[RUEZ]

DerbyX DerbyX:

No matter how you slice it we are wrong for invading and all you are doing is justifying our violence the same way the people we fight justify theirs.

You're entitled to your opinion.

[DerbyX]

RUEZ RUEZ:

DerbyX DerbyX:

No matter how you slice it we are wrong for invading and all you are doing is justifying our violence the same way the people we fight justify theirs.

You're entitled to your opinion.

So are the people wo are fighting us because we invaded their land.

So is everybody.

[tritium]

RUEZ RUEZ:

DerbyX DerbyX:

How can an attack pulled off by saudi citizens trained to fly in the US be blamed on the taliban?

I crack up every time someone like you posts that. Them being Saudi makes as much difference as if they were Chinese or Canadian. The Taliban protected them and allowed them to train in Afghanistan.

...and now the Saudi Gov't refuses to release more oil, even at the request of the United States and threats that the U.S. will no longer supply military arms the Saudis.

[Scape]

DerbyX DerbyX:

Pulling out may be the only option because enough people are too pissed off to ever negotiate at the barrel of a gun. We would do no less.

We are doing exactly what we have done in Haiti, the only difference is that there is the Taliban that has been programmed to fight us tooth and nail. The people of Afghanistan don't want us to fail, they do. They see that country as theirs and no one elses. They are nothing more than a street gang with a religious bent and access to more weapons. They need to be rounded up and shot as they are scum. They have no legitimate claims, they are no more than a bunch of Dons who think they know what power is because they have been able to sting the elephant that is the US. It is their belief that the west will flee if they provide enough of an inconvenience. That is there great plan and that is the plan of a bully that needs to be broken and have his face rubbed in his own shit. Then the people of Afghanistan who have been forced to live in the shadow of these bullies should be given the ways and means to deal with these petty thugs the way that they truly have earned to be treated.

DerbyX DerbyX:

The taliban has even said "no negotiations until we leave". Thats reason enough. We are assuming that those fighting us are actually trying to bring back a regime as oppressive as the one we deposed. Of that we have no proof. The vast majority of those fighting us are very likely people simply fighting who they believe are invaders and they are right.

NO! They have merely convinced you that they are right but their heads deserve to be on a pike for what they have done. Their naked barbarity knows no limits and they do not even deserve to be mentioned in the presence of civil society. You know very well their stance on womens rights and of outsiders. They are no more sentient then a rabid dog, except the dog deserves a merciful death.

DerbyX DerbyX:

How is it that the people trained and equiped by us cannot police their country when their oposition consists of virtually untrained recruits that we call terroists.

Because the country has has the shit kicked out of them for over three generations. They couldn't stand up to a band of girl guides! Corruption is rife because it is the only form of order they have and the vast majority of corruption that they are doing is dwarfed by the international community that is working both for and against them.

DerbyX DerbyX:

The fact is that we will never bring peace because to many people consider the presence of foreign troops as an insurmountable obstacle to peace.

We pull out and we allow them to negotiate with the taliban. They will find a solution that fits for them.

You do that and you will have the fox running the hen house. Kill these bastards, if only for the sake of justice. True, there are worse evils in this world but they do not deserve nor have earned any quarter. We are dealing with people who want to take us back to the 8th century while still holding the world hostage with unholy terror. They are begging to be expunged. That being said the devil we have sided with to rid the world of such vermin are only marginally better, but its a start.

[DerbyX]

Scape, its good to have a debate on this topic without being called an anti-American Taliban loving jihadists. People of good conscience can disagree.

Apparently we do.

$1:

We are doing exactly what we have done in Haiti, the only difference is that there is the Taliban that has been programmed to fight us tooth and nail. The people of Afghanistan don't want us to fail, they do. They see that country as theirs and no one elses. They are nothing more than a street gang with a religious bent and access to more weapons. They need to be rounded up and shot as they are scum. They have no legitimate claims, they are no more than a bunch of Dons who think they know what power is because they have been able to sting the elephant that is the US. It is their belief that the west will flee if they provide enough of an inconvenience. That is there great plan and that is the plan of a bully that needs to be broken and have his face rubbed in his own shit. Then the people of Afghanistan who have been forced to live in the shadow of these bullies should be given the ways and means to deal with these petty thugs the way that they truly have earned to be treated.

No we aren't doing what we did in Haiti. Looting and rioting civilians aren't the same as an organized (by their standards anyway) theocracy practicing a brutal interpretaion of a brutal religion.

