Tag: Afghanistan

I originally posted this here at the Great Orange Satan. I stated then and I will state now that my rights are not for sale. Now, Philip Gourevitch seeks to sell my right to know what is being done in my name down the river in the New York Times. I will repost here and then add a rebuttal to Mr. Gourevitch down below.

Crazed & Confused thinks that Obama was right not to release the torture photos. But he ignores the basic problems with Obama’s rationale — transparency is essential to a functioning democracy. It was the clear intent of the Founding Fathers that the government follow a policy of transparency — in fact, the Constitution requires that Congress publish a journal of its proceedings. If we do not have maximum transparency in our government, then how will we know if we are still a functioning democracy? How will we know if our elected officials are following the Constitution? This is the very sort of thing that Obama ran on. I suggest that he do what he was elected to do and provide more transparency in government by releasing these pictures.  

Crossposted from Antemedius

Investigative historian and journalist Gareth Porter talks with Paul Jay about General Stanley McChrystal’s new job as the head of US operations in Afghanistan. Porter says McChrystal’s appointment will hardly change US policy in Afghanistan, but could intensify US commando raids and air strikes in the region.

He also comments on Obama’s plans for a civilian surge saying, “a civilian component to a counterinsurgency strategy in Afghanistan is essentially empty talk, in the sense that they don’t really know how to do it.”.

“They don’t have the means to do it. They don’t have people that are trained in Pashtun, the language of southern Afghanistan, where the ethnic group that basically inhabits the area, where most of the Taliban gains have been made, is located.”

A Memorial Day Goal for Bob and Lee Woodruff

“Hey Friends —  Would you give a dollar to someone who risked their life for you?  We are in a big push this weekend to try to get every American to give $1.00 (or better yet $5.25 – to signify the date of Memorial Day) to help our wounded troops. This is what Memorial Day is all about.

“Yesterday by being on CNN and CNBC to talk about it– Bob and I raised $21,000 just from people twittering and going to the website to give.”…………

With Memorial Day right around the corner, check out this wonderfully moving article printed in USA TODAY entitled “More Than A Long Weekend” by Kathy Roth-Douquet, Blue Star Families’ Co-Founder and co-author with Frank Schaeffer “AWOL: The Unexcused Absence of America’s Upper Classes from Military Service — and How It Hurts Our Country”.

Wow.  I’m sure this can only be good news for the impoverished, innocent, and war-torn people of Afghanistan.  They are freaking rich, RICH!  While many think they are sleeping on dirt floors (if not already taking “dirt naps,” heh indeedy), they are instead…well let’s hear it straight from Afghanistan’s minister of mines, Mohammad Ibrahim Adel:

“We are a people who don’t have money, food or clothes. But we are sleeping on gold,” he said. The country’s iron deposits were estimated at between five to six billion tons, he added.

That’s not all.  A 2005-06 joint survey by the US Geological Survery (USGS) and NASA showed they also have considerable copper, gold, precious stones, oil, and natural gas.

Based on the USGS survey, he said, Afghanistan’s north is estimated to hold between 600 to 700 billion cubic meters of natural gas and the country has some 25 million tons of oil in four basins.

Oh boy, pass the Bean-O!  That’s a lot of gas!  I think it’s fortunate for the people of Afghanistan that we are liberating them from al Qaeda the Taliban.  For one thing, by already being there, we were in an excellent position to be invited by former UNOCAL executive Hamid Karzai to send in NASA and the USGS to determine just how minerally enhanced ordinary Afghan citizens might be.  

The year was 1967.  An Army special forces unit goes on a seven-month killing spree in Vietnam.  Far from being isolated incidents that occurred without notice, Army commanders were aware of the actions and let it continue.  Ultimately, the unit was disbanded, its members never prosecuted, the facts buried by the Army from the public.

Then, a small newspaper, the Toledo Blade, got wind of the cover-up, investigated the accusations, and in 2003, released a Pulitzer-winning mini-series about “Tiger Force“, the unit that committed wholesale slaughter in Vietnam.

Donald Rumsfeld, who in 2003 was George W. Bush’s Secretary of Defense, stifled any investigation into Tiger Force or its surviving members.  

But, the story doesn’t end there…

Like a recent tragic event in Iraq brought out a number of reports on PTSD around the country there have also been a number of other reports as well that focussed on the homeless veterans, the first one just below is in and around this Nations Capital:

Homeless War Veterans Abound in D.C. Region

A new report is giving sobering statistics about how homeless veterans are treated in the Washington area.

The report says beds are available for only 10% of the homeless vets in Virginia, 8% have beds in Maryland and in the District, there is room is less than 2%.

From the Iraq War with the Army’s First Calvary Division to fighting a battle to find homes for fellow veterans, Chad Lego says he never imagined when he came home, he would find some 200,000 service members homeless. >>>>>More

By Abdul Malik Mujahid

According to the CIA World Factbook, an Afghan’s life expectancy is merely 44 years.

That's 20 to 30 years less than neighboring Pakistan and all other surrounding countries. It is just one result of the ongoing devastation in that country.

The war in Afghanistan did not start in 2001 with the US invasion. It began 30 years ago in December 1979, when the former Soviet Union invaded the country. The human toll of the conflict is staggering: more than a million Afghans have been killed and 3 million maimed.

Five million (one third of the pre-war population) were forced to leave their country and became refugees. There are still 3.1 million Afghan refugees today, making up 27 per cent of the global refugee population. Most of them live in Pakistan.

Another two million Afghans were displaced within the country. In the 1980s, one out of two refugees in the world was an Afghan. Most Afghans alive today have seen nothing but war.

Daily life in Afghanistan is miserable.  

A number of reports have sprung up in the last few days following the very tragic shooting by one soldier in killing five of his fellow soldiers at an in country military stress clinic, of which he himself was receiving care.

Military training alone starts the process of the change needed from how most are brought up and what they are taught and told to be able to serve and defend, if needed, this country.

Place these now trained soldiers in a War Zone creating the Occupation of same lasting many years and now in these times many tours being served and not only in one but two and for many the stress of war, what they experience, their individual incidents, what they see, feel, and just know, is overwelming!

They aren’t the only ones, think of those who live in these occupied countries! It also isn’t only a war that creates the traumatic nightmares, individuals that experience trauma in theirs lives also can suffer, most silently, from those traumas!

Below is a number of recent reports, this subject should have been takin seriously many years ago after finally realizing what War and Trauma can do to a Human Being!

Crossposted from Antemedius

Pepe Escobar:

No one really knows the fate of the man who was the reason for the Bush administration-proclaimed “war on terror”. Some influential Pakistanis say the Americans don’t know it. The Americans admit they don’t know it. President George W. Bush wanted him dead or alive. No one really knows whether he’s dead or alive. President Barack Obama says he and his organization remain the number one threat to the U.S. But even America’s most media-savvy general admits his organization is not in Afghanistan anymore. Would that be reason enough for the U.S. to finally leave Afghanistan? On the contrary: now there’s a new – counterinsurgent – top boot on the ground.

Real News Network – May 15, 2009

Obama and Osama – McChrystal clear

The more it changes, the more the “war on terror” stays the same