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Obama escalates in Afghanistan
Obama escalates in Afghanistan
by Project Mayhem
Nobel 'Peace' Prize winner Obama escalates war in Afghanistan in act of Orwellian tragedy.
Within the first several minutes of the speech , Obama , brow furrowed, aggressive and serious, was working the crowd over with frightening words like 'slaughter' , 'terror' , 'Taleban' , 'ruthless' , 'ravaged' and so on. The West Point cadets sit uncomfortably as our heroic Nobel Peace Prize winner comes out sounding far more like a Roman military commander than like compassionate and liberal sitting President. To be honest the whole process was disgusting and I will not dwell on it further, other than the fact there was no mention of this. But as we all know, truth is the first casualty in war.
In terms of the political implications of this event, it is obvious we are witnessing an a serious and long-term escalation in Afghanistan by yet another President obsessed by war and acting on behalf of banks and defense contractors. But here, by 'Afghanistan', we implicitly mean Pakistan, which must necessarily enter chaos in order to meet the political objectives of Kissinger, Brzezinski, and others. So when you hear Afghanistan, think Pakistan.
Pakistan is now ravaged by CIA Predator drone attacks and in is on the brink of civil war in the Pashtun regions. But civil war appears this was precisely the political objectives of those operating behind the scenes in the Western political establishment -- to include the CFR and Trilateral Commission. We have known for some time that Brzezinski has favored fracturing Afghanistan-Pakistan into a series of micro-states. There are four major political objectives here, which you will not hear discussed outside of closed doors.
1) Protection of the Afghan drug trade
2) Control of Eurasian Oil supplies and pipeline routes
3) Fomentation of a longer-term conflict with Russia and China
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. He definitely knows Judo..
SCO summit in Russia - June 16, 2009
The former head of Pakistani ISI from 1987 to 1989 -- Lt. Gen. Hamid
Gul (on far left in above picture)-- has made the claim that the newly
created Afghan Intelligence Agency 'RAMA' has the officially-sanctioned
purpose of destabilizing neighboring Pakistan. A bold claim indeed.
4) Access to the strategic Pakistani deep-water ports
Pakistani deep-water port. US wants it. China wants it.
Deep-water ports -- strategically important.
The troop levels in Afghanistan now rival the levels when Russia was lost amongst its' quagmire 30 years ago. Pakistan is now in play. All that is required is a Gulf of Tonkin incident.
Project Mayhem Research (PMR) is a DC/Baltimore-based grassroots think tank dedicated to exposing corruption worldwide. PMR is affiliated with Zerohedge.com, a popular and growing anti-corruption site, through contribution of free articles for the public. Topics include the politics of war and weapons systems, unexpected applications of cybernetics, the growing international surveillance state, global warming 'deindustrialization' economics, broad systemic international corruption , in-depth policy analysis of studies from bank and military funded research groups, genetic analysis and surveillance of pandemic influenza, corruption in the international gold market, the power structure and history of the global elite, and analysis of their political objectives expressed through monopolistic international finance capital (read: powerful banks) between now and 2050.
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Insightful as usual. I am sure most of the informed regulars at this site are fully aware of the United States' interest in the oil reserves of this region. They might not be so aware of the dangerous Kissinger/Brzezinski " great game" of fomenting conflict with Russia and China with the intent of preventing either power individually or cooperatively from resisting US global hegemony.Most individuals even in this well-informed, intelligent and and cynical group are probably not prepared to accept that an American President is acting to protect an unbelievably profitable drug trade. I am sure you know why protecting drug trading is government policy, and I am also sure you can lucidly explain the reasons. I hope that you have the courage to use your exceptional abilities to explain why and draw the logically inescapable implications.
Joe, lets roll back to the nineteen fifties - here we find my hard working biological uncle building a road from the western border of Afganistan to Kandahar and Kabul and beyond to the east - USA AIDs money - it is on the maps today. Beyond the oddity that they were required to buy fuel from the USSR which diesel could not handle the hot summers and so had huge cost overruns (this was cost plus, of course) the Soviets enjoyed this road in the 1980's, trying to stop the 'impulsive man' - the no government guy that is prevalent in much of the world.
