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This is the story about the Afghan civilians that were killed when a US air strike blew up two hijacked tanker trucks that had become stuck in a riverbed. This news report says "aerial surveillance" (which I'm guessing is a remote controlled drone w/ night vision) had tracked the vehicles and put out the call for an airstrike. But the airstrike came in 30 minutes later. That was apparently AND PREDICTABLY plenty of time for a raft of locals to come out and try to help themselves to (or purchase, whatever) some petrol, which is likely very hard to come by in remote Afghanistan.
What I wonder is: if there was "aerial surveillance" of the trucks up to the time they got stuck, why weren't the trucks being watched at the time of the strike itself? If the drone has night vision (two big ifs on my part), it would have been very reckless to have struck the trucks with human beings standing around them.
Then the initial US report was that it is believed it was "mostly Taliban members" that were killed in the explosions of the trucks. How could the generals have known such a thing given the circumstances (remote aerial surveillance)? Again, sloppiness in handling the incident.
This kind of sloppiness should not be acceptable at this point in the Afghan conflict. There is absolutely no need for the US to be imposing additional horrors and casualities on those people. This remote controlled "video game" warfare is profoundly immoral in its own way.
Basically the Talban are always going to say they were civilains.They cliam this with very strike. In Iraq they like to say it was a wedding party it seems.Its not hard for tehm to see arm men with modern cameras. But tehn sometimes civil;ians are killed in war especailly when teh enemy like to hide amoung them.War is hell.
And the Taliban are dressed like civilians, no ?
And civilians are dressed like the Taliban, no ?
But anyone can distinguish a nation's soldier in uniform from a nation's civilian, yes ?
That is why we will never "win" this war. This is not a war against a country with an army; this is a war against terrorists. They have their own rules of engagement.
Again, no. The Taliban are not in fact walking around everywhere in Afghanistan. And the Taliban are not terrorists. Unlike Al Qaeda who are foreigners, the Taliban (Pashtuns) actually live in or near Afghanistan and always have. They are fighting for political control of that nation.
Cluelessness and sloppiness that kills noncombatants on a regular basis. Great for America.
Again, no. The Taliban are not in fact walking around everywhere in Afghanistan. And the Taliban are not terrorists. Unlike Al Qaeda who are foreigners, the Taliban (Pashtuns) actually live in or near Afghanistan and always have. They are fighting for political control of that nation.
Cluelessness and sloppiness that kills noncombatants on a regular basis. Great for America.
Well the CFR considers them a terrorist group and the CFR is pretty powerful in some circles of the government.
Yeah, I LOVE this one, use "electronic media, telecom, and radio" to win over hearts of minds of the Afghan people. And give out lots of Happy Meals as well! Military-driven cluelessness!
The whole Afghanistan "mission" is such crap. Dubya should have authorized a Special Forces-only force to go into the border region, hunt down Bin Laden and take out him and his inner circle. Using the greater America military on this mission is totally useless and a waste of resources of all kinds. It's the result of listening to the military to solve the wrong problems by blowing things up, which is primarily what the military knows how to do. But when there is an overseas "mission," some generals get to be big swinging d*cks for the sakes of their careers and spend lots of money and blow things up. These military adventures have consequences for GENERATIONS, and we Americans just don't learn from our own recent mistakes.
Last edited by ParkTwain; 09-04-2009 at 09:19 PM..
The whole Afghanistan "mission" is such crap. Dubya should have authorized a Special Forces-only force to go into the border region, hunt down Bin Laden and take out him and his inner circle. Using the greater America military on this mission is totally useless and a waste of resources of all kinds. It's the result of listening to the military to solve the wrong problems by blowing things up, which is primarily what the military knows how to do.
Yes, I agree. Letting the CIA and MI6 handle the situation with covert operations would be a lot better use of resources than a full scale conflict on our part. Send in the big guns with small groups of soldiers with the appropriate air/ground support when necessary, but otherwise it should be as subtle as possible. With this method, there is no significant political backlash, and a reduced impact of terrorist propaganda.. That is how we fought against the Soviet Union for ~40 years with minimal casualties. Should have done the same in Afghanistan from the very beginning.
i think people forget that at one time the taliban was considered "our friend". due to their religious convictions they were going in and destroying the poppy crops. remember this:
TST: U.S. Taxpayers send Billions to our Enemies in Afghanistan (http://www.house.gov/paul/tst/tst2001/tst110501.htm - broken link)
again, this is a regional battle that we are not going to be able to win and extending this war does not benefit the citizens of the united states. if you want to fight a terrorist, send a terrorist squad in without announcing that you are coming to find them!
it isn't unreasonable to speculate that the escalating actions in both afghanistan and colombia have more than a little relationship to the fact that those 2 countries are the biggest drug producers (opium for afghanistan and cocaine for colombia) in the world.
Last edited by floridasandy; 09-04-2009 at 09:25 PM..
When we invaded Afghanistan we allied ourselves with a Tadjik Militia, that had a reputation for .autrocities and dope dealing called the Northern Alliance. This despite the CIA warning us that this group was as bad as the Khmer Rouge. In one day General Dotsum personally supervised as 1,200 Taliban Prisoners were locked in air tight cargo containers and left in the sun to die. As Punshment General Dotsum was made Defense Minister of Afghanistan and his militia became the Afghan Army.
They are Tadjiks and not Pushtuns and don't mix well with the majority Pushtuns, who support the Taliban.
Recently General Dotsum was again cited for publicly executing his political enemies by running them over with a tank. I would not be surprized if the General and his Tadjik Army head for Tadjikistan when the going gets rough.
Last edited by Boompa; 09-04-2009 at 10:14 PM..
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