The taliban were the people of afghanistan and thats a major point. It wasn't foreigners that ran the gov't back in the 70s. It was them. It wasn't foreigners who became the mujahadeen, it was them. It wasn't foreigners who after driving the soviets out degenerated into warring bands of thugs it was them. It wasn't foreigners who as muslim students decided to take matters into their own hands and put a stop to the mujahadeen thuggery it was them. I wasn't foreiners who became the taliban and enacted a brutal regime based on the religion they all share it was them.

It isn't foreigners who when word reached them about dutch and danish mohammed cartoons demanded the head of their ambassadors and the removal of their troops, it was them.

The people of afghanistan want out money and all that it builds. They also want their religion and are not addressing the very reason they keep building repressive regeimes and if they don't then just like in yugoslavia they will see it happen again.

$1:

NO! They have merely convinced you that they are right but their heads deserve to be on a pike for what they have done. Their naked barbarity knows no limits and they do not even deserve to be mentioned in the presence of civil society. You know very well their stance on womens rights and of outsiders. They are no more sentient then a rabid dog, except the dog deserves a merciful death.

What they did? How is what they did any worse then what the afghan people did? The northern tribesman sell and trade their daughters who as women are just as repressed. Most of the country is now strung out on heroin with lives every bit as bad and all of it under our leadership.

Again, I'll point out that we murders 100s of millions of people in our wars. We turned back a boatload of jews to be brutally tortured and murdered in a manner as bad if not worse then anything the taliban did. We just apologized for a century of inflicting brutal repression on native children for over a century because we thought we had the right to.

You statement shocks me that you cannot see that we have done the same thing in our own right and with our own justification. It also ignores the reality that the vast majority of the people fighting us now are simply fighting invaders and have no desire to bring an identical gov't back.

$1:

because the country has has the shit kicked out of them for over three generations. They couldn't stand up to a band of girl guides! Corruption is rife because it is the only form of order they have and the vast majority of corruption that they are doing is dwarfed by the international community that is working both for and against them.

1) We are at fault for much of that and we are simply bringing the same shit kicking and violence you just mentioned. We just have alot more resources to build things. The soviets also tried building infrastructure, schools, hospitals, whatever but they had far far less resources and nothing but international condemnation all the while fighting an enemy trained and supplied by the US.

2) Corruption is rife? Sadly humanities legacy. How much of that corruption is with our people and how much is theirs? Are the corrupt people any worse then the corrupt taliban? Are they also dogs deserving death and if so why are we tolerating them?

3) None of this really deal with the fact that we trained entire armies and fought and won 2 world wars in less time then we are training suppossedly willing people to police their own country of suppossedly willing and obiedient citizens against what we call a band of virtually untrained religious zealots.

It just doesn't add up. Either we are not up to the task and should leave it to somebody else or they are unwilling to fight other muslims and thus are nullifying any effort we make on their behalf.

$1:

You do that and you will have the fox running the hen house. Kill these bastards, if only for the sake of justice. True, there are worse evils in this world but they do not deserve nor have earned any quarter. We are dealing with people who want to take us back to the 8th century while still holding the world hostage with unholy terror. They are begging to be expunged. That being said the devil we have sided with to rid the world of such vermin are only marginally better, but its a start.

Wrong. What we will have is afghans running their own lives for better or for worse.

Willingly "siding with the devil" because they are marginally better simply means that we will have only a marginally better gov't. Is that what you want? After a decade of bringing them war and violence and promising them the moon we leave and tell them their gov't and lives are "marginally better"?

Again, I'll point out that the reason those people want to bring them back to the 8th century is because those people are the afghans themselves and the religion they follow. Defeating "those people" won't mean a thing if the people we put in charge are only "marginally better" and the afghan people themselves don't realize what aspects of their society keeps creating "those people" and change it themselves.

We are simply laying the foundations for a rapid and cataclysmic return to exactly the same thing we fought the moment we leave and this time every bit of blame will be on us.

Now none of this deals with my often used prevailing theme which is "What gave us the right?". What gave us the right to decide they are bastards and attack them? Thats the very same thing as those bastards deciding that women are bastards and treating them as such?

What moral authority does Canada have, particularily in light of the things our country did?

How many people did the taliban oppress and murder? Was it more or less then the civilians who dies when we firebombed dresden and munich? How about hiroshima and nagasaki?

I know that was "different". We were fighting a war and where justified in our actions. From their perspective they are following their faith and are justified.

