion after another throughout their long history, are incapable of looking out for their own affairs if given the actual space to do so.

sw

[sandnsea]

20. It's the same thing

The alternative is a policy that supports Karzai in getting rid of the Taliban and the warlords, which would be doable if we'd get out of Iraq. You don't support a worse policy just because the current one is bad.

[scarletwoman]

22. You can't "get rid of" people in their own country!

The warlords are already elected members of Parliament and the Cabinet, you can't "get rid of" them. The Taliban are part of the Pashtun tribe, one of the largest ethnic groups in Afghanistan, you can't "get rid of" them without a major ethnic cleansing.

They are all competing factions fighting for power within their own country. They'll either all keep fighting whether we're there or not, or they'll work on some form of power sharing.

It's not up to us, it's up to them.

sw

[sandnsea]

25. You can defeat them

until they give up their oppressive ideologies. Some things are worth fighting for. Sadly, the Bushies were more interested in the pipeline than the people. That's why there isn't any real effort to make political change in Afghanistan, and that's why there won't be with Hillary either. There wasn't with Clinton, there isn't with Bush, because these people only care about globalization which means control of oil and the distribution of oil.

But that's no reason to pretend these warlords and Taliban have a legitimate place in any decent society or government. They don't.

[scarletwoman]

26. Fine. Have it your way. Exterminate the brutes! All hail Colonel Kurtz!

[sandnsea]

27. Yeah that's just what I said

:crazy: I guess you will have to go sit in the corner and debate yourself because that's not what I said.

[eridani]

28. Why do you think it would be doable?

The only reason we have any support in Afghanistan at all is because our numerical presence isn't that great. Change that, and step up our numbers and the high collateral damage methods we are using in Iraq, and Afghanistan can change only for the worse.

[sandnsea]

30. Because there is international support

And their people do not like living under the extremists' rule. This has been a nightmare for them for decades, they would like it to change. Our presence wouldn't be a problem if we would do the right thing by the Afghani people, instead of letting the oil robbers and globalists have free rein. Many Afghanis remember what their country was like before the fundamentalists took it over, they want that back. Just because Bush opposes the Taliban, it doesn't make the Taliban good.

[eridani]

31. The whole point of invading Iraq and Afghanistan--

--was precisely to let oil robbers and globalists have free reign. The US is currently waging an air war against civilians in Afghanistan, which they hate even more than the Taliban.

[sandnsea]

32. Well, no, that's not true

not for the majority of Americans. Afghanistan was about oil only for the Bush cabal. That isn't to say a President with the right policies and motivations couldn't make all the difference in that country, and if we get a President like that, we should be supportive.

[eridani]

34. I don't believe in social work at gunpoint

It is based on bullshit premises. We have been fucking with Afghanistan since 1979, entirely to their detriment. Why would any native trust the intentions of the country that inflicted the fundies on them in the first place? We have treated them like pawns and like disposable human garbage for 30 years, and all front running candidates are firm believers in imperialism and continued US military dominance, so why should anything change with a Democrat in office? People to people actions supporting NGOs like RAWA and others would be far more productive IMO.

[sandnsea]

36. RAWA opposes warlords and the Taliban too

They want them out of their government. We don't have to abandon RAWA and the Afghan people in order to change the military strategy in Afghanistan. Obama has spoken to the shame of doing nothing but dropping bombs in that country, it isn't true all Democrats are the same. Reflexively opposing anything the US does is not a foreign policy and is really not even critical objective thinking. It's just as mindless as the Bushbots rah rah USA #1 crowd.

[eridani]

37. I don't get why you think that the US military can help RAWA and similar groups

The US foreign policy establishment has no other plans for poor countries besides economic domination and further impoverishment, or being blown to smithereens if its citizens don't get with the program. Our current ambassador to Iraq (formerly ambassador to Afghanistan) wrote editorials in 1996 about how the Taliban would provide "stability" and was therefore not nearly as bad as those Shi'ite fundies in Iran. Turning on a dime and starting to shed crocodile tears for women's oppression has not changed our elite's goals for Afghanistan or any other poor country in the slightest.

RAWA and other indigenous anti-Taliban resistance groups begged us not to back the Northern Alliance and bomb the shit out of whatever infrastructure Afghanistan still had in 2001, and were totally ignored. The 2002 Loya Jirga strongly favored the former king instead of oil company shill Karzai, and were told to go straight to hell. What makes you think that our policy towards them will change now?

