Afghanistan nightmare

Lord, remember your children in Afghanistan!

The mass murder of 16 people, including 9 children, by a staff sergeant from Fort Lewis is a vision from hell. Initial reports are that the victims were killed in their beds or execution style.  A 2 year-old child is among the dead.

The vision is made all the more appalling in how it illuminates the chasm between US policy and reality in Afghanistan.  There is no purpose to our presence there.  Any purpose we may have had was swallowed up  years ago by the savagery, the cruelty.  As John Gardner wrote in Jason and Medeia:  "War proves itself."

We chose war over law enforcement in our response to 911.  One decade later, the horror continues to grow. 

The perpetrator of the crime must, of course, be prosecuted with the full weight of the law. That is, if we choose to maintain that we are a nation of laws.  If we can't control our military, why bother to keep up the pretense?

It is possible that this latest atrocity, committed by the staff sergeant from Fort Lewis could be one of those catalytic historical phenomena that change everything.  A single grain pushed off the weighting platform of a delicately balanced scale.  Beam forsakes equilibrium.  World tilts.  Maybe. 

Regardless, these 11 years have brought horrors and suffering far beyond anything we were led to expect by war's advocates.  Are we any wiser for it?

Afghanistan: Item #1 of the Bush legacy

 Old boss, new boss, yadda, yadda, yadda

About 9 months ago, I speculated that the war in Afghanistan was lost.  Well, here we are, 9 months later, with another 506 deaths among coalition forces, and an unspecified number of Afghanistan civilians (estimates are over 2000 this year alone) to add to the tally.  Beyond that, nothing has changed.

And again, even with the BP Oil Disaster still devastating our homeland, Afghanistan is thrust to the front of the national awareness.  It's like a terrible chronic disease that we can almost forget about for a little while, until the next crisis occurs.

Obama sacks McChrystal

Just today, President Obama sacked General Stanley McChrystal, the US Afghan commander, because of the general's exceedingly poor judgment.  (Read the explosive article by Michael Hastings:  The Runaway General.)  McChrystal will be replaced by General David Petraeus, the man who some say salvaged the Iraq effort.  

This is certainly not the first time that General McChrystal has been in trouble with his superiors.  Recall that, last year, General McChrystal conducted an Afghanistan policy review for Defense Secretary Robert Gates, in which the general called for an increase of 40,000 troops.  Somehow, McChrystal's report was leaked to the press, raising the suspicion in some quarters that McChrystal was trying to bully President Obama into agreeing to the general's terms.

So, given General McChrystal's record, we can dismiss him as just another general who has trouble understanding the chain of command.  History is full of them.

What worries me, believe it or not, is the way the Republicans are reacting to this news.  Or rather, the way they are not reacting to it.  They have shown uncharacteristic decorum, refraining from criticizing the President's handling of the situation.

That can mean only one thing:  even Republicans know that we're stuck in a very bad, very dangerous war.  And no one can see a way out.

What now?

As General Petraeus assumes command, questions about policy and strategy are reopened.   The July 2011 deadline that President Obama set for withdrawal from Afghanistan looms.

It is clear that we will achieve nothing in that time.  Nothing, that is, beyond more deaths, more wasted billions, more devastation.

If the inertia of bureaucracy will not allow for anything sooner, then let this next year pass quickly.  We've got to get out.  We're only making things worse by staying. 

And let me just repeat what I said 9 months ago:

Junior Bush in his cavalier, aristocratic way, started this war the way he did everything in his life: half-assed, and with no personal, emotional, or financial risk of repercussions. And, just as with Harken Energy, the Texas Rangers, and the State of Texas, the Idiot Prince  f*cked it up, royally.

Thanks again, Junior.

Please shut your face!

Shut up, Jeb

From Firedog Lake:

For months now, Jeb Bush has been listening as President Obama blasts his older brother’s administration for the battered economy, budget deficits and even the lax oversight of oil wells.