This time Obama wants to hold on so his kids can enjoy the white house, so he'll more or less do what he says about acknowledged troop levels - who gives a shit they aren't drafties.
I am smarter than all and also privy to secret information. All bow before me!
I agree wholeheartedly that #4 is an objective. I at least understand #1, and I can weigh the credibility.
But as to nos. 2 and 3, I don't fully understand the points being made. With regard to control of Eurasian oil, we're missing a critical fact: how much of the existing and proposed pipelines are controlled by American companies? There are a handful of majors that have stakes in some of the Afghan pipelines, I think. But what is the overall extent? If it's trivial, then why would the U.S. be wiling to escalate its war over this issue? What's to be gained if Roseneft controls 60% of the pipleines?
My level of understanding is even less on #3. Fomentation of conflict between the west, on one hand, and China/Russia on the other? Or fomentation of conflict between China, on one hand, and Russia, on the other? The pictures don't explain it to me -- especially the last picture, which is moderately interesting but seems totally off-topic.
One final point. Those opposing the U.S. efforts in Afghanistan love to point to the Soviet defeat there. I think that's a red herring. The Soviet Union would have crushed Afghanistan in an instant if we hadn't been covertly supplying the mujahadeen. That saga was one battle in the larger Cold War, just as Vietnam was. There's no parallel now -- while Pakistan may be mischievous, they are not a superpower. As a result, I say: evaluate the merits of the U.S. involvement in Afghanistan independently. Maybe it's a good idea based on the objectives and strategies; maybe not. But the Soviet experience is not relevant.
NOTE: I am losing the right-hand side of the comment box, in which case some stuff manages to wrap around and stay visible while other stuff doesn't. Hopefully this won't come out all messed up.
As can be seen/read from this article and from the comments, there are plenty of indirect associations and dependencies.
One cannot look at the oil situation as being purely of interest only for US companies, or the US itself, though the US government has a huge interest in all of this (as world's policeman, special lobbying interests aside).
The oil embargo of the early 70s resulted in only a small percentage drop in oil production yet had a big impact on global trade.
The global system only knows growth (it's responding to the human population; though, however, the human population has been programmed for increased consumption, which has turned this all pretty ugly). What we're currently seeing economically is this very fact- there's not enough resources to fuel growth. No growth isn't going to work, let alone negative growth.
Anyone reading Jared Diamond's Collapse would have come away realizing that civilizations can collapse due to the failure of a key trading partner. And this is the key here. Those countries who get more of the oil from the middle east (the US gets something like 18% of its imported oil from there- that's a liberal number, I think it might be lower than that) face a greater threat. But... it's not even this so much as it is the impact on the globally pooled oil production- price impact. And again, THE primary reason why the world's economy is tanking is because the world's infrastructure was built for $20 - $30/bbl oil; and here we are at $80! Not only can expansion not occur, but maintenance as well cannot be kept up.
To drive this point further, just consider the precariousness of Europe with its natural gas coming from Russia.
All eggs in one basket isn't good. This concern has been there for a long time now. It's probably the primary reason why the US backed the Mujaheddin there in Afghanistan: the "fighting Commies" rhetoric is always good for lots of free money [to/for defense contractors]).
So, as Brzezinski would say, it's all a chess match. It's in the US's interested to not allow major impacts to occur to our trading partners (if they go belly up, then the US will as well).
Asymmetric warfare. That's why the Soviet experience is relevant.
Oct. 4 2008 8:31 PM ET LONDON — The senior British commander in Afghanistan says that a decisive military victory there is impossible and the Taliban may well be part of a long-term solution for the country. The Sunday Times newspaper quotes Brig.-Gen. Mark Carleton-Smith as saying that the alliance is not going to win the war. He says the issue now is about reducing the war to a manageable level of insurgency that's not a strategic threat and can be managed by the Afghan army. General Carleton-Smith says the alliance may well leave Afghanistan while there is still a low but steady rural insurgency.
http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20081004/british_vic...
