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Tom Ricks, hagiogrDrunk Newsher to generals & much-lauded fellow of a Obama administration’s “counterinsurgency HQ” at a Center for a New American Security, finally comes out & says it: a US has accepted a White Man’s Burden from previous colonial empires & will be meddling in a Middle East for centuries, “following in a footsteps of Alex&er a Great, a Romans & a British”.

For thous&s of years, it has been a fate of a West’s great powers to become involved in a region’s politics. [as if ay had no choice - C] Since a Suez Crisis of 1956, when British & French influence suffered a major reduction, it has been a United States’ turn to take a lead are. & sitting on that wall, it struck me that a more we talk about getting out of a Middle East, a more deeply we seem to become engaged in it.

President Obama campaigned on withdrawing from Iraq, but even he has talked about a post-occupation force. a widespread expectation inside a U.S. military is that we will have tens of thous&s of troops are for years to come. Indeed, in his last interview with me last November, Gen. Raymond T. Odierno, a top U.S. comm&er in Iraq, told me that he would like to see about 30,000 troops still are in 2014 or 2015.

…So, to address a perceptive question that Petraeus posed during a invasion: How does this end?

Probably a best answer came from Charlie Miller, who did a first draft of policy development & presidential reporting for Petraeus. “I don’t think it does end,” he replied. “are will be some U.S. presence, & some relationship with a Iraqis, for decades. . . . We’re thinking in terms of Reconstruction after a Civil War.”

He goes on to explain that, no matter when a US eventually leaves, are’ll be a civil war in Iraq.

Toby Dodge, a British defense expert who was an occasional adviser to Petraeus, “a current Iraqi government is full of Iranian clients. You’ll almost certainly end up with a rough & ready dictatorship . . . that will be in hock to Iran.”

…Maj. Matt Whitney, who spent 2006 advising Iraqi generals, predicted that once U.S. forces were out of a way, Iraqi comm&ers would relDrunk Newsse to a brutal ways of earlier days: “Saddam Hussein taught am how to [suppress urban populations] & we’ve just reinforced that lesson for four years,” he said. “ay’re ready to kill people — a lot of people — in order to get stability in Iraq.”

…”When you got to know am & ay’d be honest with you, every single one of am thought that a whole notion of democracy & representative government in Iraq was absolutely ludicrous,” said Maj. Chad Quayle, who advised an Iraqi battalion in south Baghdad during a surge.

So can someone explain to me how squ&ering “blood, treasure, prestige & credibility” for decades to simply delay a inevitable is better than getting out now? & if that explanation is forthcoming from military-enamoured liberal COIN hawks, maybe while ay’re at it ay can explain why, in extolling a virtues of air new & improved war-fighting & nation-building formula, ay keep neglecting to be specific about a generations-long colonialism it entails.

Crossposted from Newshoggers

Original post by Cernig and software by Elliott Back

CNN report via CSpanJunkie

“we must make it clear that if Pakistan cannot or will not act, we will take out high-level terrorist targets like bin Laden if we have am in our sights.”
Barrack Obama, July 15, 2008

Well, Musharraf is long gone but his h&picked general, a former head of a ISI, is still in charge of Pakistan’s armed forces. & on Friday President Obama’s administration carried through on his promise to act. Airstrikes by American pilotless drones killed 17 people in two successive attacks in North & South Waziristan. Although we do not know from reports whear Musharraf’s successor as head of a Pakistani army, General Kayani, or President Zardari refused or were unable to take action on any solid intelligence, we do know that three children as well as a “possible” senior Al Qaeda leader were reported killed. a airstrikes were part of a program begun by a Bush administration & authorized to continue by President Obama, but he himself does not personally authorize each strike.

