The War on Afghanistan

[Potyondi]

I don't know if this has been posted yet, since I'm new here, but I thought I'd post it anyhow:
---------------------------------------------
DURHAM, NEW HAMPSHIRE - December 10 - More than 3,500 civilians have been killed in Afghanistan by U.S. bombs, according to a study to be released December 10 by Marc W. Herold, Professor of Economics, International Relations, and Women's Studies at the University of New Hampshire. Professor Herold will announce his findings on Monday, December 10 in a discussion with award-winning journalist, Amy Goodman of Democracy Now! in Exile's War and Peace Report (http://www.democracynow.org).

...

For each day since October 7, when the U.S. bombing of Afghanistan began, he lists the number of casualties, location, type of weapon used, and source(s) of information. Following are several examples from his daily calculations:

On October 11, two U.S. jets bombed the mountain village of Karam, comprised of 60 mud houses, during dinner and evening prayer time, killing 100-160 people. Sources: DAWN, (English language Pakistani daily newspaper), the Guardian of London, the Independent, International Herald Tribune, the Scotsman, the Observer, and the BBC News.


On October 13, in the early morning, an F-18 dropped 2,000 lb. JDAM bombs on the Qila Meer Abas neighborhood, 2 kms. South of the Kabul airport, killing four people. Sources: Afghan Islamic Press, Los Angeles Times, Frontier Post, Pakistan Observer, the Guardian of London, and the BBC News.


On October 31, in a pre-dawn raid, an F-18 dropped a 2,000 lb. JDAM bomb on a Red Crescent clinic, killing 15 - 25 people. Sources: DAWN, the Times of London, the Independent, the Guardian, Reuters, Associated Press, and Agence France Presse.
Professor Herold has sought whenever possible to cross-corroborate accounts of civilian casualties. He relied upon British, Canadian, and Australian newspapers; Indian newspapers, especially The Times of India; three Pakistani daily newspapers; the Singapore News; Afghan Islamic Press; Agence France Press; Pakistan News Service; Reuters; BBC News Online; Al Jazeera; and a variety of other reputable sources, including the United Nations and other relief agencies.

http://www.commondreams.org/news2001/1210-01.htm
---------------------------------------------------

Here's another one:
http://www.zmag.org/carrollbloody.htm

(Edited by Potyondi at 12:03 am on Jan. 22, 2002)

[Dreadnaht1]

It's disgusting that we're bombing a country that didn't really commit the crimes we're blaming them for. And of course we're doing an absolutely horrible job of bombing them. Flying at rediculously high altitudes dropping very cheaply made bombs can only equal hitting off target. So when we bomb in heavily populated areas, like Kabul, and we miss targets human lifes can only expected to be taken.

But of course, the U$A has found a way around this through the means of propaganda. With both instilling insane nationalism into the people of U$A and by instilling the ideas that the Afghans hate us for no reason seems to make a volitile combination. In other words, the magority of U$A just want the innocent people of Afghanistan dead. They feel that their lives are worthless compared to ours.

In a pole taken 60% of the American people want Usama Bin Laden killed no matter what the cost of innocent life. It's disgusting. But it doesn't suprise me now that we've put in a corrupt regime that we will benefit from. $$$$$ is all this nation cares about. Again, not suprising.

-Dread

[Kez]

Comrades, although i like my comrades here do not wish to see yankee imperialism stride over the world, we must remember that the taliban is being screwed over, and the taliban are much worse than, yes, the USA.

we musnt be used by the taliban as to be supporting the taliban.

Comrade kamo

[CommieBastard]

the USA is worse than the taleban, because though the taleban are more overtly restrictive of freedoms, the USA is both covert in it's oppression, and most importantly of all, has the power to carry it out on a much more massive scale. Hell, the Americans have got their fingers in so many despotic pies world wide that their hands are even covered in the blood attributable to the afghans... umm, or to avoid using a mixed metaphor... the americans set the taleban up, they are the ones ultimately responsible for the talebans crimes. And not to mention the crimes of all US corporations, and most of the dictators worldwide, especially in latin america.

