Keeping it Real…

22 responses so far ↓

• 1 Dan. R // Nov 12, 2009 at 10:36 pm

  Yet in numerous other countries the US has put in murderous Tyrants.
  Have we forgotten 9/11 already?
  =======

  Yes that was a horrible day but in reality those deaths are peanuts compared to what the US is responsible for over the years by over throwing democratically elected people and putting Tyrants in their place.

  The reality is as long as you do what the USA says when they say it, the USA does not care what you do to the people. Look at Womens rights under Karzai.

  Remember Pinochet that murderous thug in Chile? (on 9/11 too no less but in 73) Saddam was best buds with the USA until he defied them.. Look at how the USA lets their buds in Saudi Arabia go on with human rights violations, but again they do as they are told. If any country should of been invaded and cleaned out after 9/11 Saudi Arabia should of been on the list before the US went into Iraq.

  I won’t even go on about what the USA did to many democratically elected countries in Latin America and how they put in their own dictators and thugs that towed the Washington line, it is irrefutable to that the USA did those things. In reality the USA is as bad as the Taliban.

  I wonder if the USA would stop putting their noses in everyone else’s business if we would have a more peaceful world? But as oil will start to decline, we will see US and other countries invade smaller ones for their resources.

  (Resources: It’s true…the U.S. has supported terrible regimes ..including the Taliban and even Saddam at one time. But that’s what world powers do to protect their interests, awful as it may seem to us. However my argument with submissions like yours is that too many people are ALWAYS SO ONE-SIDED. What about the Russians and the Chinese? Were you not paying attentrion when the Russkies not long ago invaded Georgian territory, murdered hundreds and still haven’t given back the land they violently seized?? (Not to mention their history in Poland, Ukraine, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Hungary, Czech., etc etc.) Ask the people there which imperialistic power they prefer! And what about China? Ask the people of Tibet, or the Weyghurs of the north, who are being swamped purposely by Han Chinese; or the people of North Korea, who are literally dying every day, thanks to a ruthless regime, propped up by China. Ask the poor of Africa who see China making deals for resources with their dictators and corrupt governments But No, it’s only America that gets condemned ..until, of course, there’s a sunami or hurricane or earthquake …. then everyone looks to the USA for help. Why not Russia , China ..or the billionaire Arab states, who smile at us ..and then lavishly fund and host terrorist groups in many, many countries around the world? Why only the U.S.? h.o.)

• 2 Kim // Nov 12, 2009 at 10:49 pm

  http://www.rabble.ca/rabbletv/program-guide/2009/08/features/malalai-joya-speaks-out-ahead-afghan-elections

  http://www.lindamcquaig.com/Columns/ViewColumn.cfm?REF=106

  http://www.harperindex.ca/ViewArticle.cfm?Ref=0021

  http://www.rawa.org/rawa.html

  Shah H., are you in touch with family in Afghanistan? The sources I have here strike me as reliable, especially RAWA and Malalai Joya.

• 3 Kim // Nov 13, 2009 at 2:11 am

  Harv, absolutely those atrocities occurred in those places. Have you read Naomi Klein’s “Shock Doctrine, the rise of disaster capitalism”? Have you heard of the Chicago school of economics? School of the America’s? Milton Freidman? These are the people who perfected the art of dismantling democracy in those places you mention. Their teachings are alive and well in Kabul. Recommended reading.

  Absolutely we should be terrified by China, who our Forest Minister, The City Council of Sooke, the Prime Minister, are all currently visiting in order to sell off our resources and therefore our sovereignty. The country who we have been made to depend on to manufacture everything that we consume. The country that feels that human rights are not an issue? The country that holds in it’s hands 27 Trillion of US debt? Yes, I’m afraid.

  I thought we were discussing Afghanistan though. Did You check out Malalai Joya?

  (Response: The discussion seems to have expanded. No Joya yet. h.o)

• 4 Kim // Nov 13, 2009 at 5:20 am

  http://creekside1.blogspot.com/2009/02/rory-stewart-on-afghanistan.html

• 5 Norman Farrell // Nov 13, 2009 at 6:06 am

  It is good to see that a majority of comments to your blog are reasonably respectful of different viewpoints. None of us share the same experiences, values and emotions or the same sources of information. Of course, we will hold differing opinions, and should.

  What all of us can agree is that no easy answers are available. America has been unable to rebuild or reduce poverty in New Orleans and Canada has not solved the indignities facing its aboriginal people. Can we hold up our heads and tell the Afghans what is best for them? We can, but not without hypocrisy.

