What does a victory look like. Some argue that Afghanistan can not be allowed to be a safe haven for retaliations like 911. But if the plot was hatched in a hotel in Hamburg, Germany and various American and Canadian cities and the perpetrators came mostly from Saudi Arabia , how does blowing up Afghanistan stop plotters. The war will actually create more. The entire premise of the war that the right wing offers is fatally flawed.
If we are there for lithium and other mineral deposits and setting up bases, then it makes sense. It would be evil and wrong but at least follow some logic.
The Taliban allowed Al Queda to stay in Afghanistan and plot the attacks, yes, their nationalities were Saudi and Lebanese etc, but that’s not the point, they were in Afghanistan receiving training to do it.
Anyway
I’m gonna echo Ravenman and ask you where’s your evidence for Afghans wanting us out, considering the majority of them want us to stay, and only 6% support the Taliban.
The plot was done in Hamburg ,Germany. Do you think we should attack them next? The training for crashing into the towers was done in America. They paid for flight lesson here under suspicious circumstances. When should we attack Florida?
Please stop detracting from the original argument, which is ‘Is Afghanistan Worth it’
It was their base where they planned it.
Anyway again
I’m gonna echo Ravenman and ask you where’s your evidence for Afghans wanting us out, considering the majority of them want us to stay, and only 6% support the Taliban.
Are you going to refute this anytime soon? I’m getting kind of bored of the repetitiveness.
http://www.zcommunications.org/what-do-afghans-want-withdrawal-but-not-too-fast-and-a-negotiated-peace-by-milan-rai Like I said, they want us out, they don’t want the Taliban and they don’t want Karzai’s corrupt government.
http://www.stirblog.org/2010/06/what-afghans-want/comment-page-1/ And from the people who live and work there. They say the people want us out but we are the line against the Taliban who they also don’t want to return and suppress the women and destroy schools.
From your own link by the way.
From Ravenmans cite from the BBC:
*Hamid Karzai as President of Afghanistan for 2010
Excellent- 28%
Good- 44%
Fair- 19%
Poor- 8%
No Opinion- 1%*
So you are unable to refute the evidence that the Afghans do not want us out.
They want the U.S. and ISAF to stay until Afghanistan can stand on its own feet.
So they don’t want the US gone.
No they do. They want us out, but the government is so disfunctional ,thanks to our intervention, that all alternatives suck. Some Afghanis ,terrified of the power vacuum that will surely come when we pull out, want us to keep some semblance of order until they can establish a new government. THEN they want us out. Note, they want us out. They do not want us staying on an open ended basis.
You are claiming that because they want us to stay temporarily, that means they don’t want us to leave. That is twisting the facts. They want us out and they want an independent country.
You should watch some of these vids if you think ISAF is wanted:
Another: ‘It’s taken a year to move 20km’
Yes, the Afghans are the only occupied people in history who welcome the presence of their occupiers, including previous generations of Afghans who kicked various occupiers out of their country.
And even our own Generals admit that people like the Taliban more than the government we’re propping up.
Saving Women and Preventing Genocide: The Real Reasons We’re in Afghanistan Now
excerpt.
So now the cheerleaders for war would have us believe that they are more concerned for the welfare of Afghan civilians than are those who wish to end the US occupation.
First we have White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs sanctimoniously imploring the editors of Wikileaks not to post more information that the administration believes might endanger the lives of local Afghan informants:
continues…
so, don’t matter too much how many of them have to die,
its for their own good, right?
Patreus was on the TV starting his campaign to keep things going in Afghanistan. Why do these guys get the stage to themselves? How come a person with differing opinions on the war isn’t there calling him a BS artist and for trying to keep his job and power intact. I don’t care if he is in great shape. I care that he is wasting billions of dollars and soldiers lives fighting for a war that will end up with us leaving broker and deader.
I read the Taliban is using motorbikes to swoop into villages and take over. They are making more strongholds for their men . They are taking over more land every day. The people in the village will fight for whoever is in power and gives them the most money. They are not fighting for the Karzai government that is just a corrupt criminal enterprise. They sure as hell are not going to fight for the foreign invaders.
Cocaine’s hell of a drug! 
Well yes, because making sure the average Afghan is relatively satisfied with their government makes them less likely to support the Taliban, which helps in turn to decrease their ability to move around the population, which in turn stabilises the area, which helps the ISAF to eventually leave.
