Heard a great update on Afghanistan today on Radio Netherlands'

[Gloria]

Amsterdam Forum...They had on as guest the head of a group based in Amsterdam trying to help with Afghanistan's reconstruction (headed by an Afghani) and Ahmed Rashid, the author of "Taliban" and "Jihad." Rashid has spent 25 years covering the region.

The really big news for me was this startling information about how the security situation has take a huge turn for the worse....since January, incidents have DOUBLED every month.

Major problems are Security, drugs and the entities involved and a third, which I forget....

Both guests didn't think the elections would happen as scheduled...with 4,000 polling places, there aren't enough peacekeepers to keep an eye on the situation.

And that's the big problem....Not enough peacekeepers, never have been.
All the money has gone to Iraq. The comment was that since Afghanistan doesn't have oil....you know the rest. NATO hasn't sent anything and there is only a small German contingent.

In the meantime, Karzai is stuck between the Taliban and the warlords.
He's been pleading for money for reconstruction, but what the US promised hasn't been delivered.

Both guests said that Bush's talk of "victory" with Karzai last week is a total sham. Because Afghanistan is very far from being a "victory."

But Afghanistan is off the front pages, so he can get away with such talk. (Doesn't that line sound familiar, sort of like the aircraft carrier stunt about the Iraq "victory"?)

[LittleApple81]

1. But we at DU knew that it was a sham. The IDIOT Americans want

to believe it because the reality is too frightening: they have a lunatic for president. And when I say IDIOT Americans I am talking about the ones who sit on their duffs and say what Britney Spears said "We should trust our president because he is our president."