I understand asymmetric warfare. And maybe it's not totally accurate to say the Soviet experience is irrelevant. More accurate would be to say that it's not remotely close to a direct parallel, as is usually implied. To the extent it's relevant, it's one of dozens of relevant examples, some of which cut the other way. The U.S. lost at asymmetric warfare/counterinsurgency in Vietnam. But in the same context, it appears to have snatched victory from the jaws of defeat in Iraq. I'm sure you could have found a senior British commander in Iraq to say the same thing five years ago.
I don't mean to be a homer. Maybe the U.S. will lose spectacularly in Afghanistan. I just don't think it's a strong logical argument to say that is more likely to happen because it happened to the Soviets, because the same elements are not in place.
Ugh... Missed my point(s)...
It's about empire. Empires, which all expansionist governments are, require ever more resources in order to cover for its expanding government. Every empire, as history bears out, ultimately falls because eventually the empire exhausts its resources trying to keep control.
You can state things in military (sounding) jargon, but that's, IMHO, way too myopic. When it's talked about "hearts and minds" it's really the core of "winning" (such as one can "win;" fact is that it's about changing mindsets about ideologies, about economics). As the people in Afghanistan know (just as the people in Iraq know), the US isn't there for the good of the people there, it's there for oil. And in order to achive access to oil resources (in the case of Afghanistan it's territory for a pipeline) the US had to use some flowery-sounding story line. Hearts and minds will never, nor should they ever, be won over on a lie.
Again my initial intent was to state that total global domination will NEVER happen. Not for the Soviet Union, and not for the US.
But in the same context, it appears to have snatched victory from the jaws of defeat in Iraq.
You seem to speak with some sense of authority/knowledge. Perhaps you could explain, because no one else has yet been able to, what constitutes "victory" in Iraq? The only measure of vicotry that I can see is that Iraqi oil was kept from being traded in euros: and long-term it's a stretch to believe that this will hold (for the USD).
No modern army has defeated an insurgency. The French in Algeria. The US in Vietnam. The Soviets in Afghanistan. The Turks in the Kurdish region of Turkey. Geez, it just goes on and on...
For those with "homer-itis," the US is mired in economic troubles (with future government commitments and diminishing resources exacerbating this condition). Its population is aging and is obese and lazy. Its infrastructure isn't sustainable. And, perhaps the most damning attribute: extreme arogance. No, these aren't the hallmarks of something robust, something that's going to expand (win "hearts and minds").
It's the Afghan terrain which makes asymmetric warfare more difficult. Look how Hezbollah stopped Israel in an asymmetric war in Northern Lebanon, difficult terrain but not as difficult as Afghanistan.
First I thought it said Ejaculates, them emasculates , damn I need better glass's.
Thanks for sharing.
It is curious that physical courage should be so common in the world, and moral courage so rare. -Mark Twain.
Anyone who thinks that the American people have one iota of control over the direction their nation is going in needs either their head examined or a new cathartic. This jackal is the just the worst sort of lying whore, a function solely of the interests, financial, arms, drug and Middle East policy, that terrify him and fund his political aspirations. We've had our democracy stolen from us. One day, the people are going to want to recover control of their public life and vermin like Obama and his associated fungi in Congress will be cringing in their offices as a sea of faces peers angrily at them from every street and mall in Washington DC. That moment just can't come soon enough.
Wow!! No doubt here!
Sep 30, 2006
General Boris Gromov, the charismatic Soviet commander who supervised the withdrawal in 1989, warned, "The Afghan resistance is, in my opinion, growing. Such behavior on the part of the intractable Afghans is to my mind understandable. It is conditioned by centuries of tradition, geography, climate and religion.
