When I was about 12, I believed that we had the best interests of the people in mind when we did something in a foreign land. I quickly learned the difference about why we go to other countries and disrupt their governments. When we overthrew an elected government in Iran and installed the Peacock throne, a brutal dictatorship that exploited the resources and brutally suppressed the people, what we are, came through. If you actually believe we are in Afghanistan for the people you are so naive . We do our horrible work to make money for our corporations or to install another damn military base. There is no altruism involved in our actions. The Karzai government we keep propping up at great expense of lives and money, is horribly corrupt. The government is involved in suppression of the people and sells drugs .
Good point, you know we are in Afghanistan for the sake of corporations. Now, can you find a cite to prove it to the rest of us?
We did not go into Afghanistan to help the people. We went in for revenge. But I suppose you would have to admit that pulling out would most likely return the people of that country to the hands of some very nasty people.
I am not willing to turn women, children and others to the hands of killers.
What killers? Al Qeada is not there. We are killing plenty of people to save them from killers. Are we killers? If you lived there and were getting rocketed from afar ,if you saw wedding parties blown up, if you saw soldiers shooting up everything, you might not see it them as saviors. Then the idea that we are installing and protecting a corrupt government just makes it that much worse.
Is there a time limit on revenge. The kid soldiers we are fighting were about 6 or 8 years old when the towers fell. But they will forgive us for killing their people and destroying their land, because we claim they are still responsible for 911. They never were.
Like Most US Wars... - LewRockwell Yep oil pipelines were a spur to war and the release a couple weeks ago that there are vast mineral deposits in Afghanistan, should have told you something. The minerals were known about for years, but we were just told about it now. It includes lithium deposits. make any batteries with lithium lately.
http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/MAR201B.html You know I feel kind of bad , Paul. I wish i could believe America actually cared about other countries having a fair and democratic government. But our actions have blown that over and over. I wish I could still have a belief in the innate good of our government and our military ,but reality intruded.
What, it’s not about revenge? And incidentally, who was being protected by the invasion of Iraq? Not you, because Iraq posed no threat. Not the Iraqis, because you dropped bombs on them, prevented them from fleeing cities you were about to attack out of retaliation, and tortured them. So, who? Your claim sounds like jingoistic nonsense to me. On the other hand, Predator drones work, in part, because I work, so keeping you safe really is my job. Hoo-rah, etc.
Yeah, I had a friend over there. He came back shy a couple of legs. I don’t think your revenge is worth that.
I give a damn about other people, just not you. And why are you faking all this concern? Isn’t this about revenge?
Ah.
So? You’re not there for their sake anyway, you’re there for revenge.
You’re a peach. But I don’t believe you. I think you’d make up any excuse to stay there out of revenge.
http://academic.evergreen.edu/g/grossmaz/interventions.html This is how often we make countries safe for democracy . (if thats what you think we do)
:rolleyes: Oh, please. we prey on the weak. We hold the weak in utter contempt, often escalating to outright hatred.
Our friends the child raping mass murderers, you mean?
And other people like you like to fund and support the oppression of others, all the while smirking about how it’s all for the victims own good.
Nonsense; you support them being in the “hands of killers”, as long as they are our killers.
You are being wildly inconsistent; one moment you cry crocodile tears over the suffering of the poor Afghanistani people, and the next you admit we went there out of revenge, and talk about how we need to destroy their culture and reshape them in our image no matter how many we need to kill.
Where’s “The Dirty Dozen” when you need them?
Sadly, 8 US soldiers died today, and three British yesterday. The Taliban apparently have a strategy to drive us out-inflict a large number of casualties, via roadside bombs. This will work for them, because they have an unlimited supply of explosives.
I think we ought to leave this place of death.
You keep making this claim about their side being savages while the guys we support are somehow a bunch of moderate social democrats. It just isn’t the case. We’re either going to return the country to the hands of some nasty people or fight and die to keep the country in the hands of… some nasty people.
Here’s a perfect illustration of how well things are going in Afghanistan. Apart from being reknowned for producing the best hashish in Afghanistan, Mazar-i Sharif is the most secular city in Afghanistan with the best economy. It’s also mainly ethnic Hazara while the Taliban are Pashtuns, so it’s a natural that these guys should be behind the government and against the Taliban, not least because of recent history when they rebelled against their rule and thousands were killed on either side. So what’s happening in Mazar right now?
In northern Afghanistan, over 1,000 people have joined a protest to demand foreign troops get out of the country.
The rally in the city of Mazar-i-Sharif was sparked by a NATO raid on a market in which two local security guards were killed.
The demonstrators insist the two posed no threat, but the alliance says they were shot after refusing to put down their weapons.
Read more
The raid has added to the growing anger over the number of civilian deaths in the country.
On Friday, NATO accepted blame for accidentally killing six civilians in eastern Afghanistan.
http://rt.com/Top_News/2010-07-10/afghanistan-protest-nato-troops.html?fullstory
Our guys are nasty brutes. Just like every other war we are allied with nasty people. But if we stay the course we have a possibility, a very good possibility, that we can change Afghanistan.
We ought to do that. To do otherwise would be immoral.
Thank you for your demonstration of mind reading. Now, how many fingers am I holding up? Which one?
Is it your typing finger?
Don’t make me laugh, I am trying to be all indignant here.
Attention: Paul in Qatar and The Tooth, both of you need to knock it off immediately or I’m going to start handing out warnings. And Paul in Qatar, I told you about this earlier in the thread.
That’s just ridiculous. Allying ourselves with nasty brutes will, as always, result only in nasty brutishness. Putting brutes in power results in a brutal regime, not a better one.
We aren’t even trying to make Afghanistan a better place, even if we were able. Your “White Man’s Burden” fantasy is just that, a fantasy. We are neither well intentioned nor doing good.
I shall bow out of the thread. Thank you all very much.
Consider it done.
*Not *responding with violence is non-pacifist how, exactly? It’s the very essence of it.
Or are you saying pacifism itself is morally bankrupt? In which case, start a new thread.