The requested article has expired, and is no longer available. Any related articles, and user comments are shown below.
© Copyright 2010 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.NATO and U.S. differ over Afghan combat exit in 2014
LISBON, Portugal©2024 GPlusMedia Inc.
14 Comments
Login to comment
GJDailleult
Even if they were out by 2014 (doubtful) that would still be 13 years. WW1, WW2, and the Korean War lasted 13 years combined. What a joke. If you want to know why this drags out at least 13 years, follow the money.
MisterCreosote
What - from Saudi, Iran, the UAE, "Palestine" and probably even China, as it flows to Pakistan and then to Taliban and al Qaeda scum in Afghanistan?
MisterCreosote
Obama tells NATO: My way or the highway.
Sarge
"WW1, WW2, and the Korean War lasted 13 years combined."
The difference here, GJ, is that we are dealing with Islamist extremists who are slow learners. It'll take many more years for them to learn that they cannot take over Afghanistan.
MisterCreosote
What of their consequences? North Korea is as big a problem as ever. WW2 era Nazi propaganda broadcast throughout the Mohammedan mid east is said by some scholars to have been a major factor in the rise of the new rabidly anti-Israel and anti-Jewish policy that govts in that region have made official, e.g. the Hamas Charter calling for Israel's destruction. The battlefields are empty or long since changed, but that is not the same as saying we have peace and goodwill on all sides.
GJDailleult
Yes, that is very convenient. And why would they think they can't take over Afghanistan? They have before, so by definition it can be done.
Sarge
GJ, yes, they took over Afghanistan before, but that was before 9/11. They won't take it over again, not even on Obama's watch.
Foxie
It's about time. Too many innocent civilians have died and too much money has been spent. When will NATO finally learn from the Russians?
lostrune2
America doesn't have the money anymore to keep this going indefinitely. It'll have to decide when enough is enough.
GJDailleult
Sarge, and that it is the catch-22. I might make sarcastic comments when I roll out of bed in the morning about how some people are profiting from this situation, but I am also aware that there are other people who genuinely want success. But the bad guys know they have the ability as long as they wait things out, because they have done it before. They are not going anywhere.
AuntyAmerican
Indeed, so slow and stupid that they have kept the world's biggest military killing machine bogged down in a conflict for 10 years.
The Taliban government offered to hand Bin Laden over to the US authorities if and when they handed over the evidence linking him to the atrocity, Washington failed to do so and still hasn't produced any evidence as to his complicity; Neither does the FBI have him down as wanted for that particular crime.
So what exactly are the American's doing over there?
The concept for 9/11 might have originated in Afghanistan but more likely it was Pakistan, money came from Saudi Arabia as did the majority of the perpetrators. Planning took place in Germany and training in Waziristan and the United States.
No Afghans were involved in anyway, no government was involved, at least not officially. Could it have been that Washington decided after thirty years of conflict, Afghanistan would be an easy pushover like Panama and Grenada?
Interestingly it's situations like Afghanistan where empires usually get a their first and last lesson on the limits of empire, which is why the country is called the Graveyard of Imperialism, because of those who've come unstuck there.
SuperLib
Afghanistan is a policing issue, not a war. We'll always be engaged there.
Why be so coy? Just tell us the companies and the people who are profiting. Give us some names. Show us some stock prices. Then compare the costs of the war and convince us that making these men rich wouldn't be easier by simply writing them a check and covering it up in a different way.
AuntyAmerican
OK that's no problem SL. Here's one: Haliburton. A quick Google reveals everything you need to know about the money behind the two most recent American-led invasions.
WilliB
Another purely political deadline. Of course nothing will be different in 2014; it is only a convenient date far enough for Obama to dogde critical questions.