"We saw over a period of many years how the country was torn apart by civil war ... But in the face of outside aggressions, Afghans have always put aside their differences and united. Evidently, the [US-led] coalition forces are also being seen as a threat to the nation."
The 100,000-strong Soviet army operated alongside a full-fledged Afghan army of equal strength with an officer corps trained in the elite Soviet military academies, and backed by aviation, armored vehicles and artillery, with all the advantages of a functioning, politically motivated government in Kabul. And yet it proved no match for the Afghan resistance.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/HI30Df01.html
It proved no match to the "Afghan resistance" because the United States armed the Afghan's with advanced surface to air missiles and pumped billions into Pakighanistan.
About 350 Soviet helicopters lost. Nearly 5,000 helicopters lost in Viet Nam. That was not a decisive factor. The Russians are probably trading black market SAMs and RPGs for opium but it won't be the decisive factor.
Hey! don't let facts cloud the issue! LOL
Now days I hear that the Afghan army is being given AK47s because the US weapons are crap. Geez, where have I heard this before? And the "support the troops" flag-wavers don't flinch! And then there's the Humveee, need I say more?
Arogance gets you closer to death...
Interesting post, but not sure how much "research" is there.
"a bunch of cavemen in Afghanistan could have pulled off the WTC attack"
even our own government doesn't believe that. according to the 9-11 official report, the hijackers were from Saudi Arabia, planned the attacks in Germany, trained in florida and lived in various states within the US.
so why exactly are we killing Afgan people? Oil, pipelines and Opium sounds pretty believable to me
No no the cavemen work for Buffet. Of course we want the oil 'status quo' is the gig. Speciality drug sales are also the status quo and are the exclusive domain of the political system, unfortunately down to the cops who get the chump change off the streets. No politician who has risen on high has done it with clean money - nobody with established wealth cares that much, it is only for the folks who need special help that huge, impossible to find political gifts make sense
I thought they came from Canada
http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2009/04/21/napolitano-border-canada021.htm...
Hogwash,
Were this president a war monger he would have committed the troops when asked for by the General on the ground rather than being indecisive for 6 months and wavering on the issue. PM shows complete ignorance of the issue on the ground and proves once again why fringe conspiracy bloggers can be largely ignored.
If anything the president is guilty of being 2 much of wuss for committing less than the number of troops required while taking 6 months to do it...
Since when did zerohedge become infowars.com.....
hogwash?
a nice yiddish term that may come in handy for what this war is really all about. with me around i assure you, this place will not be anything like that controlled door keeper over at infowars.com. on this make my pledge....
'Complete ignorance of the issue on the ground', huh? Let me tell you, I have friends who just barely made it back from that shithole , and they told me all about it. Think 12 people , including women and children , living together in a bombed out rubble and you'll get the picture.
How about I refresh your memory with some photographs
home destroyed
Rahmatullah, 19, a victim of Friday' NATO air strike, tries to sit up on his bed in a hospital in Kabul, Afghanistan, Saturday, Sept. 5, 2009.
LASHKARGAH , Nov 5, 2009 : The body of a teenager killed by a rocket attack of the NATO-led soldiers lies in a vehicle after the residents of Babaji brought the body to the provincial capital, Lashkargah, as a protest against the killing of nine civilians. PAJHWOK/Zainullah Astanakzai
How do you get to post pictures? I have a few you'll love.
I don't see how your friends being somewhere makes you any less ignorant, and I'm not some bleeding heart liberal who gives 2 shits about your war pictures. The world is a shit hole for most of the people that live in it and it always has been and always will be. Nature is simple and unforgiving the strong survive and the weak perish, all you conspiracy nut jobs can't understand this and turn toward some bullshit ideology.
and you're so strong you have to be anonymous...
Winning hearts and minds...so sad
"Winning hearts and minds"... one corpse at a time.
If Obama wants to establish order in a drug-addled, illiterate region of the world he would do well to start with Detroit.
