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Syndicate
So now they're shipping more of our tax dollars to a private military training company in Virginia, called Team Crucible, to teach Canadian soldiers how to survive in Afghanistan. From Team Crucible's website:
And this is after Canada's ten-year combat mission!
Mission accomplished, indeed!
you'll also find somewhere in the threads 'Blackwater trains our troops'. No surprise the head of the army Peter Devlin was trained at the US War College and served as a General in Iraq. The Americanization of our forces is a longstanding and ongoing process, not much discussed unfortunately. But don't worry, we're militarily making links with other militaries too - like Irael.
Corruption in Afghanistan: Worse Than You Thought
http://www.salon.com/2011/11/17/corruption_in_afghanistan_worse_than_you...
"A new report suggests up to 30 percent of US taxpayer money spent on certain aid projects is stolen...So where is all that stolen money going? The report explains...Corruption takes many forms..."
The Fruits of Liberation - by Glenn Greenwald
http://www.salon.com/2011/11/25/the_fruits_of_liberation/singleton/
"In Afghanistan - yet again: Six children were among seven civilians killed in a NATO airstrike in southern Afghanistan, Afghan officials said Thursday.
All in the name of a single, one-day attack [likely orchestrated by themselves] more than a decade ago, the US has spent more than ten years slaughtering children in numerous countries in all sorts of different ways, and we continue to do it unabated - see here, here, here, here and here as just illustrative examples.
All this as the Washington Post demands regime change in Iran, national security reporters start casually calling for war in Syria the way most people ponder their lunch options, and it is reported today that the US is escalating its drone attacks and other proxy war fighting in Somalia.
At some point, doesn't a country's ongoing willingness year after year to extinguish the lives of innocent human beings in multiple countries, for no good reason, seriously mar the character of the country and the political leaders responsible for it, to say nothing of the way it inexorably degrades the political culture of the nation and the minds of the citizens who acquiesce to it?
Showing 'em how to do it right!
Afghanistan is just one of number of conflicts(wars) where Canada is involved. They are discussed separately in this "international" forum but there has never been a specific forum for PEACE/ANTI-WAR ACTIVISM as there is for aboriginal issues or anti-racism. The anti-war movement in Canada is divided and weak especially with humanitarian wars (UN and NATO) and R2P seeming the future.
That's mostly because it gets zero political leadership and support from our politicians.
Does anyone remember from spring 02 reading about robo disks? They were like drones, but disks with big guns, operated from California.
There was a forum of military types going on about them, which of course I can't find now. I remember being so horrified, as were some of the posters in the forum.
Now no one reaches for something to puke into when a drone appears on the screen or in print. They might be useful for "our" oil in the Arctic.
Canadian mining companies winning in fourth world Afghanistan DeBeers winning in Third World Attawapiskat
Afghans still desperately poor and terrorized after ten years of military occupation
US-Supported Afghan Militias to Expand, Depite Atrocities - by Jason Dix
http://news.antiwar.com/2011/12/12/u-s-supported-afghan-militias-to-expa...
"The US policy of arming and supporting violent, criminal Afghan militias to fight Taliban insurgents in villages across Afghanistan is in the process of being expanded according to a senior officer in the NATO-led war..."
Keynesian-militarists goal is to $pend but not win IED's and America's war in Afghanistan
It's not whether you win but how the war lobby and Pentagon capitalists are able to push the big game into overtime, and how many billions of taxpayer dollars they can cheat and rob from increasing numbers of impoverished Americans.
Vietnam was a resounding success for them, too.
Convoys of Chaos
An inspirational account out of Pakistan. It had me grinning from ear to ear when I thought of those tea bagist/evangelical/security state gomers wanting to cut their fellow citizen's social programs...excepting their own of course...in order to continue paying for all of this.
I think warfiteers have known for some time that Afghanistan is unwinnable. Apparently Napoleon was the first "Great Satan." The worst case scenario is if Karzai and his US Military backers strike a deal for power sharing with the Taliban. Afghanistan's three largest ethnic minorities oppose Taliban ideology. Women and other groups will be left out of what would be a very undemocratic process. Karzai and the west would likely deal away women's rights to their former friends and proxies, the Taliban.