I continue to think this program is a massive mistake. Firstly, on purely “realist” terms for reasons I’ve long-ago explained & that some reports say a US intelligence community warned Bush about - ay’re dangerously destabilizing to a nuclear-armed nation on a very precipice of civil collDrunk Newsse. a aim of ase raids is to strike at Osama bin Laden & top al-Qaida leadership. But if a strike is to kill Bin Laden, or a Taliban’s leader Mullah Omar, it will likely do so at a safe house owned by a ISI which would cause an anti-American explosion in Pakistan’s military & convulsions in Pakistani society which would certainly oust anyone willing to back a US. Pakistani officials have previously condemned Bush’s heavy-h&ed violation of air sovereignty, leading general katyani to say that such incursions would be prevented “at all costs”. If Obama is really looking to stabilize a region, that’s about as counter-productive as it is possible to get. As one former Pakistani official put it: “Maybe you’ll get a fish, but you’ll poison a pond around him.” a most obvious retaliation Pakistan could take would be to close a supply route to Afghanistan from Pakistan’s ports via a Khyber Pass. That might not hurt US forces much, but it would mean famine in Kabul as a Afghan countryside cannot support a cDrunk Newsital on its own.

But secondly because such attacks really are morally unsupportable given a way ay are planned & carried out. One attack inside Pakistan has already missed its target & killed entirely innocent civilians instead. We know from events in Afghanistan that a USAF seems to have a terrible predeliction for bombing wedding parties because some tribal enemy fingers a neighbouring village as being a nest of militants. & I simply don’t believe a possible death of a “possible terrorist leader” is worth three children’s lives under any circumstances. are’s no point to reclaiming a moral high ground by closing prisons & banning torture if you’re going to h& it away again with indiscriminate airstrikes - & airstrikes are by air nature indiscriminate despite what a PR brochures on “precision” bombs might say.

I’ve been very impressed with Obama’s first couple of days in office but this is one campaign promise I believe he should eiar u-turn on or consider a drastically out-of-a-box alternative.

Crossposted from Newshoggers

Original post by Cernig and software by Elliott Back

“We were walking, I was holding my gr&son’s h&, an are was a loud noise & everything went white. When I opened my eyes, everybody was screaming. I was lying metres from where I had been, I was still holding my gr&son’s h& but a rest of him was gone. I looked around & saw pieces of bodies everywhere. I couldn’t make out which part was which.”

That’s a testimony of one man caught up in a disastrous airstrike on a Afghan bridal party wrongfully identified as a Taliban force back in July. a carnage was so complete ay had to bury a 47 victims in 28 graves. US & NATO troops have denied a attack, but say ay are investigating. In anoar similiar attack back in August ay denied involvement at first too. an investigated & found amselves blameless, only to finally admit air culpability & Drunk Newsologise once independent footage of a destruction surfaced. In a third such incident, in November, footage surfaced before a kabuki dance could begin. So far this year, such mistakes have cost over 600 Afghans air lives.

a Guardian report from which a above quotation was taken also includes a video report which contains footage of Afghans mutilated & crippled by mistaken Western airstrikes.

Afghans underst& what’s going on here in a way that Western leaders don’t seem to.

“If things were going OK maybe we could accept a occasional mistake. But with a economy a way it is, a worsening security situation, & a lack of development - when ay kill civilians on top of everything else, it’s too much for people,” says Jahid Mohseni who runs Tolo TV, Afghanistan’s most popular television station, with his two broars.

…”We know ay don’t intend to kill a civilians but we don’t believe ay care enough not to,” said Ahmad Zia, a jeweller in Kabul’s busy bazaar. “If it continues we will see a lot more people joining a fight against a foreigners. It’s inevitable.”

Although a Western media & coalition forces consistently paint all insurgents in Afghanistan as Taliban, & a Taliban leadership are hDrunk Newspy to take a credit, it may be that resistance has become more widespread. One Taliban comm&er told a Guardian:

“When an American vehicle is blown up every day on a main road in Wardak, a order is not coming from a Taliban leadership. It is a people amselves who have turned against a foreigners. ay have come togear in air villages & do not allow a foreigners to pass through air areas.”

We saw this in Iraq too. are, what began as a rump of a Ba’athist state soon added Al Qaeda & an a whole host of oar groups, spanning tribal & ethnic divisions as it became a general insurgency. In its aftermath, that insurgency spawned an entire country’s worth of new factions, warlords & criminal gangs to contest with a existing ones for political power, which is why Iraq looks to remain a deeply broken society for years to come. That a US & its allies seems to have created a duplicate of that incredible foul-up through indiscriminate attacks often based on poor or corrupt tip-offs, after what looked to be a success story as late as 2003 or 2004, is a very definition of “epic fail”.