“It’s kind of like a kid coming to school saying, ‘The dog ate my homework,’ ” Mr. Bush, this state’s former governor, said over lunch last week at the Biltmore Hotel. “It’s childish. This is what children do until they mature. They don’t accept responsibility.”

Childish, you say?  Well, Jeb, since I know you speak Spanish quite well: ¡Yo cago en la leche de su hermano!  I have no patience for anyone who holds that the Bush administration, led by vile Dick Cheney, was anything other than an unmitigated disaster for this country.  For humanity!  And your mealy-mouthed effort at rehabilitation makes me want to vomit!

What are these Taliban?

What are we up against in Afghanistan?  What are these Taliban?

On Wednesday, December 30th, 2009, a man, reportedly wearing an Afghan National Army uniform detonated an explosive device concealed on his person at Forward Operating Base Chapman, a CIA counter-terrorism hub in the Khost region of Afghanistan.  Seven persons were killed and six wounded.  The dead included CIA officers, contractors, and the Agency's base chief.  CIA officers have described the attack as "devastating."

According to reports, Chapman base focuses on infiltration.  That is, they work on "turning people," acquiring informants, infiltrating enemy networks.  The bomber is thought to have been a double-agent. He was a person whom the CIA thought they had "flipped."

On MSNBC's Morning Joe, host Joe Scarborough said that, the way he heard it, the bomber had contacted the Agency, communicating that he had urgent information and needed to meet with them immediately.  His communication was so convincing, and he was held in such trust, that the base chief and other high-placed officers wanted to be on-hand for the briefing.

And then, disaster.

When one reflects on the significance of the event, one is compelled to pause for a befuddled moment and wonder just what in hell we are up against in Afghanistan.

This monstrous attack conjures dark thoughts and images.  Dwell for a moment on the evolution of reasoning and emotions that must have occurred in the mind of the bomber.  He carefully and skillfully deceives experienced CIA officers trained (I assume) to be wary and suspicious.  Using the utmost caution and care, he constructs an elaborate ruse that must certainly have been the endeavor of many months.  He so completely wins the trust of the CIA that he is brought into the presence of the base chief and high level staff without being subjected to a personal search.

And now, imagine those final seconds before the detonation.  Did the bomber shout something?  Did the victims become aware of the deception before they died?  What final acts of desperation and heroism occurred in that room in that instant?

These are horrible contemplations.

This terrible act was a message from the Taliban.  "We are unbowed and unbroken.  We are fanatic in our determination.  We can get to you."  And also this:  "We cannot be 'flipped.'"

I am utterly at a loss as to what to do in the face of such savagery.  If the United States withdraws from Afghanistan, we unleash these Taliban on the long-suffering Afghan people.  If we escalate, we are drawn deeper into a conflict that has the potential to bankrupt our country and ignite a full-scale world war in which every country on the face of this Earth is forced to choose sides.

President Obama gave us some straight talk last month in his Afghanistan speech.  His remarks were stark and sober.  With the bombing at Forward Operating Base Chapman, the Taliban makes its rebuttal.

Defeat in Afghanistan: Another colossal Bush failure

Buried under the tragicomic inanity of the health care debate, there is yet another colossal f**k up endowed upon us by President Junior. Careful examination of the political maneuvering this last week reveals one fact, rather starkly: the war in Afghanistan is lost.

The politics

According to the White House, President Obama is considering an increase in troop levels there. But he is meeting resistance from a corner that casual political observers might find surprising: Congressional Democrats.


Senator Carl Levin (D-MI), Chairman of the Senate Defense Committee, sounded a little less than enthusiastic about a "surge."

"We should increase and accelerate our efforts to support the Afghan security forces in their efforts to become self-sufficient in delivering security to their nation -- before we consider whether to increase US combat forces above the levels already planned for the next few months," said Levin, who returned last week from a trip to Afghanistan.

And this, from Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the House:

"I don't think there's a great deal of support for sending more troops to Afghanistan in the country or in the Congress."

This, I believe, is what might be called "retreat under cover."

