A key fight to win?
| 07:18 UK time, Wednesday, 18 February 2009
President Obama's sending another 17,000 troops to Afghanistan, to help stabilise the worsening security situation there. The additional troops being deployed had originally been scheduled to go to Iraq. You can read more about the details here.
Nicky's talking about this on the breakfast phone-in this morning. 8,000 British troops are serving in Afghanistan. Is the war against the Taleban a war the US and Britain must win?
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It's ludicrous for your foreign affairs journalist ((breakfast approx 0710) to state Obama's new Democrat administration first major troop deployment in Afghanistan marks a key shift for the better in US foreign policy. If anything it just enforces what it already was under the Republican's!
If the proposed troop withdrawal in Iraq is supposed to represent a key change then it was going to happen anyway because of the failure of the whole military campaign there. The change of Presidency just gives the appearance of a change of policy.
This 'military occupation' that's labelled a 'war' in Afghanistan cannot be won because there is nothing to win. It's all about US imperialism which uses the Taliban to justify the military campaign.
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This may be a war that must be won, but is not one which CAN be won, as all previous interventions here have shown. We never learn from history. What the West wants will probably never happen, but if greater troop numbers eventually force the Talban to the conference table, this new move will be worthwhile. I enjoyed the 5 Live discussion, but was irritated by Lord Ashdown's pomposity in dismissing the other contributor to the programme (Michael Griffin) whom he didn't once mention by name.
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Not only is this war unwinnable it is a delusion and a smokescreen.When the Russians were in Afghanistan we in the west were up in arms called it an invasion and supported the mudjahadeen.
We now call the enemy "the taleban" and talk about how they have persecuted the Afghans.Pre 9/11 I doubt that Bush gave the country and its people a moments thought and nor to my memeory did we in Britain.We are told about British troops killed ( they dont tell us about wounded) but we hear nothing about how many Afghans are bombed abd slaughtered by out hi tech weapons etc.
Karzai is a total dupe and puppet of the west and we talk about democracy which must really rankle with the Afghans.
Anyone who thinks that we have won in Ireland and Iraq militarily must be mad and to me it is just like Korea and Vietnam.
I used to strongly support the Labour party until Iraq etc. and it saddens me now that all our political parties are pro war.
I am in despair over this.
Bill Beeby
Dover in Kent.
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The allies in Afghanistan are following a strategy that is dependant upon the use of air power. Just as the french did in their Indo-china campaign and USA did in Vietnam. This is bound to fail because it is dependant upon having local strategic supply centres with air bases. The loss of Manas airforce base in Kyrgizstan leaves them without such a base.
Obama's commitment to Afghanistan carries echoes of Kennedy's commitment to Vietnam.
As regards our boys' personal reasons for being there, it has always struck me as bizarre that whilst the soldiers of other countries can believe that they are carrying the cause of freedom and democracy, ours are carrying the cause of Queen and Country
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Col (Retd) Mike Dewar like most senior serving commissioned officers simply represents the Tory, or more precisely the 'established right wing view' in military uniform.
He states that our interest in Afghanistan is out of self-interest which is to protect us from terrorism. Senior militarists always exaggerate the terrorist threat or indeed any external military threat to justify their positions and influence. Hence they are reluctant to address the true cause of terrorism or war in general which is political and economical.
One should always be wary when military personnel are put on air to express their thoughts and feelings over aspects of their military deployment because it's not in their professional interest to disbelieve or reject what their senior officers and mainstream politicians tell them is the threat! As the Major General who accompanied N Campbell on the BBC's 5 Live Officer recruiting day at the RMAS on Monday openly admitted: "service personnel don't think about the politics, they just get on with the job"!
If however a more 'independently minded' member of HMF somehow got on air and expressed views starkly contrary to those of Col Dewar he would be arrested and court martialled!
If Col Dewar, as a representative of the Armed Services albeit retired can come on air and express his political beliefs then so should any serving member of HMF whatever their views may be! If they had that right maybe governments might be less wary of despatching them into illegal or unwinnable wars!
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