Imperial domination of the rest of the world by military force is an utterly evil project, and I don't get why you persist in trying to put lipstick on this pig. True, not all Democrats are the same. Kucinich opposes the imperial project and says so publicly, which is exactly why he is "unelectable". There is no other rational response but to oppose US foreign policy, period. That will change when we have leadership in place that intends to do away with that policy and backs it up with meaningful action. Let me know when you notice anything of the sort.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

35. "we have every right to be there."

So you support an invasion of Pakistan?

[sandnsea]

5. *sigh*

And Khan walks free too. What a colossal disaster of a Presidency.

[acmavm]

7. Another war that we can't win. And Putin told the bush** admin that.

Maybe we had a chance, I don't know. But the clowns in the bush** administration didn't care. They wanted the oil.

[Disturbed]

13. Can the Busholini Regime overcome the History of Afghanistan?

Afghanistan has never been conquered by any foreign invaders.

Two books on this topic are vital to understanding.

"Imperial Hubris" & "See NO Evil"

Karazi should insist that all the Foreign Occupiers exit Afghanistan within three months.I have no love for the Taleban but the Afghan people need to forge their own destiny.

If the US Regime were serious about their War On Terror they would take that War to al Q in Pakistan. To Hell with Musharef.

[KharmaTrain]

11. Total Frustration

Not long ago, I met a veteran...served in both Iraq and Afghanistan and he said that no matter how terrible a loss in Iraq will (he said will) be, a loss in Afghanistan would be a real slap in the face...a complete squandered venture that will demoralize the military and embolden other religious movements in the Arab world. It also will be a signal to American's remaining allies that we talk the game, but sure don't know how to play it.

Many of us supported actions in Afghanistan in the wake of 9/11 specifically to close down or destroy Al Queda camps and the Taliban. Moreso, according to this vet, most Afghan people were behind us...they wanted the Taliban gone and were ready to accept Karzai. That's all gone now as the "Mayor of Kabul" never delivered on promises, warlords divided the country and our military's folly in Iraq gave the Taliban both the breathing space and local support that could easily lead to Mullah Omar taking power...again.

This is a desperate attempt on Karzai's part to prevent a total meltdown of what remains of his limited authority. But all the corporate media cares about is another war with Iran. Reading and watching Sy Hersch today, it's not a matter of if, but when this country will escalate this mess into Iran and who knows who else will then decide to get involved...like the Turks invading Kurdistan or revolts in other "friendly" Arab countries.

Words just can't express the frustration I have about how this regime has destroyed this country inside and out...and except for those of us who keep up on our own to get this information, most Americans don't give a shit. They'd be more upset if Notre Dame starts out 0-5 than if Afghanistan becomes a repressive theocracy.

[blm]

12. Another reason why the 2004 nominee was right - fighting terror SHOULD be a law enforcement

issue with a specially trained military unit that comes in only after the cells are located and pinned.

But, hey, bombs cost alot more and need continual replacement bombs.

[Disturbed]

15. Isn't it real goddamn obvious that Iraq & Afghanistan are targets

of garnering resources such as oil, natural gas & water? The War On Terror is a smokescreen covering over the real situation of the Busholini Regime & their Multi-Corp backers to dominate the ME.

[alfredo]

19. The PNAC "Rebuilding America's Defenses" spells it out.

[blm]

21. It is to some of us. War on Terror has just become another on of their marketing ploys.

.

[scarletwoman]

23. The "War on Terror" is just a masquerade for the REAL war: The Resource War. (nt)

[blm]

24. Global fascism.

Resources will be the treasures they control - Guarani Aquifer, anyone?

And Enron was in Pakistan and India trying to sew up control of their water sources when they became exposed.

[Disturbed]

29. Karazi the Mayor of Kabul would last a couple of days if

The US & NATO Forces withdrew from Afghanistan. He is a westernized Afghani that most in his country
do not respect. They know that he is a puppet of the US Regime that will sell out his people for
that pipeline to transfer their natural gas out of their lands. Millions of Afghans are still out of the country that has been at war for well over 20 years. It will probably be another 20 years until the West finally gives up and allows the Afghans to determine their own future.

[candymarl]

33. About those Warlords

They were US allies when the whole thing started. I saw a BBC documentary about that.
Then they switched sides. I wonder why? There's a story for an enterprising journalist.