Afghanistan

NOVANEWS August 11, 2010  by Michael Leon - Given the current trend of things in Afghanistan, if President Obama and SecDef Gates are really serious about reclaiming “efficiencies” in defense spending, maybe they ought to think a little harder about the billions spent every month in that country, not to mention the wisdom of retaining 50,000 U.S. troops in Iraq. Sven Ortmann  appropriately quotes Winston Churchill: “The Americans will always do the right thing … after they’ve exhausted all the alternatives.” - By Jason Sigger in Crooks and Liars Bob Herbert at the NY Times had an impassioned op-ed last week on the insanity of our forces staying in Afghanistan even as all indications note that we’re not making any progress in that country. He calls it “reading from a lunatic’s manual.”...

NOVANEWS Ex-Pakistan spy chief: Afghanistan war neocon-created ‘lost cause’; Negotiate with Mullah Omar and move out August 9, 2010  by Michael Leon Gen. Hamid Gul, member of Veterans Today Editorial Board of Directors - The attacks of September 11 were a pretext to a war already under consideration, Lt. Gen. Hamid Gul said. “I think some of the neocons, who were very close to President [George W.] Bush, they wanted that he could embark on a universal adventure of Pax Americana, and they thought that the world was lying prostrate in front of them,” he said. The 2001 terrorist attacks helped win the public support for the neocon plans, he said. - From CNN: The U.S.-led war in Afghanistan is a “lost cause,” said a former Pakistani intelligence chief, and the United States needs to nego...

NOVANEWS Rajeesh | August 10, 2010 | Categories: Uncategorized | URL: http://wp.me/pglpM-1SU  by Mike E on August 10, 2010,Revolution in south Asia Kasama received the following statement from Shola Jawid. On the Occasion of Martyrdom of Comrade Azad: Expressing solidarity with Communist Party of India (Maoist) Comrade Azad, spokesperson for Communist Party of India (Maoist), was murdered on July 1st 2010. Let us honour his memory and continue on his path! Comrade Azad was a member of central committee and also a member of the politbureau of the Communist Party of India (Maoist). His death is a big loss for the CPI (Maoist), the Indian revolution, the revolutions of the region, and also the global revolution. He would have played a very critical and decisive role at the current ju...

NOVANEWS Afghanistan War: Petraeus Tightens Rules of Engagement August 6, 2010  by Michael Leon By Jason Motlagh In his first tactical directive since assuming command of international forces in Afghanistan, General David Petraeus doubled down on the orders imposed by his predecessor that put a premium on protecting civilians first to win their support. For months those rules of engagement, formulated by General Stanley McChrystal, have led to rank-and-file grumblings by U.S. soldiers. The servicemen say that the strict rules put them in greater danger, even as they aim to avoid civilian casualties. The grumbling is unlikely to diminish with the new directives that Petraeus issued on Wednesday. The renewed call for a disciplined use of force – plus added restrictions – were not what mo...

NOVANEWS By Anne Gearan WASHINGTON – Defense Secretary Robert Gates is predicting that only a small number of U.S. forces will come home from Afghanistan when a presidentially mandated withdrawal begins a year from now. Gates reaffirms that a withdrawal will begin in July 2011. He says he thinks the initial pullout will be modest, and that a large number of U.S. forces will remain in Afghanistan. The Pentagon chief says the pace of the withdrawal would pick up as security conditions improve. The U.S. will have more than 100,000 troops in Afghanistan by the end of this summer. The plan is to begin bringing them home next July, with the scope of the pullout to be determined by security conditions then. Gates was interviewed for ABC’s “This Week.”

NOVANEWS Leaked Documents Paint Devastating Portrait of the Failing war in Afghanistan July 26, 2010 by Michael Leon   Afghanistan war - Greatest government leak since the Pentagon Papers, NYT: The War Logs - By Glenn Greenwald The most consequential news item of the week will obviously be — or at least should be — the massive new leak by WikiLeaks of 90,000 pages of classified material chronicling the truth about the war in Afghanistan from 2004 through 2009.  Those documents provide what The New York Times calls ”an unvarnished, ground-level picture of the war in Afghanistan that is in many respects more grim than the official portrayal.”  The Guardian describes the documentsas “a devastating portrait of the failing war in Afghanistan, revealing how coalition forces have killed hundre...

NOVANEWS General Muhammad Abdullah Gul: AFGHANISTAN, PATHS TO PEACE July 23, 2010  by Gordon Duff AFGHANISTAN, PATHS TO PEACE By Muhammad Abdullah Gul for Al Jazeera and Veterans Today History is about to take a monumental turn in the rugged, desolate hills and dales of Afghanistan where the world’s sole superpower leads an alliance facing defeat at the hands of the nameless resistance fighters of al-Qaeda and the Taliban. The impact of this enormous defeat will be felt across the globe. The bloody conflict in Afghanistan has been going on for almost nine years, since October 2001. The Taliban, who appeared to have been defeated at the beginning of the war, have since grown from strength to strength, particularly after 2003 when the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) of th...

NOVANEWS Watchdog: Poor grades for Afghan reconstruction July 17, 2010 by Michael Leon An Afghan National Army soldier rests at Wilson Forward Operating Base, Kandahar, Afghanistan, By LARRY MARGASAK WASHINGTON – The inspector general investigating fraud, waste and abuse in the $51 billion Afghanistan reconstruction program has received a failing grade from his peers. The council of government auditors who reviewed the work asked Attorney General Eric Holder to consider suspending or rescinding law enforcement powers of the Afghanistan reconstruction watchdog. The United States has committed $51 billion to Afghanistan reconstruction since 2001, and plans to raise the amount to $71 billion over the next year. The review found the Afghanistan reconstruction inspector general did not train ...

NOVANEWS July 17, 2010  by Michael Leon · Leave a Comment  Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton By Matthew Lee WASHINGTON – As concerns grow about the war in Afghanistan, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton is heading to South Asia on a mission aimed at refining the goals of the nearly 9-year-old conflict. U.S. lawmakers are increasingly questioning the course of the war. The number of soldiers from the U.S. and other countries in the international coalition in Afghanistan is on the rise. Corruption is a deep problem in Afghanistan, and members of Congress wonder about the utility of massive aid to both Afghanistan and Pakistan. Clinton will attend an international conference in Kabul on Tuesday where the Afghan government is expected to outline plans to improve security, rei...