The Democrats (both Congress and the White House) are handling this with amazing and uncharacteristic skill. Congressional leaders call for a lessening commitment (leading, ultimately, to complete withdrawal), while the President appears to support a renewed commitment. No one can then accuse the President of lacking the moxie to continue the fight, and the burden of selling an escalation falls to Republicans. The end result is that the GOP must either continue to carry Bush's dismal failure into the mid-term elections, or tacitly admit that the whole thing was a criminal (and I do mean "criminal") mistake. (Let's see if Big Dick shoots his mouth off this time.)

The Republicans, for their part, seem to recognize that Dick and Junior's Most Excellent Adventure is a bad political investment. They're treating the idea of increased commitment like the hot potato it is. Angry Senator John McCain (R-AZ) seemed none-too-eager to grab it. From Bloomberg:

Senator John McCain, the ranking Republican on the Armed Services panel who also met McChrystal in Afghanistan, said he would support an appeal for additional U.S. forces. McCain, an Arizona Republican, said in an interview he expects the request to be “substantial” and “controversial.”

That's not exactly a quote made for prime time television.

"I'll get you back for this, Boehner. Some day..."

And here's what House Minority Whip Eric Cantor (R-VA) had to say:

"I also applaud the President for his continued support for the War in Afghanistan and for his commitment to provide the men and women in uniform, and the generals on the battlefields, the necessary resources to achieve victory." (Read the whole thing here.)

Cantor's position is amusing. With the GOP base all whipped into a frothing fit of histrionics over the health care debate, he must still extend praise to the man whom the Scream Machine has all but labeled the Enemy of Mankind, President Obama. (What do you want to bet Minority Leader John Boehner pulled rank on ol' Eric? Can't you just see it? Boehner well into his 5th apple martini of the evening, slouches over on the bar stool and slurs, "Well, Eric, old boy, that's the Whip's job... looking like an assh**e, so I don't have to.")

Where we are today

In any case, after 7 years of war in Afghanistan, our presence there has produced neither political stability (there are wide-spread reports that the recent elections there were rigged in favor of Bush lackey, Hamid Karzai), nor military success (casualties are on the rise, and military leadership are raising alarms).

You'd think we would have learned

A renewed commitment expects too much of the war weary American public, not to mention enormously burdened US military personnel, many of whom have been summoned for three and four tours in Iraq or Afghanistan.

Further, all indications are that any further requests made of our NATO allies, who after all, have already done what might reasonably be expected, would get "lost in translation."

Thank you, Junior

Junior Bush in his cavalier, aristocratic way, started this war the way he did everything in his life: half-assed, and with no personal, emotional, or financial risk of repercussions. And, just as with Harken Energy, the Texas Rangers, and the State of Texas, the Idiot Prince f**ked it up, royally.

Million laughs, eh, Junior?

Remember early in the war, when the Taliban was in retreat, and the news wires were full of speculation that the US military had al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden holed up in Tora Bora? That may well have been the decisive moment of the war. A full scale offensive at that moment might have actually bagged bin Laden and much, if not all, of the al Qaeda leadership.

But, of course, there would have been significant US military casualties. And Junior and Cheney didn't want to spend that kind of political capital on this Afghanistan sideshow. They had something much bigger in the works and they didn't want to dull the American public's appetite for war with reports and images of American service personnel killed in action. So they bid the job out to rival Afghan tribesmen, who, truth be told, had probably cut their own deal with bin Laden. Net result? Al Qaeda survives, but more importantly (from Junior's perspective) so does the "war mentality" of the American public which Junior needed for his Iraq adventure.

Now, 7 years later, President Obama and all of us are left holding the bag. We've got a daunting mess to pay for. And we will pay in treasure and blood long after we withdraw. Suicide rates are exploding in the US military. Countless thousand of lives, American, Afghan, and others, have ended. Families are breaking apart. Between the myriad demographic and social factions of this country, vitriol and bitter recrimination are the stock-in-trade.

And that, for all you teabag monkeys out there, is what becomes of your "Support the Troops" bumper stickers.