[revolutionary]

The taliban are worse because the taliban is a dictatorship based on enforcement of Religion. Religion caused hatred and the belief that one person is inferior to another because of their believes. Gods are fiction, set up to distract the ppl and stop them revolting and fighting for what they want, it is a ancient way of stopping the ppl asking questions.

[peaccenicked]

The Taleban was an evil regime but what gives Bush the right to knock them over and replace them by another regime which in some areas is worse. They have no right in the region whatsoever. they have admitted they have no evidence against Bin laden that would stand up in a court of law. It is not a matter of supporting the taleban. It is a matter of supporting rawa and the revolutionary forces against the Taleban, the northern alliance and yankee mass murder.

[CommieBastard]

The USA is worse because they are just the taleban, but with power...
whereas the taleban use religion to keep people in place, the USA uses the beleif in money.
Whereas the taleban says that non-beleivers are inferior, the USA says the same about the non-beleivers in money, BUT ALSO about those with slightly less money than others.
The USA propogates the lie that it is the proletariats fault that they are poor.

The USA is a dictatorship based upon the changing of the tyrant every 5 years.

not to mention that the state and religion seperation are getting screwed about in the US anyway...

[HardcoreCommie]

no, no, the taliban is worse beca....what the hell, once again, you are all *****es...

[Dreadnaht1]

I don't think anyone sided with the Taliban in the first place. We are all against the taliban, U$A, and the northern alliance. These people in Afghanistan need something that's stable, democratic, and socialist.

-Dread

[peaccenicked]

Robert Fisk lets rip at AmeriKKKa again
http://www.zmag.org/content/TerrorWar?fisk...ats-america.cfm (http://www.zmag.org/content/TerrorWar?fisk_congrats-america.cfm) I am getting a diectory list denied message now
but here is a copy anyway.
Congratulations, America.
You have made bin Laden a happy man

by Robert Fisk
The Independent (UK)
January 22, 2002

Taken to a remote corner of the world where they may be executed, where the laws of human rights are suspended. Sounds to me like the Middle East. Shackled, hooded, threatened with death by "courts" that would give no leeway to defence or innocence. In fact, it sounds like Beirut in the 1980s.

I've written this story before. Last time, I remember writing about the threats to my kidnapped journalist friend Terry Anderson of the Associated Press, tied up, hooded, always threatened by his "Islamist" captors in Lebanon. That was between 1986 and 1991 and Terry – let us remember this distinction – was no man of violence. He was a journalist, a comrade, a friend. But he was most cruelly treated, allowed no contacts with his family, held in cold confinement, threatened with death every bit as absolute as the American military courts that know they hold the fate of al-Qa'ida's men in their hands.

And then I remember the revolting prison of Khiam where Israel locked up its Lebanese adversaries – real and presumed, none tried by a court – and where prisoners were brought, shackled, hooded, sedated, for questioning. Their interrogation included electric torture – electrified metal attached to penis and nipples (there were women prisoners, too) – which could never happen at Guantanamo Bay, as America's Israeli allies taught their Lebanese militia men in 1980. They in turn taught it to their Lebanese Shia militia enemies who used electricity on their captives. America, Israel's friend, could have closed down this sick, disgusting prison if it had insisted.

But Washington remained silent. The Lebanese Shia prisoners were left to face the men who applied electrodes to their testicles. The nation that would later declare a war of good against evil didn't see much wrong at Khiam. And now, a trip down memory lane. In the 1980s, when I was covering the war in Afghanistan between the brave mujahedin guerrillas and the Soviet occupiers, Arab fighters – armed by the Americans, paid by the Saudis and the West – would occasionally be captured by the Russians or by their Afghan communist satrap allies. For the most part, the Arabs were Egyptians. They would be paraded on Kabul television and then executed as "terrorists''. We called them "freedom fighters". President Reagan claimed that their masters were not unlike the Founding Fathers.

From time to time, these revolutionary forces would sally forth across the Amu Darya river to attack the Soviet Union itself. The "Arab" Afghans would attack a foreign country from Afghanistan. They would do so in their war against occupation. We supported them. For, yes, they were "freedom fighters". Now, having opposed America, having dared to oppose US forces inside Afghanistan, in order to destroy US forces "occupying'' part of the Arab world – in Saudi Arabia, in Kuwait – they have become "unlawful combatants'', "battlefield detainees''. That, in essence, is what the Russians called them in the 1980s. It justified their detention in the hideous Pol e-Chowkri prison outside Kabul, their incarceration like animals – partly exposed to the elements – before their appearance in front of unfair, drumhead courts.