Taliban intends to open peace talk offices in Qatar
Karzai, NATO and CIA officials will want to deal with the Taliban and not the large majority of tribal and ethnic leaders. It will be most undemocratic.
Wacky Office Games Used As Morale Boosters in Prime Minister's Department
http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/canada/breakingnews/wacky-office-games-...
"Several hundred of the prime minister's civil service staff donned full combat gear, pretended to visit an Afghan village, and sucked on name tags using straws in a zany day of games meant to boost morale...the Afghan village event was designed to help staff understand the day to day work of Canadian Forces members and civilians deployed in Afghanistan.."
any 'interrogation' of detainees or 'wacky' JTF2 night-raid games?
The Roadmap to the Afghan Endgame - by Pepe Escobar
http://aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2012/01/20121610014530356.html
"Some Taliban may set up an office in Doha, but will all Americans actually leave Kabul?
..After all, there is no monolithic 'Taliban' - it's a Pashtun style coalition of the willing...Yet by any possible measure the Taliban will never allow permanent outposts of the US Empire of bases. Their maximum concession is to sever links with al-Qaeda. Doha is a Hail Mary pass.
The Obama administration had to come up with something, after all there's a NATO summit in Chicago next May. The eurozone is imploding. 2012 will be a hardcore social unrest year all across the Western Europe. There's simply no more collective stomach - not to mention wallets - for the interminable AfPak quagmire.."
Talking to the Taliban
'Have A Great Day Buddy!': A Perfect Picture of US Foreign Policy
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2085378/video-Marine-Corps-urina...
"While we have not yet verified the origin or authenticity of this video, the actions portrayed are not consistent with our core values and are not indicative of the character of the Marines.."
oh yes they are...nazi bastards
Canada Opposes Afghan Demand for Control of Prison
http://www.ottawacitizen.com/news/canada-in-afghanistan/Canada+opposes+A...
"Canada has chastised the Afghan government for attempting to take control of an important prison outside Kabul, a move many say puts the safety of Canadian-captured security detainees in serious jeopardy. Afghan President Hamid Karzai demanded last week that American forces relinguish control of the Detention facility in Parwan, located near [on] the Bagram Air Base, within a month.
Canada signed a new detainee agreement with the United States last month, which says any Afghan captured henceforth by Canadian Forces personnel will be transferred to US custody. Karzai's demand for control of the Parwan detention centre was prompted by a new report by Afghan government investigators, led by Gul Rahman Qazi. The report says Afghans in US custody endure mistreatment..."
so abuse by US is better...?
Is Bagram, Barack Obama's Guantanamo?
http://thenewblackmagazine.com/view.aspx?index=2246
"At Bagram Airbase in Afghanistan, it is said that the conditions are far worse than those in Guantanamo. In 2005, 15 US soldiers were tried for torture and abuse in relation to the high profile homicides of Habibullah and Diliwar, two unarmed civilian Afghan prisoners who were chained to the ceiling and beaten to death at the camp....daily abuses take place within this notorious camp.."
Secret Intel Report Leaked: US In Afghan Dead End
http://rt.com/news/us-intelligence-taliban-afghanistan-699/
"The latest US intelligence report concludes the war against the Taliban has reached an impasse, with the Taliban remaining committed to taking back Afghanistan by force as soon as NATO troops leave the country.."
Analyst: US Using Afghanistan, Taliban to Attain Bigger Goals
TEHRAN (FNA)- A senior Afghan political analyst underlined the strategic importance of Afghanistan for the US, and said Washington uses Afghanistan and Taliban as a tool to attain its macro-scale goals in the region.
Afghan analyst comments on the phony war in his country.
And we might make a wild guess as to which undemocratic forces the imperialist invaders will want to deal-in to the power sharing arrangement in Kabul in order to sabotage any chance for democracy and women's rights after the pullout,Two British Soldiers Abused Kids Aged Ten
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/4068363/Two-British-soldiers-a...
