I like the free uniforms.
Can’t argue with that!
uh huh. Thanks for your insight but I have friends who served and are serving in Afghanistan so I’m going to listen to them before I listen to some arrogant fuck on the internet (or you).
Well, the guy who blew himself up (taking 7 CIA personnel with him), isnow known to have been a double agent. The fact that he was let in to a secure base, without a body search, speaks reams about the stupidity of the CIA. Of course, they have a great traditin of this (Bay of Pigs, Vietnam, Cambodia, WMD, etc.)
I hope Obama realizes what is actually going on in Afghanistan
One thing I’d heard is that the CIA doesn’t generally frisk its assets as part of trying to engender the relationship. They want them to feel trusted.
I’m sure (if what I heard is accurate) that they have that policy under review.
You’d take the political opinions of random low level soldiers (I assume) you happen to know over numerous cites?
You would assume wrong. My friends are of retirement age. If you look at my earlier post you’ll understand I do not think Afghanistan is a nice place.
First, if you want to whack me, just do it straight out.
Second, your friends personal experiences of course say fuck all about your claims regarding Karzai’s positioning - it is an objective fact he was selected by the Americans after they toppled the Taleban regime, it is clear that the Americans - and allies of course - have poured relatively substantial resources to back his regime over other choices, it is an objective fact that international observers found (in Karzai controlled areas, e.g.) substantial vote fraud in his favour, and it is widely reported in respected sources such as Financial Times, Economist, Times (London) - of impeccable non-Left character - that the Americans twisted the arms of the opposition to knuckle under and not contest Karzai’s “win.”
Now, you doubtless prefer the Hollywood narrative of the plucky freedom loving Afghan overcoming dangers to vote for the “Right Guy” but the objective facts say something very different - and blaming the Karzai corruption etc on the Afghans alone is pure bollocks. The American fingerprints are all over this, fingerprints quite clear really, one need not get into wild conspiracy mongering.
Now, those fingerprints are very understandable and I don’t know that there is anything different the US can do - other than Afghanise the conflict, but engaging in fantasy analysis is certainly going to get you even more fucked than you already are. You already made that mistake in Iraq (and Vietnam as well). One would think some lessons might be learned.
Or maybe fantasy is more comfortable.
Those parentheses don’t quite cover your ass the way you hoped they would.
Knock it off.
[ /Moderating ]
If you want to duke it out in the Pit, then just open a Pit thread, don’t encourage more of that behavior, here.
[ /Moderating ]
About two minutes ago, Maddow announced that apparently two of the persons killed in the suicide attack that is the subject of this thread were not CIA but employees of Xe, the company formerly known as Blackwater.
Helping distribute aid funds for schools, no doubt.
Well, I feel even less bad about the death of mercs than I do of spooks, who (at least theoretically) have loyalty to a nation rather than just a paycheck as an additional excuse.
I read about Eric Prince and Blackwater and I can’t make up my mind. Steven King or Tom Clancy? Did he maybe have a really creepy governess?
Robert Ludlum
Do you think that there’s any chance that we’ll have the national will to stay there long enough to create an educated populace with commensurate infrastructure? The current long-term aim of us being there is to build up the government and institutions of Afghanistan to somewhere near the level of Pakistan, which you’ll remember is the country where Osama bin Laden currently lives. Really, what’s the point?
Even if we do make a muti-generational/trillion dollar committment to rebuilding Afghanistan up to a western-friendly country with an infrastructure level similar to Pakistan there’ll be no shortage of unstable countries that Islamic radicals can hang out in. Yemen is the latest, Chad isn’t far behind, there’s always Somalia and a whole bunch of other potential failed states over the next decade or two.
And it’s also worth noting that neither Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen or similar will ever be as western-friendly or as well-governed as Hamburg, Germany, where the 9/11 attacks were actually planned.