Minus the torture, the United States is now doing what most Arab regimes have been doing for decades: arresting their brutal "Islamist" enemies, holding them incommunicado, chained and hooded, while preparing unfair trials. President Mubarak of Egypt would approve. So would King Abdullah of Jordan. So would the Saudis, whose grotesque, hopelessly unfair system of Islamic "justice" would be familiar to America's prisoners. The jails of Saddam would be far worse - let us keep things in proportion – but in most of the Arab world and Israel, al-Qa'ida would receive similar treatment. And whether we like it or not, many Saudis believe that American troops are occupying their country, that the very presence of US soldiers in the Kingdom is a crime. King Fahd, of course, invited the Americans into Saudi Arabia in 1990, after Iraq's invasion of Kuwait. President Bush senior promised the Arabs they would leave when the threat of Iraqi occupation was over. But they are still there.

Several years ago, I reported in The Independent that Crown Prince Abdullah – the effective ruler now that the King is so badly incapacitated – wanted the Americans to leave. Much jeering there was from American commentators. But now the Washington Post, no less, has reported that the Saudis want the Americans to quit and the commentators are silent. Not so US Secretary of State Colin Powell. For him, the American presence in Saudi Arabia may last until the world turns into "the kind of place we dreamed of''. American troops in Saudi are not only a deterrent to Saddam, he said at the weekend, they are a "symbol'' of American influence. Could al-Qa'ida have a more potent reason for continued resistance?

The "occupation" of Saudi Arabia remains the cornerstone of Osama bin Laden's battle against the United States, the original raison d'être of his merciless struggle against America. And here is Mr Powell proving, in effect, that Washington had ulterior motives for sending him into the Gulf. When he added that "we shouldn't impose ourselves on the Government beyond the absolute minimum requirement that we have", the phrase "beyond the absolute minimum" tells it all. The United States will decide how long it stays in Saudi Arabia – not the Saudis; which is exactly what Mr bin Laden has been saying all along.

Now we learn that US troops arrested six Arabs when they were released from a prison in Bosnia. The Bosnians announced that, since the Americans would not disclose the evidence that might be used against them in a trial – to protect US "intelligence sources'' – the men should be released from their Bosnian prison. Which they were – only to be seized by the Americans. And what did the Washington Post tell us in all seriousness? That, the operation was reportedly conducted by US troops acting independently of the Nato-led force (in Bosnia). R

eally? Is the Washington Post that stupid? Are we? Is that what law and order is all about? Yes, the West is fighting a cruel enemy. Anyone who has read the full video statement by Osama bin Laden in December must realise that the war against him – indeed the conflict in Afghanistan – has only just begun. But already we are turning ourselves into the kind of deceitful, ruthless people whom Mr bin Laden imagines us to be. Shackled, hooded, sedated. Prepared for a trial without full disclose of evidence. With a possible death sentence at the end, we are now the very model of the enemies Mr bin Laden wants to fight. He must be a happy man.






(Edited by peaccenicked at 9:53 pm on Jan. 25, 2002)

[CommieBastard]

hey, i read that! :D

[Imperial Power]

Commie bastard we may have supplied them with the weapons but we didn't tell them to use them for slaughtering innocent people.

Peace do you believe that the prisoners would be treated better by another country. Well, perhaps the French they would just tell them to go to Cuba and leave it at that. They are not being tortured. I repeat they are not beng tortured.

[MJM]

Keep repeating often enough and people may believe you.
It depends on your definition of torture really. Being locked up like an animal in a cage is the same as getting locked up in a concentration camp. If not worse.
Is that a form of torture?
Also getting around the rules rearding POW's is a big point against the US and leads me to suspect the worst.

[CommieBastard]

So, you are completely absolved of reponsibility when you hand weapons, devices for killing, into the hands of psychopaths?
oh, but ofcourse....