:-)
If Obama wants to establish order in a drug-addled, illiterate region of the world he would do well to start with Detroit.
John, you have won the post of the day! Congratulations.
Ha... easy to cheapshot Detroit when it's down... Washington also fits the bill you know and is a major reason why Detroit is on the ropes to begin with.
And , unlike Detroit, there's lots of natural gas in D.C. too.
Thank you for break in these self appointed experts, I'm a conspiratory sort, but what is he to do, kick a little ass, spend a lot of money, and see if he can get Pakistan somewhat reasonable. These things wouldn't happen, we'll go low key in Pakistan - we want Irag oil so we don't have make any changes here - guys and gals sign up for great benefits - I had $10,000 life insurance in Nam, my stepson has $250,000. To you guys that is chump change but in rural america that is money.
Detroit or Chicago, both good options for that. It's hard to get past the fact that US troops are guarding opium production.
or Chicago.
hahah
sorry for the puff ho, but couldn't find it elsewhere:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/12/02/brzezinski-calls-anti-cor_n_376...
talkin his book for sure, yet...
"Who are we to seriously be preaching [such] a crusade?" he asked. "We have a financial sector that is voraciously greedy and exploitative, to put it mildly. We have a Congress which is not immune to special interests. And we have an electoral system that is based largely on private donations which precipitate expectations of rewards. The notion of us going to the Afghans and preaching purity is comical... I think we should just quit that stuff."
p.s. poppy flowers sure are purdy...
18 months is just long enough to get the US past its midterm elections and then leave the drug dealers and goat fuckers to their own devices.
So Obama said he's going to bang Afghanistan a little harder for a while and then pull out? Somehow I never believe a man who says he's going to do that.
"To be honest the whole process was disgusting and I will not dwell on it further, other than the fact there was no mention of this. But as we all know, truth is the first casualty in war."
PM,
Truth is also the first casualty with conspiracy wingnuts. They don't want to believe the evidence their own eyes were witness to, or don't want to believe that the simplest explanation is often the best. (See:Occams Razor)
They don't want to believe that a bunch of cavemen in Afghanistan could have pulled off the WTC attack any more than they want to acknowledge or believe that some lone, loser asshole like a Lee Harvey Oswald could possibly have had the affect on world events or the course of history he had either.
I personally don't want to believe it either, but that doesn't mean it didn't happen.
If anyone seriously believes the WTC attack was an inside job with some sort of 'thermatic material', (to say nothing of a new fatal flu being deliberately released in Ukraine a few weeks back which didn't happen either) their tinfoil is on waaay too tight.
Your wild conspiracy theories have now made any of your future posts much less credible (and ignorable) except to your fellow wingnuts.
Them thar cavemen in Afghanistan were really, really good organic and inorganic chemists.
Indeed, nanotech thermitic material is their specialty.
They made it in their caves and put it in the elevator shafts of WTC 1, 2 and 7.
Great post.
Lou,
Niels Harrit found rests of an explosive in the WTC dust and published it an an scienticfic journal with peer review.
"Niels Harrit and 8 other scientists found nano-thermite in the dust from the World Trade Center. He is interviewed on danish TV2 News. People can see a full transcript, news, forum and the video in high quality here: agenda911.dk Another site in danish is encouraging people to stand forward..."
http://exercisebetter.com/Niels+Harrit/
That is not so easily dismissed as invention or conspiracy theory.
Theory? No. Just the usual, underreported geopolitics (at least in the proud US of A). Since when do human beings stop thinking about power and control?
As for WTC:
And your post is chock full of irony. I thought maybe you were joking until you replied above.
Lou629,
In what are your obvious struggles to formulate a rational (counter) argument, it would behoove you to spend some time at the following web site:
Fallacies
http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/
In particular, see:
Fallacy: Ad Hominem
http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/ad-hominem.html
As you may be aware, ad hominem is a logical fallacy.
see
http://pf11.blogspot.com
No one is forcing you to read anything.