"...The accused pair - a sergeant and a private in the Mercian Battle Group - allegedly encouraged a boy and a girl to touch them through their clothes. They are said to have filmed the children doing it before showing the footage to other soldiers on laptops.
The allegations come days after the US military was rocked by video said to show Marines urinating on Taliban corpses."
and the "Taliban" appeared from the footage to be not soldiers but young boys, probably farmers with no weapons and a wheelbarrow. Good thing the resistance is winning and the West losing this war. Such sadism and perverted practices are a particular hallmark of anglo-american armies and occupations...
Why Was It Kandahar for Canada's Troops?
http://www.cbc.ca/dispatches/news-promo/2012/01/20/why-was-it-kandahar-f...
"In sending troops to secure that southern province of Afghanistan, Canada committed itself to the deadliest assignment since the Korean War. A new report characterizes the Canadian effort as valiant and important, but also as 'flawed' and 'ill starred'. It says Canada didn't know how dangerous Kandahar was when it lobbied for the assignment, and it cut NATO out of the process to get there. Why?..."
'DU Destroying Afghans Gene Pool' (and vid)
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/224042.html
"The US use of radioactive munitions in Afghanistan has destroyed the people's health and mutilated the genetic future of the country.
US Uses Depleted Uranium, Makes Graveyards in Afghanistan (and vid)
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/224165.html
"An Afghan activist reveals the US is still using horrific depleted uranium weapons in Afghanistan, creating graveyards of people who die of caner and other unusual diseases. The Afghan activist also warned that as long as the earth exists the Afghans will be dying from the disaster because uranium 238 has a half-life of 4.5 billion years.."
our warcriminal allies...
Reuters
-----
The Telegraph
And just so long as their former proxies, the CIA/ISI-supported Taliban do take control and not the other 80% of the Afghan resistance. Because that would be a real failure of Western policy in Afghanistan.
The phogna-balogna war on terror continues.
The Telegraph
-----
NATO combat role in Afghanistan to end next year
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The Telegraph
The US and friends want to create another purely ideologically driven Islamic state, like they did with Iran by 1979 and have attempted doing in Pakistan and Afghanistan since General Zia.
Paving the way for and propping-up militant Islam is like pouring sulphuric acid on a flower. Pretty soon there can be no flowers.
Before very long the ground is no longer fertile for democracy. It's what they do.
I really wish the Afghan people would win some day in the near future. The US and Brits have been meddling in Asia for a helluva long time.
This is idiotic nonsense. The U.S. wanted to keep the Shah in power, not replace him with Ayatollah Khomeini.
Yeah, I mean really... come on Fidel, that's streching it a bit much don't you think?
And when Khomeini seized power, what changed exactly? The Shah's torturerers were replaced with the similarly bloodthirsty Ayatollah's, and what was left of Mossadegh's people, moderates and left wing mullahs were rounded-up and executed. According to memoirs of a former Iranian president, the west provided Khomeini's regime with a list of lefties to be rounded-up and eliminated in 1983. Khomeini through Ahmadinejad have kept the lid on counterrevolution ever since. And in case you haven't noticed, this is still not a social democratic regime in Tehran sorry to have to break it to you.
And they worked to achieve similar results in Pakistan and Afghanistan with the Talibanization of those two countries since Zia, senator Charlie Wilson and stacks and stacks of U.S. dollars were invested to ensure the proliferation militant Islam there. With militant Islam you guarantee that at the very least half the population namely women will be denied basic rights. It's been a pattern in Latin America with the backing of right wing death squad governments, and the reppression of women's rights in the "Middle East" and Central Asia has achieved similar results for them. It's why the west is supporting "AQIM" in their drive to create militant Islam in the greater Maghreb region of North Africa today.
Democracy prevention is what the CIA and Brits have done since the 1950's, I'm afraid. Wakey wakey. It's time to smell what the chefs from hell have bin cookin'.
So I guess the USA supported Fidel Casto's take over in Cuba then, right?