[Dreadnaht1]

Giving a gun to someone and not expecting them to use it reminds me of a quote: "Don't put a condom on unless you expect to fuck." Don't hand out guns unless you intend for them to be used.

-Dread

[Vertigo]

Quote: from Dreadnaht1 on 1:17 am on Jan. 23, 2002
I don't think anyone sided with the Taliban in the first place. We are all against the taliban, U$A, and the northern alliance. These people in Afghanistan need something that's stable, democratic, and socialist.

-Dread


I agree there, there's no point in placing extremists again there. A socialist government would culturize people there and keep integrism out if that's what we want to get. Anyway, US would never admit that, they need wild people there to be able to bomb everytime they need it, to get oil or anything else.

[Vertigo]

Quote: from CommieBastard on 10:48 pm on Jan. 25, 2002
hey, i read that! :D


I've also read it at La Insignia. I really liked it...

[Imperial Power]

We had to supply weapons because the middle east was the largest arms race in the 80's. Russia and China were supplying the rebels to spread communism. The US was not going to allow the world oil supply to be threatened and had to contain communism so they supplied weapons. The blame for supplying them with weapons has to be shared by many countries not just the United States. And that majority of weapons they have are soviet anyways. RPG's and AK-47's. The most advanced weapon the United States gave them was the Stinger shoulder launched rocket ground to air missile.

As for the prison cells they are the small size as most maximum security prison cells. I think your getting a little bit to liberal when you say prisons are like cages for animals.

[CommieBastard]

why hasn't this guy been banned yet? he's repeatedly violating the restrictions on boards that anti-communists can post on...

anyway, i think it is an important point you make there about the oil. Whereas the russians and chinese were trying to spread freedom, the americans simply wanted to plunder the middle eastern oil supply for their own gain.
And whereas the Russians and chinese handed arms to those they knew shared their ideologies and therefore considered safe, the USA was handing out weapons to anyone who would oppose russia. Thats anyone. Even religious fundamentalist psychoes like bin laden. There is such a thing as discretion, and the US has none. They handed out weapons and training to these guys, and you'll never guess what, bin laden learnt all of his tactics and strategy, and also his militancy, in his involvement in this campaign against the soviets.
well done USA for shooting yourselves in the foot once again.

maximum security prison cells? maybe US ones, as i have read about them, and they are truly sickening. However, i certainly know the UK doesnt have anything comparable to gunatanoma bay or any of your maximum security prisons. it may be bad here, but it aint that bad. I mean, we treat our prisoners like subhumans beings, but not like ahuman beings.

[Dreadnaht1]

IP, I do agree that the most common gun in the middle east (and possibly the world) is the AK-47. But it's not because they were supplied by the Russians. The AK-47 is a gun that is very easily made from scratch and can easily be duplicated. Many cities in the middle east have gun shops that actually make the 47's from their own supplies. That's why they're so common in the middle east.

Allthough I suppose a simple minded person who jumped to conclusions could say that just because there are Russian guns in the middle east the Russians supplied them with weapons. AK-47's, allthough illegal, are commonly found in the hands of terrorists (robbers, bombers and the like) in the U$A. I suppose you could say that the U$A was a magor ally with the USSR all through out it's history.

Do us a favor, IP, get a brain.

-Dread

[peaccenicked]

Afghanistan: Factions Challenging Government's Authority
22 January 2002

Summary

A fresh outbreak of fighting between Northern Alliance factions highlights the continued ineffectiveness of Afghanistan's central government. Warlords who have a stake in the government are only behaving long enough to receive international aid while those outside the government are motivated to cause its collapse.

Analysis

Fighting has broken out between rival factions of the anti-Taliban Northern Alliance in Afghanistan. The Afghan Islamic Press reported that clashes occurred Jan. 20 and 21 between forces belonging to ethnic Uzbek warlord Abdul Rashid Dostum and ethnic Tajik fighters in the northern Kunduz province.

The violence is further evidence that Afghanistan is rapidly devolving into the factionalism and warlordism that gripped the country a decade ago. Those groups that are represented in the new interim Afghan government will attempt to keep a lid on ethnic infighting only long enough to receive Western aid while those factions left out will encourage the use of violence to expose the government's frailty.