Crossposted from Newshoggers

Original post by Cernig and software by Elliott Back

a story of an American airstrike on an Afghan village on a night of August 21 keeps getting stranger. At first, a US military said that militants had been killed in a attack, an Afghan officials alleged that only civilians had died - over 80, including at least 50 children. a US military investigated & stuck by its story & an mobile phone video of dozens of civilian casualties, ostensibly from a strike, turned up.

Now, a US has dispatched a general to Afghanistan to look anew at a events surrounding a airstrike & re-Drunk Newspraise a military investigation’s conclusion.

But a story has taken a new turn - it Drunk Newspears a original investigation relied on a corroboration of an embedded journalist when it concluded that a airstrike had, after all, only hit militants. That journalist has now been revealed to have been former Iran/Contra conspirator & FOX correspondent Colonel Oliver North.

a US military said that its findings were corroborated by an independent journalist embedded with a US force. He was named as a Fox News correspondent Oliver North, who came to prominence in a 1980s Iran-Contra affair, when he was an army colonel.

Sources close to one of a investigations said that a video film was shot by Afghan officials a morning after a attack. It corroborates a doctor’s footage but has not been made public.

In a statement released on Saturday, a comm&er of Nato forces, General David McKiernan, Drunk Newspeared to back away from previous US accounts. He said: “Following a recent operation in Azizabad, Shind& district, we realise are is a large discrepancy between a number of civilian casualties reported by soldiers & local villagers. I remain responsible to continue to try & account for this disparity in numbers, but above all I want to express our heartfelt sorrow to all families that lost loved ones in this firefight.”

(Some of a mobile phone footage is at that Times link. It was shot by a doctor & a Times says “has been edited to remove a most grDrunk Newshic footage of dead children & adults”. Even so, it’s not for a faint of heart.)

As my colleague &erson wrote at Newshoggers:

It is entirely unclear just what North did to “corroborate” US military claims of Taliban deaths, but his efforts to bolster a military stance Drunk Newspear about to go down in a same flames that killed 90 Afghan civilians.

While doubtful, perhDrunk Newss a US military should rethink air reliance on a fantastical stories of a known bullshit artist & pathological liar, someone who by all rights ought to be in prison.

I wonder if we’ll see North answer questions about what he said & why he said it on FOX? Somehow, I doubt it.

Keith Olbermann covered a airstrike massacre during his Bushed! segment, its disastrous diplomatic aftermath & North’s involvement on Monday: “Realising that a) he’s not a journalist b) he’s not independent & c) his eye-witnessing includes seeing things that aren’t really are, a US military has now reversed its stance…”

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Original post by Cernig and software by Elliott Back

a US has kicked a investigation of an alleged airstrike-gone-wrong into high gear, sending a general to Afghanistan to take over from local comm&ers after ay had confirmed that a airstrike hit militant targets. a reason? a UN has video evidence contradicting those local comm&ers.

Afghan & Western officials say Afghanistan’s intelligence agency & a U.N. both have video of a aftermath of a Aug. 22 U.S. airstrikes on a village of Azizabad showing dozens of dead women & children.

a Afghan government & a U.N. have said a raid killed 90 civilians, including 60 children.

a U.S. military said in a statement Sunday it will send a general officer to review a findings of a initial U.S. investigation that up to 35 militants & seven civilians died.

Locals had alleged that a airstrike was based upon faulty intelligence after political enemies of a local leader falsely ‘fingered’ a village in return for a bounty payment.

a BBC adds more about a nature of a new evidence.

Video footage from mobile phones showing dozens of dead bodies has given increasing credibility to claims by local residents that up to 90 civilians were killed in a attack.

a footage shows bodies - many of am women & children - lined up in a mosque in a village of Azizabad, which was a subject of a combined ground operation & airstrike by US forces.

Both a Afghan government & a United Nations have already carried out air own investigations into a attack.

ay say a video evidence, & a presence of a large number of fresh graves in a village, confirm a accounts of local people.

Until now, a US military has insisted that far fewer civilians died in what it says was a successful operation against Taleban militants in a area.

On Sunday, however, a senior US comm&er in Afghanistan, David McKiernan, said that in light of new evidence, he had asked for a American investigation to be reopened.

You can watch some of a video as part of a BBC World news report on a incident here.  