• 6 Shah // Nov 13, 2009 at 6:43 am

  Kim,
  Let me be clear I am not advocating long term foreign occupation. That will not work. What I am saying is we cannot wash our hands and just walk away.

  Throwing money at the problem is not the answer either. Afghan need the world’s help in rebuilding. The educated population left decades ago. There needs to be skilled professionals brought in to train the locals.

  And let’s take about corruption. Can we all say ‘fast ferries’. regardless off where you are, large amounts of money put into the hands of a few will lead to huge problems.

• 7 Shah // Nov 13, 2009 at 6:58 am

  I find amusing our love to hate relationship with the US. On one hand we trash them on the other hand we lineup for hours to go to the US for their goods. In times of peace down with the US but at any sign of trouble we are crawling on our knees to Washington for help.

  We can’t have it both ways.

  (Response: Perfectly put! h.o.)

• 8 Kim // Nov 13, 2009 at 6:50 pm

  Shah, you comment about reconstruction efforts. Absolutely, but not carried out by our military, or anyone’s. The UN had a plan in 2002 to go in, but they were only allowed 4500 bodies to accomplish that. The money would have to go directly to the women, they are proven to hold the interests of the community first.

  Could you put the ‘fast ferries’ behind you already! Puhleeeese! We have german ferries now, and I hear they run really well, and are great on fuel!

  I don’t shop in the states, I can’t afford the ferry off the island. And if I had a problem, I’d probably look in my own backyard for help.

• 9 Leah // Nov 13, 2009 at 11:27 pm

  “In times of peace down with the US but at any sign of trouble we are crawling on our knees to Washington for help.”

  When have we crawled on our knees to the US for help?

  Perhaps it’s time to view a different side of what appears to some as being “down on America”…I’m not…but I am “up on Canada.” I don’t view the US as being a lesser country than ours, but I sure as hell don’t view as a greater one either. I only wish our politicians could see our worth separate, and apart from our neighbour to the South instead of trying to create a newer, bigger, better North American Union. I’m quite happy to have the two remain separate, but friendly.

• 10 A. G. Tsakumis // Nov 14, 2009 at 8:42 am

  My mother was a little girl during the Second World War. She read by candlelight while the Luftwaffe engines broke the black, sooted sky with a cadence so decidedly evil, she swears that she can still hear them. When she talks about how one of her little friends was killed in the town square, and the mother raped, you cannot hold a dry eye…

  Some years ago, when I was sitting on one of the benches left behind at Auschwitz, I thought about my mother, and began to cry. Not because she was gone, but because she managed to live. You cannot be a human and walk through that camp and not feel the weight of the lives extinguished. You can still smell death, if you’ve ever had to smell it before (I worked on the DTES for many years).

  Mom was raised Christian but my grandfather’s family were half Jews. She doesn’t talk about it still, but I suspect it was because of the interminable fear that they might have gotten carted away–and it stuck. I think it’s why she became such a strong Christian…

  In October 2001, the year my only son was born, (three days after 9/11) , I was in LAX waiting for a connector to Scottsdale and I was reading the WSJ. There was an open letter to the President on how bin Laden’s anti-Americanism was really fueled by anti-Semitism. It was well-written compelling piece, by a woman who survived Dachau (although her mother, three brothers and sister did not–her father was shot by the SS). While I cannot recall the entire column, verbatim, I will never forget her closing: “One day I will be gone, but you must remember me. I am no different from any of the little girls you will rescue from the plains of hell. For if you do not, my blood will be on your hands, as my rescue from the Germans will have been in vain. My life will have meant nothing.”

  There are no better reasons for any of you bleeding hearts on this issue, to try to come to grips with than this: There are people who have been savaged, no differently, in fact, quite similarly, to how the Jews were terminated in those ungodly camps. Are you willing to watch because your hate of America and George Bush, trumps your ability to understand the pain in my mother’s eyes, or in the trembling hand of the woman who wrote the op/ed piece I wrote about? Gays, women, children, Christians and Jews are all at risk in the sickening Middle East (that I have traveled), but you keep bumping for the conspiracy obliviots and for “peaceful” methods of arm-wrestling the devil. At this rate Ahmadinejhad would be your choice for Secretary General of the UN, and Chavez an Ambassador at-large.

  You should be forced to visit the Wiesenthal Center in LA (where I am a proud annual contributor).

  You should be forced to sit with someone who has seen evil first hand and then offer up some psychobabble about American “tyranny” or imperialism and oil.

  We should hold off on stopping the killing fields of Iraq or Afghanistan because of past Americans sins, should we?