Afghanistan is breaking apart faster than the new government is coming together. It is becoming increasingly unlikely that leaders in Kabul will be able to establish any degree of authority in the country. This puts extended reconstruction plans at risk and will encourage the industrialized world to step away from its involvement in Afghanistan.

Details about the fighting in Kunduz are sketchy. All sources agree that Dostum's Uzbek forces were engaged in the battle, but the affiliation of the Tajiks is unconfirmed. Media reports suggest that they may either be under the command of interim Defense Minister Mohammed Fahim, former Afghan President Burhanuddin Rabbani or Rabbani loyalist Mohammed Daoud.

All three are Tajiks with strong support bases in the area. Fahim was allied with Rabbani until recently, when he and other younger Tajiks excluded the former president from the new government.

The clashes broke out around the Qala Zaal area, about 40 miles west of Kunduz. The fighting was fierce by Afghan standards: Some 11 men were killed and more than a dozen injured, Afghan Islamic Press reported. The battle appeared to be aimed at taking command of the Zaal district in order to control access to the Tajikistan border.
The fighting occurred at the same time that international donor states met in Tokyo to put together an aid package for Afghanistan. By the end of the conference on Jan. 22, the various participants had pledged $1.8 billion for Afghanistan's reconstruction this year and $4.5 billion over the longer term. Most of the money will be funneled to the interim Afghan government headed by Hamid Karzai.

The recent battle itself is relatively unimportant in regard to Afghanistan's future. But the cast of characters in the fight highlights important trends in the country's internal politics.

If the Tajik fighters are under the command of Defense Minister Fahim, the fight will likely be an isolated incident -- although it is probable that similar limited skirmishes will break out from time to time. Both Dostum and Fahim managed to get positions in the new government and are awaiting the aid money.

Neither has any affection for the other, but both likely realize the benefits of keeping open warfare to a minimum in the coming months in order to squeeze more financial assistance out of the international community.

They also know that international donors will tolerate, and probably expect, a low level of violence between the country's various competing factions. But outright warfare will quickly turn off the financial taps. Once it appears that the international aid well has finally run dry, Dostum and Fahim will fall back into their old habits.

However, if former Rabbani or his ally Daoud is controlling the Tajiks, there will be much more ethnic infighting with greater intensity. Rabbani held the Northern Alliance presidency for most of the last decade but was rather unceremoniously dumped when a new regime was installed after the Taliban's collapse.

As such, he and others who are not included in the new government have a vested interest in making the interim administration look as inept as possible. Slowing the aid inflows, or sowing dissent between the Uzbeks and the Tajiks, may render the new government ineffective and allow Rabbani to return to power.

No matter what the case, it is clear that Afghanistan is rapidly returning to the state it was in when the Soviet army left over a decade ago. The authority of Karzai's central government does not extend much past Kabul, and a recent bombing outside the U.S. Embassy there shows that the leader does not even have full control of his capital city. Afghanistan is being divvied up between the same ethnic groups and strongmen that controlled it in the 1990s.

Iranian-backed Ismail Khan controls the west, Dostum controls the north, Tajiks loyal to Rabbani or Fahim control the northeast, Durrani Pushtuns under tribal chief Gul Agha control the southern provinces by Kandahar and a number of Ghilzai Pushtuns control the southeast. Ethnic Hazaras control several central provinces, and warlords control the area around Jalalabad.

The only lever Karzai's interim government has is its ability to distribute aid money. But Karzai is in a difficult position. If he gives out money too freely, the warlords will not need him. If he holds the aid close, the warlords will figure that they'll never get the cash, so there is no use behaving. Either way, he faces an increasingly volatile situation.

[Imperial Power]

Dread- "Get a brain" Dont hurt my feelings like that. All i do is tell you facts dread. You tell me bull shit. The russians

Commiebastard- I thought the soviet tactic was to provide economic aid, and send represenitves to spread anti-american propaganda among the poor and promise them they will "all be equal in a classles society." Very few of tem fought for a socialist ideal. They fought for propaganda.

[Dreadnaht1]

Sorry, IP, perhaps I was too hard. Kindly get a brain in your head, pretty pretty please. Thank you ever so much.

-Dread

[peaccenicked]

http://www.claybennett.com/pages/latest_40.html