And whilst some of the information on Wikileaks is not really a big deal in terms of being ‘outed’ it is kind of a big deal when there is the potential threat of intelligence agents details being exposed and compromising Allied operations in Taliban areas. you know, kind of makes the war harder.
I also hate this condescending attitude towards our efforts, as if the alternative (Taliban rule, fracturing) would make the region any more stable in the long term. We need to help stablise the country and provide Afghans with the ability to bring about a functioning government, which, I keep reminding you again and again, they’ve not had for the last 10 years, and haven’t had a stable one since the 1970’s when the King was toppled. And in that time when they didn’t have a functioning government, the Talibs sprang up and international terrorism rooted itself. It isn’t going to happen overnight.
So lets talk of the benefits of Afghan stability by using this very simple example:
1919-1975ish The most important news stories to come out of Afghanistan in that time period was hmmm, the Axis tried to use it as place to agitate the Raj via spies and a I think a dam was built by the eisenhower administration oh and a road by the soviets.
1975-Present Soviet Afghan war, collapse of Najibullah administration, warlordism, Taliban rule, Al Queda plans 9/11 there, Nato intervention.
See what I’m getting at?
Ok, so where’s the polls to back that claim up? I backed my assertion up, where’s the evidence you’re providing for this? Otherwise, all I can say to that is that 6%, and hey it could be a loud and vocal 6%, admire the Taliban.
He’s trying to provide what’s called direction to a campaign which has suffered mission drift. Morale plays a part in war just as much as a gun does.
If this was the case, again, I’ll use a simple example
Soviets invaded Afghanistan, you saw uprising in nearly** every single Afghan province** against them.
NATO invades Afghanistan, there’s a few border provinces where there’s alot of violence, however other than that, most of the country is relatively peaceful.
See what I’m getting at?
The Soviets were making progress but paid with their soldiers getting addicted to the easily available drugs. It was when the Afghanis got access to missiles that could shoot down helicopters that they decided it wasn’t worth it. Choppers are expensive.
The Afghanis want jobs. For many the Taliban provides them. They will fight for them to feed their families. If we pay better they will likely fight on our side for a while.
You actually think the Afghanis want us to be there. Many do just because the Taliban is a horrible alternative. But the Karzai government may be more hated than the Taliban.
What can we offer to those on the fence, An American puppet state with Karzai in charge? Would you fight for that?
Step one should be cleaning up the government so the people can have some hope. But how would the world treat us overthrowing another government ?
No, the Soviets paid before they even stepped into Afghanistan, they backed a government which had virtually zero support from the majority of Afghans, whilst, Karzai, is backed by a majority of people in the country. Missiles and Soldiers getting addicted to drugs were an unfortunate by-product of the invasion, not the cause of its failure.
Love the connotations of ‘a while’ implying the Afghan will naturally gravitate towards the Taliban, even though, so far, I’ve been the only person who’ve provided substantial evidence that the average Afghan does not support the Taliban and doesn’t want foreign forces to leave.
Which is incorrect as I’ve just provided an example of why it isn’t…
Again, since I know more about this subject than yourself, I’ll direct you to the last, simple example I constructed to educate you about ‘levels of support the ISAF has’
Which was this.
Soviets invaded Afghanistan, you saw uprising in nearly every single Afghan province against them.
NATO invades Afghanistan, there’s a few border provinces where there’s alot of violence, however other than that, most of the country is relatively peaceful.
See what I’m getting at?
Beginning of the end for Afghan war? | Mark Weisbrot | The Guardian If you like polls, you will like this one done by the US Army. It says 95 percent of the residents of Khandihar want the Us and NATO to negotiate with the Taliban. See what they are getting at?
They are offended by the US atrocities that keep happening. Innocent civilians, women and children getting blown away causes people to reject the US run war. Can you see what they are getting at? They want peace. We will not deliver that.
http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=51089
Negotiation doesn’t mean they support the Taliban the survey was done before the US took major operations to clear the Taliban. I didn’t know the US had the monopoly of terrorist related violence. Not to mention, Kandahar is in one of the areas where I said the violence is located.
Oh and I forgot to mention, the reason why they wanted negotiation last december, ignoring the fact that Kandahar has been the spiritual capital of the Taliban, and that the ISAF did major offensive in the region around April.
So again Gonzo, refute my last arguements.