Tag: Afghanistan

 This just came up on McClatchy.  Because of the outcome of the November 2, 2010 election, with the new Republican House majority,  there is now less pressure on President Obama to stick to his earlier pledge of beginning a troop withdrawal timeline of July 2011 in Afghanistan. This December was supposed to be the month for the big “review” of the ongoing military operations (and the Pentagon budget was supposed to be passed before the pre election campaign break and the lame duck session, and that didn’t happen, either) and now it will be a smaller review – ‘with no major changes in strategy.”  Other than those American troop withdrawals will be delayed at least until 2014.  Remember when a few weeks ago the military said the Afghan transitional stuff was going better than expected?  Wrong narrative when you’re on the international arms sales circuit.

NATO’s spent 19.4 billion on “training” Afghans in the past 7 years.  What is the current message for the NATO meeting on Nov 18 in Lisbon ?   send more trainers. “No trainers, no transition.”  

The only thing McClatchy didn’t mention was that the Taliban and assorted terrorists and homegrown guerrilla combatants traditionally take the winter off in Afghanistan.

And of course, they’re trying to blame Pakistan.  You could see this coming a mile down the road. Why would Pakistan wish to interrupt the gravy train of having a foreign country “fighting” your pesky terrorists and selling intelligence to it ?  The earlier 2011 date, claims a Pentagon advisor in the story, had Pakistan trying to negotiate a “political settlement instead of military action.”

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/201…

“This administration now understands that it cannot shift Pakistani approaches to safeguarding its interests in Afghanistan with this date being perceived as a walk-away date,” the adviser said.

And of course, everyone was speaking anonymously.  There is now no timeline, nor will Gen. David Petraeus being doing one of his publicity tours, er, testimonies before Congress in December, the way he was all last spring and summer before the latest Afghanistan/Pakistan offensive.

Whoops. Did I say Pakistan.

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A short but good article pointing out two extremely important issues Not being talked about during this campaign cycle especially by those getting the most press {and their very own 24/7 cable channel hyping them}, the so called Mad electorate calling themselves the TEA party. Many, or most, are from the same that brought us these two long running occupations and are supporting those seeking representative jobs from the same political party with no ideology but quickly rubber stamped the credit card of dept and already have stated they won’t Work for the Country, in no way to compromise but to raise the obstruction within!

Veterans know the benefits of conserving fuel

This comment by Angle, caught it last night on CBS and my head nearly exploded, shows Exactly what she thinks? about the Soldiers we’re sending into these occupations and their families at home waiting, which in turn shows what she, and (R)’s, especially this phony TEA party, think? about us Veterans, All Veterans, as well as National Security!!!!!

Like clockwork in being timed with the latest wikileaks release:

After increasing the number of drone attacks in September, now the US is pressuring Pakistan to let in more covert paramilitary and CIA forces to increase the unknown, classified number that are already there – to support the death by drones program that is killing an unknown number of militants and civilians.  The story in the WSJ also says that Pakistan’s Inter – Services Intelligence agency, ISI, is currently doing most of the intelligence gathering and that CIA chief Leon Panetta has called them “very cooperative.”

Wall Street Journal:

http://online.wsj.com/article/…

The Obama administration has been ramping up pressure on Islamabad in recent weeks to attack militants after months of publicly praising Pakistani efforts. The CIA has intensified drone strikes in Pakistan, and the military in Afghanistan has carried out cross-border helicopter raids, underlining U.S. doubts Islamabad can be relied upon to be more aggressive. Officials have even said they were going to stop asking for Pakistani help with the U.S.’s most difficult adversary in the region, the North Waziristan-based Haqqani network, because it was unproductive.

Pakistani officials believe the CIA is better able to keep details of its operations largely out of the public eye, although the agency’s drone program has received widespread attention and is enormously unpopular with the Pakistani public.

U.S. military forces on the ground remain a red line for Islamabad. A senior Pakistani official said if the Pakistan public became aware of U.S. military forces conducting combat operations on Pakistani territory, it would wipe out popular support for fighting the militants in the tribal areas. Whether covert CIA forces would cross that line however, remains an open question.

Back in July, the public relationship wasn’t so cozy.

HuffPo, 7/6/10

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/…

…. but the US – Pakistan relationship is at the heart of Washington’s counterterrorism efforts.

But the CIA became so concerned by a rash of cases involving suspected double agents in 2009, it re-examined the spies it had on the payroll in the Afghanistan-Pakistan region. The internal investigation revealed about a dozen double agents, stretching back several years. Most of them were being run by Pakistan. Other cases were deemed suspicious. The CIA determined the efforts were part of an official offensive counterintelligence program being run by Gen. Ahmed Shuja Pasha, the ISI’s spy chief.

Recruiting agents to track down and kill terrorists and militants is a top priority for the CIA, and one of the clandestine service’s greatest challenges. The drones can’t hit their targets without help finding them. Such efforts would be impossible without Pakistan’s blessing, and the U.S. pays about $3 billion a year in military and economic aid to keep the country stable and cooperative.

