There is a difference my friends when you're trying to define a war versus a military action. And, Afghanistan IS NOT A WAR. Because G Dubya calls it a "war on terror", it does not make it a war.
It's Bullshit!!! Pure Bullshit! If it was a f@#king war, there would be 100,000 plus troops there bombing the shit out of everything in sight. It's a military action put in place to stop a group of people called the Taliban - the same Taliban that the US government propped up for years against the Russians. We're supposed to be there to prop up a rampantly corrupt government, get rid of Al-Queda, and rebuild some infrastructure. So, does anyone in their right mind see that happening in the immediate future? When I say immediate, I mean within the next ten years. Anyone?
I, for one, will call this an "UNWINNABLE WAR". Russia couldn't beat the Taliban and our 35,000 NATO forces scattered all over the place aren't gonna beat them either. So my question is: HOW MANY MORE CANADIAN MEN AND WOMEN ARE WE WILLING TO LET COME HOME IN CASKETS AFTER 2009??? 100? 1000? 10,000? WE'VE ALREADY LOST 2.5% OF OUR CURRENT DEPLOYMENT THERE.
In the meantime, we have a little 2.5 million person genocide going on that nobody gives a rats ass about.
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The Taliban's first military action was in 1994. The Americans supported the mujhadeen. These are not the same people (though they are minimally overlapping sets).
Anyway, I get it that you think the Taliban should be asked to certainly take power immediately and not perhaps take it in two or ten years.
well put, couldn't of said it better myself, my big beaf is the war crimals, drug dealers and warlords we are proping up with the lives of our boys and girls...its uncanadian and discusting.
I would much rather send our troops to keep the peace somewhere where they don't use IDEs. Surely there are other countries that could use some schools and roads! And what about Sudan!?
Tell the children of Afghanistan that they are not living in a war zone.
It's not about symantics. What is the difference really?
There was an awful oppressive gov't in Afghanistan who was stripping its people of basic human rights and allowing terrorists to use its land as a training ground to destablize the world. Something had to be done about it. Nobody WANTS a war, but perhaps stronger action with more NATO support and we wouldn't be having this argument. It would and should be in the reconstruction phase. The USA took it's eye of the real target.
Our soldiers should be proud of fighting a noble mission/war/whatever. There should have been more support for it and dealt with it more swiftly. This was/is not unwinnable. But as Dion says, we need to get a handle on the Poppy fields. That is the major problem and the only way to destabilize the Taliban.
The argument about the US proping up the Taliban is a red herring. Not relevant, but certainly a big mistake in retrospect.
Tell the 2.5 million in Darfur their lives are worthless.
We went to Afghanistan NOT for the Taliban, but to "find" Osama and Al-quaeda. Just remember that.
Russia already tried to kill the Taliban. Didn't work.
If you want them gone, send another 100,000 troops and get rid of them just as Vietnam got rid of the Khmer Rouge from their country. While you're at it establish a new Pakistani government as well.
BTW. The children will suffer more with an escalated action. Korea wasn't a war either. It was know as a Policing action.
Jim,
You are wrong on several counts.
First, Russia did not try to kill the Taliban, an organization which emerged some years after Russian withdrawal. Nor did we fund them during the 80s, as you suggest above.
Second, the NATO invasion was in fact tasked with removing the Taliban as the government of Afghanistan, not only finding bin Laden.
Third, the Khmer Rouge was in Cambodia. Which is not Vietnam.
Fourth, no one is guiltless in our neglect of Darfur, but you are providing a clearly false choice. We are not not in Darfur because we are in Afghanistan and it's near deceitful to suggest otherwise. We are not in Darfur because there is no multilateral consensus to go and because we (Canada) do not have the will to do so in the absence of such a consensus. It's for shame, I agree.
Do you know that in 1998 the Taliban killed more than 8000 civilians in a two days and then left their bodies to rot in the streets for six more? Surely such actions would repeat if we left Afghanistan to them again. I'd think hard about that before I started accusing those who support the mission in Afghanistan of turning a blind eye to the suffering of civilians, whether in Afghanistan or Darfur.
Okay. Allow me backtrack and concede.
1. The Vietnamese sure as hell did drive the Khmer Rouge out of Cambodia. I suppose it was lost in the wording. Nonetheless, that is how you get rid of an unwanted group.
2. The Russians, like the Americans, were invited into Afghanistan by the ruling government of the day. I'll concede the mujahadin as the enemy and not the Taliban. Score one for you. Nonetheless, The Russians were invited in and could never win the hearts and minds, suffered major casualties and went home empty. That was with 80,000 soldiers, 2 tank brigades, 2 helicopter brigades, and an entire air force.
Out of that lovely military action came the wonderful Al-quaeda and taliban groups. All were trained - including the mujahadin - and funded by the US.
History of the Taliban 101
The Taliban initially had enormous goodwill from Afghans weary of the corruption, brutality and incessant fighting of Mujahideen warlords. Two contrasting narratives of the beginnings of the Taliban are that the rape and murder of boys and girls from a family traveling to Kandahar or a similar outrage by Mujahideen bandits sparked Mullah Omar and his students to vow to rid Afghanistan of these criminals. The other is that the Pakistan-based lorry shipping mafia known as the "Afghanistan Transit Trade" and their allies in the Pakistan government, trained, armed and financed the Taliban to clear the southern road across Afghanistan to the Central Asian Republics of extortionate bandit gangs. What actually marks the beginning of the Taliban is when, in the late 1970s, the CIA and the ISI (Pakistan's Interservices Intelligence Agency) started the process of gathering radical Muslims from around the world to fight against the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. Osama Bin Laden was one of the key players in organizing these U.S. backed training camps for the Muslims. The U.S. poured funds and arms into Afghanistan and "by 1987, 65,000 tons of U.S.-made weapons and ammunition a year were entering the war" . The Taliban were based in the Helmand, Kandahar and Uruzgan region, and were overwhelmingly ethnic Pashtuns and predominantly Durrani Pashtuns. They received training and arms from Pakistan, the U.S. as well as other Middle Eastern countries who had been recruited by the U.S. to thwart the Soviet invasion of this region.
So you see, the Russians did fight the Taliban. And for the US it was a matter of "the enemy of my enemy is my friend".
Now, we, as the Russians were, were invited by the ruling government of the day. So, I ask you, How we making out? We're already 5 years in.
3. I cringe when I hear of the mass murders you speak of. Iraq had them. Yugoslavia had them. Somalia...Darfur, and the list continues. Bad wars are bad wars. Iraq is one of them. Vietnam was one of them. Afghanistan/Russia was one of them. And, now, Afghanistan is one of them again.
4. World peace, stopping genocides, defending the denfenseless and saving the world has always been Canada's calling on the world stage. Propping up weak and corrupt governments is the job of the US.
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