Downer calls for Taliban negotiations

At first glance, this is a particularly unpalatable notion, but perhaps the Realpolitik of the situation warrants such a change of strategy.

THE initial objective of the invasion of Afghanistan has been achieved and it’s time for a diplomatic settlement involving the Taliban and their Pakistani creators, says former foreign minister Alexander Downer.

In an article entitled “Our messy war” published in The Spectator ahead of the parliamentary debate on Afghanistan, Mr Downer said the initial military goal was to destroy al-Qaeda’s capacity to use Afghanistan as a base for attacks on the US and other western targets.

“That goal was achieved. Al-Qaeda was destroyed in Afghanistan. As time has passed there has been mission creep,” he said.

Mr Downer said the task now was apparently to improve the quality of democracy and security, but that was proving perilously difficult as Afghanistan had never been competently governed by an administration based in Kabul.

However, on the one hand we see reports of a decimated Taliban having endured a near decade-long “arse-kicking”. Their best commanders are either dead or captured and what’s left is literally a rag tag army.

Thus, why negotiate now? Rather, seizing the jugular (g’day, reader Carpe Jugulum ;-)!) would appear to be the more effective option in the long-run.

But then there are the reports of a wishy-washy US president who even after an Iraqi-style troop surge- which has arguably been a success, just like in Iraq – still appears to not really know what to do.

American Spectator’s Alfred S. Regnery:

Afghanistan is often called the “graveyard of empires.” It is also Barack Obama’s Achilles’ heel. He has nobody to blame but himself.

Afghanistan has little strategic value and the war is one of choice rather than necessity. Now, at the end of a wasteful and frustrating decade, our objective is to end the fighting and leave a measure of stability behind. But clarifying even this simple goal seems more than the Obama administration can handle.

That’s probably why Downer is calling for a deal. Regnery’s piece goes on to remind us that Afghanistan, hardly a nation, is but really a collection of tribes, rooted in the middle ages, and certainly not a prime candidate for nation-building.

Still, something doesn’t sit right. Even with Al-Qaeda taken care of over there, what’s to say they wouldn’t re-emerge – and quickly? A deal and/or pull-out would likely inspire Islamic terrorist forces around the globe. And just how much could you expect a “legitimised” Taliban to keep up their end of any bargain?

The Australian parliament is set to debate the Afghanistan War this Tuesday. Yet with the major government power-broker, Greens’ leader Bob Brown, not even having been there, it seems folly to have this debate just now even if both, generally speaking, the ALP and Liberals are committed to the war.

You’d think the best course of action would be to head the advice of the generals on the ground. Bob Brown flies in the face of this, however.

“We have to take what our army commanders are saying into account here but then I have letters from relatives of troops who are in Afghanistan or going to Afghanistan who do not want their loved ones sent to what they see as a hopeless war,” he told ABC Television.

A US debate over what step to take next is scheduled for December.

Faced with a White House war review due in December and decreasing public support for the war back home, the U.S. military is not in a position to hold back. The current phase of operations is geared to make a statement: drive the fight as aggressively as possible and rout the Taliban in their own backyard. Looking forward, commanders posit that improved civilian freedom of movement and a stronger government presence will be reliable gauges of progress. But it remains to be seen just what metrics will be enough to convince the Obama Administration that serious money and manpower should be poured into a conflict now entering its 10th year.

Whatever the powers-that-be decide, now is a good time for Western forces to strike hard while the iron is hot. One reason is purely military in nature: the Taliban is at its knees. The other reason is purely political in nature: Obama and other Western politicians appear to be at their knees.

A deal with the Taliban?

Picture source: Taliban feud over murder of Polish hostage


cross-posted

2008: Year of the Moonbat?

South Australian Premier Mike Rann has called for David Hicks to apologize for his Taliban training and terrorist sympathies. In response, here are some words of wisdom from a commenter at abc.net

Hicks never trained with al-Qaeda, there was no al-Qaeda until 9/11.The term al-Qaeda was thought up by the CIA, who has subsequently admitted doing so. The falsehood was started in January 2001 by Jamal al Fadl, a Sudanese who had been with Bin Laden in the early 1990s. Jamal al Fadl stole money from Bin Laden, and then sought protection in the USA. The FBI and CIA paid him hundreds of thousands of dollars to create the al-Qaeda fiction. In fact, al Fadl invented the name al-Qaeda.Osama Bin Laden never used the term al-Qaeda until after 9/11, when he realized that al-Qaeda was the term the Americans had invented for him.

This is all about oil, a consortium represented by George W Bush’s father met with the Taliban to discuss the construction of a pipeline through Afghanistan to convey oil from Azerbaijan to a port in Pakistan, where it was to be tankered directly to the US. This consortium’s proposal was rejected by the Taliban, who gave the rights to the pipeline to Brazil. Thus the Taliban became the world’s enemy #1 according to the US.

If the Taliban had agreed to Bush snr’s proposal Hicks would have been a friend of the US, not an enemy. The invasion of Afghanistan and later Iraq would never have happened, and life as we know it would not have changed in any way.

Pakistan says al Qaeda behind Bhutto killing…Well come on AND???

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) – Pakistan has “intelligence intercepts” indicating that al Qaeda was behind the killing of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto, the Interior Ministry said on Friday.

“We have intelligence intercepts indicating that al Qaeda leader Baitullah Mehsud is behind her assassination,” ministry spokesman Javed Iqbal Cheema told a news conference.

Mehsud is one of Pakistan’s most wanted militant leaders and is based in the South Waziristan region on the Afghan border.

Reuters

LIKE, the Taliban AND the ISI??? Come clean…Wait, you CAN’T come clean. The blood on your hands will not wash off.

A Desert Tale

Off in the desert of Afghanistan, a Taliban leader is fleeing from the US soldiers. He’s in the middle of the desert, and is going crazy from thirst. In the distance, he sees something, but doesn’t quite know what it is. When he reaches it, he finds an elderly Jewish man selling fine silk ties.

The Taliban fuckhead asks the man “Do you have any water? I’m very thirsty!”, to which the elderly man answers “No, I do not. I only have ties to sell. Would you like one? They are only $50.” The Taliban fuckhead looks at the elderly man and says “I don’t need a tie. I need water!” The elderly man looks somewhat thoughtful and says “I know you don’t like me and would much rather I was dead, but after a two hour walk that way, you should come across a restaurant, with the finest water, sparkling and cool.”

The Taliban fuckhead starts walking. Four hours later he returns and says, with a glare to the Jewish man, “Your infidel brother won’t let me in without a tie!”