Pakistan has its own worries about the Americans. During the first term of the Bush administration, Pakistan became enraged after it shared intelligence with the U.S., only to learn the CIA station chief passed that information to the British. The incident caused a serious row, one that threatened the CIA’s relationship with the ISI and deepened the levels of distrust between the two sides. Pakistan almost threw the CIA station chief out of the country.

July 2010 – HuffPo says 8 years after the war in Afghanistan, a very poor and not very large country, was not going so well, the Obama administration finally became “concerned” about their intelligence partners in the region.   Three months after the first batch of wikileaks were released,  April 5, 2010.    

Yesterday I received an e-mail from the Communications Director of the House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs, Kristal DeKleer. Thank you Kristal for sending this out to the e-mail list, will be passing the information on as I’m sure others will as well.

Also yesterday I used the following in a few posts as related to recent Veterans Administration press releases:

Let me tell ya folks, if the so called repubs, still haven’t met one true one in a couple of decades, pick up Any Seats let alone take the House what Shinseki and his Great Admin have been doin will come to a Screeching Halt on many and curtailed on others! This is the Most Pro Active VA in my lifetime!

When they’ve had to re-act, what with trying to move everything into the 21st century as well as catch up to What Wasn’t Done Nor Mentioned As Two More Wars Were Waged, they’ve been Spot On and Quick, pretty much getting up to speed in a very short time span or getting rid of the contractors holding it back and bringing in new!

And I would suggest, strongly, that any and all Democratic Candidates running in this election download, print out, study them and start using the points made as this Op-Ed is suggesting as to the lack of mention in this election cycle.

From CNN, Your Most Trusted News Source:  

The October Surprise

Anonymous NATO Spokesperson Upgrades Osama Bin Laden From Cave To House in Pakistan, Getting a Jump on the Latest Wikileaks Which Will Show He’s Working at al- Zawahiri’s International House of Naancakes

Kabul, Afghanistan, CNN, Monday, October 18, 2010

http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/…

Osama bin Laden and his deputy Ayman al-Zawahiri are believed to be hiding close to each other in houses in northwest Pakistan, but are not together, a senior NATO official said.

“Nobody in al Qaeda is living in a cave,” said the official, who declined to be named because of the sensitivity of the intelligence matters involved.

___

The official would not discuss how the coalition has come to know any of this information, but he has access to some of the most sensitive information in the NATO alliance.

Wikileaks Donation Site Shut Down

CNN, Friday October 15, 2010

http://articles.cnn.com/2010-1…

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange claims the U.S. government was behind the decision by Moneybookers to shut down the account, an allegation denied by American officials.

According to e-mails provided to CNN by Assange, Moneybookers informed WikiLeaks of its decision in August, shortly after the Pentagon demanded WikiLeaks return all of the military documents and remove them from its website. WikiLeaks refused to do so and is expected to release hundreds of thousands of additional Pentagon papers later this month.

The first e-mail from Moneybookers that notified WikiLeaks of its decision indicated one of the potential grounds for termination was “to comply with money laundering or other investigations conducted by government authorities, agencies or commissions.”

When Assange asked for a further explanation, he received another e-mail from the company saying the account was initially suspended “due to being accessed from a blacklisted IP address. However following recent publicity and the subsequently addition of the WikiLeaks entity to blacklists in Australia and watch lists in the USA, we have terminated the business relationship.”

How much has our war mongering Really cost this Country?

Have searched on and off these years looking for reports on the real costs of building the so called coalition, especially related to Iraq, but also the private citizens who reaped War Profiteering Blood Money in this Country and elsewhere, could this faucet of information finally start opening!!!

VoteVets sent out an E with three new ads they’ve started running and over at their Vet Voice site have a couple of posts up with explanations of.

View the ads and then give them a hand getting them out or passing them on especially to residents of the states representatives targeted.

  A generation ago Lyndon Johnson’s secret CIA war in Laos caused liberals to take to the streets in justified moral outrage. That morality, idealism, and liberal values have been replaced by bland pragmatism that threatens to allow another military and political catastrophe.

  The standoff began three days ago when a pair of Apache helicopters attacked a border post inside Pakistan, killing three soldiers.

 But a change of direction may ultimately place a great strain on relations with Pakistan and prove counterproductive, according to retired general Talat Masood.

  “These attacks are very serious for Pakistan. It goes to show [coalition forces] are expanding their zone of conflict and violating Pakistan’s territorial sovereignty,” he says.

  “This war against militants is not just a question of using force – you have to get the whole country to support you. You should not alienate the people in such a way which can be very harmful,” he says, adding that such strikes have the power to “destabilize” Pakistan.

 The lesson from the wars in south-east Asia was that bombing unstable countries has unintended and disastrous consequences. It appears we are determined to learn that lesson all over again.