Violent Uproar in Afghanistan Casts Shadow on U.S. Pullout
American officials sought to reassure both Afghanistans government and a domestic audience on Sunday that the United States remained committed to the war after the weekend killing of two American military officers inside the Afghan Interior Ministry and days of deadly anti-American protests.
But behind the public pronouncements, American officials described a growing concern, even at the highest levels of the Obama administration and Pentagon, about the challenges of pulling off a troop withdrawal in Afghanistan that hinges on the close mentoring and training of army and police forces.
Despite an American-led training effort that has spanned years and cost tens of billions of dollars, the Afghan security forces are still widely seen as riddled with dangerously unreliable soldiers and police officers. The distrust has only deepened as a pattern of attacks by Afghan security forces on American and NATO service members, beginning years ago, has drastically worsened over the past few days. A grenade attack on Sunday, apparently by a protester, wounded at least six American soldiers.
Nearly a week of violent unrest after American personnel threw Korans into a pit of burning trash has brought into sharp relief the growing American and Afghan frustration and, at times, open hostility and the risks of a strategy that calls for American soldiers and civilians to work closely with Afghans.
full: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/27/world/asia/burning-of-korans-complicates-us-pullout-plan-in-afghanistan.html?pagewanted=all
boppers
(16,588 posts)Time to leave them. Maybe in another ten years they might get the "civilization" thing again. Sad, really, as before they became a ball in the cold war, they were a huge, amazing, historic place.
CAPHAVOC
(1,138 posts)But leave them enough guns and ammo to kill each other off.
Jackpine Radical
(45,274 posts)In his novel Caravans, Michener basically said that their whole tribal culture was built on warfare; when they run out of external enemies, they just fight each other.
boppers
(16,588 posts)They were at peace. Then:
The anti-communist whackos got funded.
The pro-communist whackos got funded.
The religious whackos got funded.
Then they got invaded by the USSR, and later, the USA.
Guns and ammo is not a problem.
rusty fender
(3,428 posts)and occupied by the U.S.! How uncouth! Weren't they taught any manners?
You act like it is their fault: hello, we invaded them.
boppers
(16,588 posts)This is an image from the 1950's in Afghanistan. No stone-age dress customs, it's people buying music in a music store (both outlawed by later religious governments).
They've now suffered 50 years of continuous war, and their society and culture has regressed at least 1000 years as a result.
Skittles
(153,122 posts)liberalmike27
(2,479 posts)So we can make money for the MIC, and perhaps to get those minerals to be mined, maybe an eventual pipeline was in the cards, a dream perhaps too far. Then there is the fact it's the Eastern border of Iran.
Any other reason? Made-up BS.
dixiegrrrrl
(60,010 posts)Substitute the word "Afghan" for " Iraq"
and it is exactly the same line that was used as we delayed leaving Iraq.
patrice
(47,992 posts)entire class of police-trainees were subsequently blown-up, all dead, and how clearly that proved God's interest in (them)him, as he had left them only just a few days before.
True. Story.
Vincardog
(20,234 posts)Right down to the part where we are arming and training the people who attack us.
Have any of the powers that be determined that they are attacking us because we are there?
dixiegrrrrl
(60,010 posts)CAPHAVOC
(1,138 posts)His strategy sucks. Patton would have kicked him out.