  Well, then you can go to hell…because I’m coming with you, along with everyone else.

  Think…

  (Response: I hope everyone who fllows my blog will read this comment … at least TWICE. h.o.)

• 11 A. G. Tsakumis // Nov 14, 2009 at 8:51 am

  As for our friend the Afghan, you are a HERO, Sir, for having the intentesinal fortitude to tell it like it is…

  Bless you and your family.

• 12 Norman Farrell // Nov 14, 2009 at 8:50 pm

  A.G. T. – Is he a hero for speaking out, or for agreeing with you? I suggest that Malalai Joya demonstrated real heroism, trying to speak out as an Afghan legislator while targeted for death by misogynist warlords.

  She speaks in Vancouver Nov 14, by the way.

  http://www.malalaijoya.com/index1024.htm

• 13 RC // Nov 15, 2009 at 4:00 pm

  Don’t Do It

  Looking up Afghanistan in the CIA Fact Book reveals the nation’s official population tally at some 28 million.

  But that number is totally, dangerously wrong.

  Dangerous because the erroneous population count sets the stage for a certain failure of the United States military’s efforts in Afghanistan, and even raises the possibility of a nuclear conflagration.

  I will attempt to quickly explain.

  The story begins with an Englishman by the name of Mortimer Durand who, in 1893, was tasked with drawing a border separating Afghanistan from British conquests in India. Other than dictates from the Raj to assure the Brits kept the strategic parts, Durand’s line was arbitrary.

  In this way was divided the population of Afghani Pashtuns, the region’s dominant ethnic group.

  On one side of the invisible line, in modern-day Afghanistan, live about 12 million Pashtuns (out of a total population of 28 million). Tucked up against the other side of the line, in what now constitutes Pakistan, live another 25 million Pashtuns.

  Simply, they are members of the same large family – a family with a long and colorful history of putting aside their internecine shoot-ups in order to come together to wear down and ultimately defeat far stronger and better equipped invaders.

  Now, look at the map here.

  <>

  As you can’t miss, there is very long and uninterrupted border between the countries of Afghanistan and Pakistan. A border no more substantial than the ink Durand used to draw it over a century ago.

  Across that border, in a region of incredibly hard terrain, flows an almost uninterrupted exchange of relatives, food, guns, refugees, and warriors in need of rest and sustenance, donkeys, RPGs, and any other thing the Pashtuns and other Afghani insurgent groups want to move in one direction or the other.

  In the past, I have referenced (and recommended) David Galula’s excellent manual Counter Terrorist Warfare: Theory and Practice, the very same manual that General Petraeus, on taking the reins in Iraq, purchased in bulk for his officers. In his book, Galula lays out the required conditions for success in fighting a guerilla war. At the top of the list is that the insurgents can have no safe sanctuary to which they can retreat to for rest and resupply.

  Simply, the Pakistani Pashtun problem alone makes sending more troops into Afghanistan a non-starter. The border separating the Pashtun populations is too long and too rough to control. And so the insurgency will never want for supplies, sanctuary, or fresh soldiers for its struggle. That gives it a staying power well beyond that the latest crop of invaders will be able to manage as the months and years string out and the casualties rise.

  Of course, the U.S. could decide to take the war to the Pakistani Pashtuns, using more than just drone strikes. But such an invasion would necessitate pacifying a large, well-armed, and hostile population. It would also likely result in the toppling of our allies in the fragile Pakistani regime. That could then require an even broader action or risk Pakistan’s nukes falling under the radicals’ control. And that would quickly bring India into the picture.

  In other words, should the U.S. decide to invade nuclear-armed Pakistan, the whole situation would quickly get so wiggly that there’s no telling where it could lead, but it’s doubtful it would lead anywhere good.

  Which leaves the U.S. and its allies with only two alternatives. Get out or continue trying to pacify the Pashtuns (among others) in Afghanistan, while a huge number of their brethren are actively are cheering them on – and providing material support – from just across Durand’s line. While I am no expert, I have read enough history – and Galula’s manual – to form the strong opinion that such an effort will end poorly.

  Maybe we can get tougher? Really take off the gloves and all that stuff?

  Well, it’s hard to imagine how we could get tougher than the Soviets, or Genghis Khan, or Alexander the Great, or all the other invaders that didn’t just capture the region but actively tried to exterminate the population. The Soviets, much to their discredit, actually went so far as to drop bombs designed to look like toys, in order to blow off the arms of the next generation of mujahedeen.

  The Afghans are still standing.

