Misspent Resources

This morning’s paper didn’t even carry the story, but the BBC informed us this morning that a major offensive is going on in Afghanistan where coalition troops are trying to push the Taliban out of an area where they have been regaining more and more control.

The BBC’s interviewer made it abundantly clear that the military representative he was interviewing was being much less open than he usually was when he evaded questions about coalition progress and whether or not any significant Taliban leaders had been killed or captured.

The general picture, though, was that the fighting had initially been intense but had eased off somewhat over the last 24 hours or so and that the coalition was making headway.

I find it ironic that the Bush Administration, here given an opportunity to finally announce some good news about its efforts in the “war against terror”, is offering no word at all about this battle. Why would that be?

Perhaps the spin doctors think that any reference to pushing the Taliban back offers too big an opportunity for opponents to point out that after our invasion of Afghanistan the Taliban should never have had an opportunity to come back at all. They could be right about that.

Maybe they are afraid that someone might say that if we had put into Afghanistan a quarter of the resources we have poured down the rathole in Iraq, we would by now have put the Taliban totally out of commission, found Osama bin Laden, ground Al Qaida into the dust, and probably eased the problems now being faced by Pakistan.

Maybe they fear that someone might point out that the reason we didn’t do that is because Afghanistan lacks Iraq’s oil. Afghanistan offers only a path for us to use to run an oil pipeline from Russia’s Kirghiz fields, while Iraq offers one-third of all the oil the Middle East has to offer.

Perhaps then someone might have drawn the conclusion that BushCo’s war in Iraq really has nothing to do with Saddam Hussein and his WMDs or with the “war on terror” and everything to do with American control of Middle East power and oil.

Believe it or not, I supported Mr. Bush when he announced that we were going to Afghanistan to root out the Taliban and terrorists they supported. Our “war against terror” should have been a war against Osama bin Laden. The Taliban should have been eliminated because of their open support of his hostility, and we should have put our efforts at government building into Afghanistan and not Iraq. We could have dramatically improved the lot of the people of Afghanistan while demonstrating our sensibility to the rest of the world. Instead we have demonstrated our irrational bellicosity and our willingness to trade our humanity for the mask of power. Pray that our next administration will have the sense to turn us around.


Be the change you wish to see in the world. -- M. K. Gandhi

Individually we have little voice. Collectively we cannot be ignored.
But in silence we surrender our power. Yours in Peace -- BR

The reason for going was to keep the crude flowing and raise a false flag abroad. – from a poem by Jack Evans titled 3500 Souls - http://www.myspace.com/paralegal_eagle