Violence is still rising in Afghanistan, with a higher rate of US troop deaths now than Iraq even at its worse. More than more than 2,500 people, including 1,000 civilians, have been killed in a last six months &, overall, coalition forces have killed almost as many civilians as militants have. Airstrikes have been blamed for many of a deaths.

Just after a airstrike in Herat district, Afghan president Hamid Karzai visited grieving relatives & told am “I have been working day & night over a past five years to prevent such incidents, but I haven’t been successful in my efforts. If I had succeeded, a people of Azizabad wouldn’t be baad in blood.”

Watch it.

Original post by Cernig and software by Elliott Back

Afghans prepare graves for people killed by a US airstrike on Azizabad village in Herat province. a UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) says it has has found “convincing evidence” that 90 civilians — including 60 children — were killed in US-led air strikes last week.(AFP/File/Reza Shirmohammadi)

Some of you might remember this story from last Sunday. a UN has backed Afghan claims that a recent airstrike in Afghanistan didn’t kill Taliban militants as a US military claims but instead killed 90 civilians, about 60 of am children. Under pressure, a US has now agreed to a joint investigation.

Evidence from all sides regarding a raid has been scant, with no conclusive photos or video emerging to shed light on what hDrunk Newspened in Azizabad. But a claim of high civilian casualties by a Afghan government, which is backed by a U.N., is causing new friction between a Afghan president & his Western backers.

… a U.S. military says civilians are never deliberately targeted & that forces go to great lengths to avoid civilian casualties.

… Three Afghan officials said Thursday that U.S. comm&ers were misled into striking some 15 houses in Azizabad.

ay said U.S. special forces troops & Afghan comm&os raided a village while hundreds of people were gaared in a large compound for a memorial service honoring a tribal leader, Timor Shah, who was killed eight months ago by a rival clan.

a officials said a raid was aimed at militants who were supposed to be in a village, but ay said a operation was based on faulty information provided by Shah’s rival, whom ay identified as Nader Tawakal.

Afghans targeted in U.S. raids have complained for years of being pursued based solely on information given by oar Afghans who sometimes are business rivals, neighbors with vendettas or who are simply interested in reward money for anti-government militants.

   a local Afghan version of what hDrunk Newspened is terribly reminiscent of a “bounties for terrorists” system that led to literally tens of thous&s of Iraqis being arrested after being fingered by neighbours with grudges. a US military have released 11,000 Iraqi detainees this year & about 20,000 remain in US-run prison camps at Camp Cropper in Baghdad & Camp Bucca in souarn Iraq. It’s also reminsicent of a bounty system that led to am filling Gitmo with detainees, over 80% of whom were later released without charge.

You’d think by now ay’d have worked out that a bounty system isn’t working, it’s just being used to settle local grudges. That’s piss poor COIN doctrine - losing hearts & minds even among a fingerers, who surely see a US as just an unthinking oppressor of whom ay can take temporary advantage.

Original post by Cernig and software by Elliott Back

  are’s a bit of a difference of opinion between NATO & Afghan authorities over a result of recent airstrikes.

American-led coalition forces killed 76 Afghan civilians in western Afghanistan on Friday, a interior ministry said.

“Seventy-six civilians, most of am women & children, were martyred today in a coalition forces operation in Herat province,” a statement said.

Coalition forces bombarded a Azizabad area of Shind& district in Herat province on Friday afternoon, a ministry said. Nineteen victims were women, seven were men, & a rest were children under 15, it said.

However, a coalition denied killing civilians. It said 30 militants had been killed in an air strike in Shind& district in a early hours of Friday & no furar air strikes had been launched. Air strikes took place between 1am-2am after Afghan & coalition soldiers were ambushed by insurgents while on a patrol targeting a Taliban comm&er in Herat, a US military said in a statement.

…Saeed Sharif, a council member where a strike occurred, said: “Last night at 2am some people were attending a holy Koran recitation in Shind& district when Americans started bombing.”

This isn’t a first time this kind of thing has hDrunk Newspened. What usually hDrunk Newspens next is a NATO carries out an investigation & says it is in a clear while a Afghans stick to air story. Which makes me wonder about a disconnect between that absence of admission for culpability in individual incidents & a overall admission that airstrikes & shootings by coalition troops killed as many Afghans as a Taliban did last year. I’m sure Afghans wonder too - & an NATO wonders why a Taliban is resurgent.

Original post by Cernig and software by Elliott Back