  Then there’s the all-important question, what exactly is it we are fighting for? On that topic, I’ll have to defer to someone who purportedly knows — or should know: Ambassador Richard Holbrooke, the U.S. special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan. Two months ago, he was asked which benchmark the U.S. was using to measure its success and progress in Afghanistan. His response, “We’ll know it when we see it.”

  Pathetic.

  So, why am I writing this article, knowing that it will offend pro-war readers?

  First and foremost, because of my distain for foreign adventures and my hope that a pushback from an increasing number of Americans will keep Obama from going deeper into Afghanistan. Secondly, there is a moral issue here. We can’t very well call ourselves the land of the free if we are fighting wars here, there, and everywhere for objectives that even our senior diplomat in the area is unable to enunciate.

  And then there is the less important, but still important, question of finances.

  Namely, the U.S. is already broke. Thus, the idea of spending trillions of dollars on a war with no clear objective and no clear enemy is not just stupid, it is madness. I read recently that the U.S. spends $350 million a day on fuel alone in Afghanistan and Iraq. Money that is ultimately being spent to support a fraudulent regime that condones the sort of religious intolerance you’d expect to be championed by a mullah from the Middle Ages.

  Finally, there is the truth inherent in the old saying, “War is the health of the state.” This war, like so many others, opens the door for the government not only to rationalize the sort of fiscal irresponsibility just discussed, but also to exert more and more control over the populace, all in the name of “national security.” Over the last 100 years, the U.S., despite its high-road self-image, has engaged in more wars, in more countries, than all of the other Western powers combined. Of course, some have made more sense than others. But this one makes no sense at all.

  In my opinion, having fired off some shots that cost far too many lives, it’s time for the U.S. to end this madness and head home. Sticking our face ever deeper into the dark hole that is Afghanistan is not just futile, it’s crazy.

  Don’t do it.

  http://www.caseyresearch.com/displayCddPrint.php?id=277

  (Response: You disdain foreign adventures. So we should not have gone to save Europe during the First or Second World Wars?? Some foreign adventures THERE save us from dangers/attack HERE. And if you don’t think Al Qaeda and other radical Islamic groups would attack us here, kill thousands if they could , you aren’t listening to what THEY THEMSELVES say. h.o)

• 14 sunshine coast girl // Nov 15, 2009 at 4:44 pm

  I haven’t said anything during this discussion because of the respect that I have for you Harvey. But I thoroughly disagree with your column. Here are the words of a female Afghani who was also a politician and marked for death because of her position. I’m more inclined to listen to her. Perhaps you should also listen to her A.G. Tsakumis, as she has a much different story than yours (as legitimate and painful as it is).

  http://www.timescolonist.com/news/Afghan+speak+Victoria+believes+occupation+answer/2225631/story.html

  (Response: In any country, free or not, peole have different views, even if they are constrained from saying it for fear of arrest etc. Her view, from what she has seen, is quite different from mine (based on what I have read or seen reported). So of course you might tend to accept her version over mine. However ,what I find most perplexing is how you accept her view, but reject the view of Shah, who is also from Afghanistan and wrote on my blog supporting our actions. Perhaps becasue she fits your pre-conceived leaning, and he fits mine? h.o.)

• 15 A. G. Tsakumis // Nov 15, 2009 at 10:24 pm

  Good grief….more lather than a bubble bath.

  The whole issue boils down to this, in case it wasn’t so clear in my previous note: the entire lot of nutters and whackjobs who “govern various, dare I say, most, countries in the Middle East are all-consumed by anti-Israeli, anti-Semitic bromide. They want to wipe Israel from the map, and continue to stop young girls from going to school; degrade and dehumanize through acts like clitoral mutilation; deny homosexuals the right to free expression, freedom of anything; expand the many classes of poor so that wealthier castes can reward 16 year olds with 18KT Ferraris; mauling Christians and Jews; building nuclear arsenals and, ultimately, to seek world domination.

  No?

  After Ahmadinejhad suggested that Israel should be “wiped from the map”, how many surrounding countries in the Middle East condemned his words? One: Israel.

  All this other historical revisionism and manipulation means nothing.

  There is no ‘pro-war’ crowd on this blog. I hate war, in case reading doesn’t come easy, a few posts up , I just finished telling you of how my mother and I can’t talk about her childhood. Miss that? And I can’t think of a more decent guy than Oberfeld. Harv’s a war monger because he’s got his head screwed on right, eh?

  Iraq and Afghanistan must be tightly held by the West, or the Middle Eastern countries will fully conspire, quietly or not, to eliminate Israel, and if another Holocaust ensues, that’s okay, because the brave and gallant Canadian soldier will have been spared from the very risk inherent in becoming one. What a bunch of nanny-state bleeders!

