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Title: Trump’s Taliban Talks Led by Neocon Operation Cyclone Agent & PNAC Member
Source: [None]
URL Source: https://www.mintpressnews.com/trump ... ember-zalmay-khalilzad/261784/
Published: Sep 13, 2019
Author: Alexander Rubinstein
Post Date: 2019-09-13 09:47:46 by Ada
Keywords: None
Views: 239
Comments: 6

U.S. Special Representative for Afghanistan Reconciliation Zalmay Khalilzad, the top American official in the negotiations, has been quietly overseeing the destruction of Afghanistan for most of his political career — longer than the Taliban has existed as an organization.

National Security Advisor John Bolton’s firing may be the 9/11 anniversary gift the war-weary American public wanted, but the support he received from the establishment demonstrates that the war machine is much greater than one man.

Bolton, the neoconservative movement’s standard bearer in the Trump administration, took up a crusade against high-level talks between Trump and the Taliban at Camp David — what appears to be the impetus for his firing. That made him the momentary champion for the interests of the traditional GOP establishment and the liberal establishment. In effect, he was trying to pull the brakes on U.S. disengagement from Afghanistan.

The national security advisor’s reputation as a war hawk preceded him. He was a director of the influential Project for a New American Century (PNAC) think tank, which is widely credited for providing much of the political support needed to invade Iraq, and a hype man for hire for the MEK. When Bolton met then-Defense Secretary Gen. James Mattis for the first time after joining the Trump administration, the latter quipped “I’ve heard that you’re absolutely the devil incarnate.”

The war in Afghanistan, phase one of the War on Terror, is going worse for the United States than it ever has before, by a number of metrics. The regime-change campaign against the Taliban may have been swift, but as with other regime-change projects of the United States, the blowback would be enormous and enduring. It meant the militarization of American police through the Pentagon’s 1033 Program, more than two thousand American troops killed, scores of innocent civilians murdered and the complete destruction of the society — at a price tag of $975 billion by the end of 2019. That money has largely fallen into the hands of contractors.

The occupation of Afghanistan itself will soon be old enough to enlist in one of America’s forever wars.

“We should withdraw from Afghanistan,” Max Abrahms, a leading expert on terrorism and Professor of Political Science at Northeastern University, told MintPress, adding “I don’t see a lot of progress. The Taliban’s territorial holdings are substantial. The violence that the group wields is substantial… I have no illusions that the U.S. staying there will dramatically improve the country.”

One may be tempted to view the peace talks with the Taliban and Bolton’s departure from the White House as signs of a turning tide; of Trump making good on his anti-interventionist campaign promises. This, however, is a misguided reading, even beyond Trump saying that the peace talks “are dead” in response to the killing of an American soldier. Abrahms told MintPress News that the negotiations are really a tactic to keep the United States in Afghanistan indefinitely.

But perhaps the best single explanation for why the war in Afghanistan has dragged on so long, why the tide is not turning, and why there has been so little progress is that many of the U.S. officials and businessmen who worked in support of the precursor to the Taliban and al-Qaeda in Afghanistan continue find shelter in Washington as they try to put out the fire they started 40 years ago, politically unhindered by the repeated failures of U.S. policies since.

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#1. To: Ada (#0)

Taliban kills one American – so Trump reacts and says “we are staying!”

Hmm -- how very stupid.

johnj  posted on  2019-09-13   23:14:38 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#2. To: johnj (#1)

Trump reacts and says “we are staying!”

When I was still on Medicaid a few years back, I was using the State Transport to get rides to and from the doctor.

One driver was at a hot air balloon festival. They were giving helicopter rides for $50. He told me he was sitting in a porta-john and a helicopter flew over. He said, "For a minute I thought I was back in Afghanistan."

Yikes! ;)

"When bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall, one by one." Edmund Burke

BTP Holdings  posted on  2019-09-13   23:25:08 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#3. To: BTP Holdings, johnj (#2)

guess you had your final for "how to use a pallet jack-101 and bone-heads" and were cramping; hence your lack of zion don he's so fine dud of a bombshell aka smoking gun post this am.


I used to be in a hurry, then I figured out I was just getting nowhere fast.

IRTorqued  posted on  2019-09-13   23:46:24 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#4. To: IRTorqued (#3)

The eternal questions of our time!

“I am not one of those weak-spirited, sappy Americans who want to be liked by all the people around them. I don’t care if people hate my guts; I assume most of them do. The important question is whether they are in a position to do anything about it. My affections, being concentrated over a few people, are not spread all over Hell in a vile attempt to placate sulky, worthless shits.” - William S Burroughs

Dakmar  posted on  2019-09-13   23:53:28 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#5. To: Dakmar (#4)

The eternal questions of our time!

um, for how many beatles songs did george harrison do the lead vocals?


I used to be in a hurry, then I figured out I was just getting nowhere fast.

IRTorqued  posted on  2019-09-14   0:02:33 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#6. To: IRTorqued (#5)

42

“I am not one of those weak-spirited, sappy Americans who want to be liked by all the people around them. I don’t care if people hate my guts; I assume most of them do. The important question is whether they are in a position to do anything about it. My affections, being concentrated over a few people, are not spread all over Hell in a vile attempt to placate sulky, worthless shits.” - William S Burroughs

Dakmar  posted on  2019-09-14   0:07:25 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


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