  The war effort by this country is entirely in line with the fine traditions of servicemen and servicewomen that we have offered the world from the Great War on.

  And no amount of frothy mouthed nonsense from some Afghani woman co-opted by the peace movement is going to change that, or the threat to Israel or the rest of us might as well hit DEFCON 1.

  How come you don’t offer an opportunity to listen to the endless number of academics and Afghani ex-pats who give a thumbs up to the war effort?

  Oh, sorry, you must be busy watching news reports this morning intimating how the Iranians are further developing their uranium.

  Strictly for nuclear energy, of course…

  (Response: As always, it will no doubt end with us realists havng to save the rear ends of all the skeptic types who throughout history believedthe lines delivered by people like Chamberlain, Kennedy Sr., Ford and Lingbergh and those who dismised reports of concentration camps as ridiculous “myth” and who thought the Soviet Union just wanted to liberate the Balkans/ Hungary etc. h.o)

• 16 Norman Farrell // Nov 15, 2009 at 10:54 pm

  Harvey, you pose a good question. It’s fair to ask the reverse of you. Are you admitting that you featured Shah’s views because they fit your pre-conceptions?

  I don’t want to dwell on that because, the more important fact is that you open your blog to different and conflicting views. That’s what I wish would happen at large media outlets. Unfortunately, it doesn’t happen. For example, letters to the editor at Canwest die a quick death if they effectively challenge conventional wisdom.

  The comment above from RC, repeating an article first published at Casey Research, has good points to ponder. I don’t share their entire world view but their statements are certainly worth reading.

  These last few days Keeping it Real has been an excellent forum for exchange of ideas. Thanks.

  (Response: Partly yes. Especially after receiving such a widespread negative reaction to my view! But notice I published them all! However, I decided his deserved special treatment also because he was the only one to write to this blog, from his personal perspective and experience of actually being Afghan and directly from there. (Just like I featured a letter from an actual paramedic ..not one from the rest of us chatting about them.) h.o)

• 17 Norman Farrell // Nov 15, 2009 at 11:16 pm

  So we learn from A.G.T. that views different than his are “frothy mouthed nonsense” and that most countries in the middle east are led by “nutters and whackjobs” who favor, among other things, genital mutilation.

  “… Al-Azhar Supreme Council of Islamic Research, the highest religious authority in Egypt, issued a statement saying FGM/C has no basis in core Islamic law or any of its partial provisions and that it is harmful and should not be practiced.”

• 18 Kim // Nov 16, 2009 at 6:25 pm

  I agree with RC and Norman. He makes a great point about the stimulating debate that is possible here. I also agree with him that AGT is beginning to resort to personal attacks here. I understand his experiences with WW2 were intensely personal, but in his assumption that he’s arguing with bleeding heart liberals here, I have to take exception to that.

  As a bleeding heart liberal I served my country for fifteen years in total. I also supported my husband that he could serve and now, proudly my son serves. I see my job now as ensuring that any conflict we engage in is true and ethical, and that our leaders are transparent with regards to foreign actions.

  I won’t bother going into other reasoning on this as RC, Norman and Sunshine coast already did. Apparently we’re going to have to agree to disagree on this one.

• 19 A. G. Tsakumis // Nov 16, 2009 at 6:27 pm

  Norman, I stated “most” countries in the Middle East.

  But you keep believing false rhetoric and spin from any of them.

• 20 Romeogolf // Nov 23, 2009 at 6:53 am

  Equating the threat of Al Qaeda with that presented by the Nazis amounts to hyperbole. Their respective military capabilities are vastly different.

  I also find the arguments made here for staying in Afghanistan to rely more on emotion than a careful analysis of the situation, taking into consideration different factors and points of view. Statements, like “If we leave Afghanistan alone, there will be another 9/11.” are easily thrown out, but without any supporting information or argument.

• 21 genuine // Nov 26, 2009 at 4:18 am

  You know this is a little off topic ,but that little thing about torture in Afghanistan,all the hullabaloo….there’s a simple solution why not have a vote in the house of commons ,and start using that minority govt. that can do so much for us,let’s have a vote in the house to release those letters (hope there not deleted),and then the people themselves could decide who’s the next govt.,will be in the next election!!!!!

• 22 Romeogolf // Dec 7, 2009 at 7:38 pm

  You’ll find numerous Afghanis speaking out in this documentary who hold a different point of view to the NATO presence there: http://www.snagfilms.com/films/title/rethink_afghanistan_part_1_military_escalation/.

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