Now you aren't the typical johnny_retarded (I'm looking at you keanu) right wing pundit so you are able to see both sides of the argument clearly. How are we any better then they are when we are simply using force to force our values and our will on others? Thats just what they did and the reason we are fighting them. How are we better then them if we call them sub-human and arbitrarily mark them for slaughter when we consider the worst aspects of islam to be when they call us sub-human simply because we don't believe as they do?

We are setting an example and so far between Afghanistan and Iraq the example being set is that might makes right and that you are perfectly justified in invading whatever country you want for whatever reason you want.

Canada should consider itself very luck that a bigger nation doesn't invade us to liberate the natives and return vast tracts of land to them. Canada is lucky beccause Canadians are so much better then everybody that we can look down our noses at the Americans, the Taliban, whoever criticizes our seal hunts, the natives protesting, Iran, Iraq, China, ............

[Scape]

DerbyX DerbyX:

Scape, its good to have a debate on this topic without being called an anti-American Taliban loving jihadists. People of good conscience can disagree.

Apparently we do.

Mental note, I must stop mixing beer with 12 year old scotch. Perhaps rye next time.

DerbyX DerbyX:

No we aren't doing what we did in Haiti. Looting and rioting civilians aren't the same as an organized (by their standards anyway) theocracy practicing a brutal interpretaion of a brutal religion.

The people of afghanistan want out money and all that it builds. They also want their religion and are not addressing the very reason they keep building repressive regeimes and if they don't then just like in yugoslavia they will see it happen again.

We all have our vices, the sicker the more extreme but vices also provide for character which endures. The disorganized rabble of Haiti were not cohesive as the Serbs and the Taliban. They did not possess the national will required to forge a nation.

What we are doing has not changed. We did not demand a new nation in Haiti, Serbia or now here in Afghanistan. The Taliban could do well to choose the path of the IRA and become legitimate and sit at the table of civilized nations to feast on its limitless bounty but they have chosen a different path and with such a choice comes consequences.

DerbyX DerbyX:

Again, I'll point out that we murders 100s of millions of people in our wars. We turned back a boatload of jews to be brutally tortured and murdered in a manner as bad if not worse then anything the taliban did. We just apologized for a century of inflicting brutal repression on native children for over a century because we thought we had the right to.

You statement shocks me that you cannot see that we have done the same thing in our own right and with our own justification. It also ignores the reality that the vast majority of the people fighting us now are simply fighting invaders and have no desire to bring an identical gov't back.

We learn from mistakes and as much as history repeats itself we must stand up against the darkness not acquiesce to it. The people fighting us are in their own way reinventing the wheel because they will accept nothing that they have not made by their own hand. I admire their pluck but they aren't helping anyone and are simply reacting in a type of group think. This mob mentality ends up killing lemmings and anyone else that gets swept up in it.

DerbyX DerbyX:

1) We are at fault for much of that and we are simply bringing the same shit kicking and violence you just mentioned. We just have alot more resources to build things. The soviets also tried building infrastructure, schools, hospitals, whatever but they had far far less resources and nothing but international condemnation all the while fighting an enemy trained and supplied by the US.

The red horde was not there on some errand to better humanity, they needed access to a warm water port or their economy would collapse. Afghanistan was a stepping stone and part of that plan was pacifying them. The schools were a part of that anesthesia.

DerbyX DerbyX:

2) Corruption is rife? Sadly humanities legacy. How much of that corruption is with our people and how much is theirs? Are the corrupt people any worse then the corrupt taliban? Are they also dogs deserving death and if so why are we tolerating them?

They may be worse but they know what side of the bread is buttered. Taliban have the option to join like the IRA did if they truly do care about the people of Afghanistan, but they don't as they only care about themselves.

DerbyX DerbyX:

3) None of this really deal with the fact that we trained entire armies and fought and won 2 world wars in less time then we are training suppossedly willing people to police their own country of suppossedly willing and obiedient citizens against what we call a band of virtually untrained religious zealots.

It just doesn't add up. Either we are not up to the task and should leave it to somebody else or they are unwilling to fight other muslims and thus are nullifying any effort we make on their behalf.

We are fighting them and training a country at the same time. Yes, there is much to be wary for but this is no simple plan, no easy outs here. However, if the world does not do anything to close the huge gap between the haves and the have nots we will end up with more than just planes flying into tall buildings we will reap a bitter harvest of hate and chaos that will never relent.

DerbyX DerbyX:

Willingly "siding with the devil" because they are marginally better simply means that we will have only a marginally better gov't. Is that what you want?

No, I want a START and you have to work with the tools you have on hand. In time this can be improved upon but only if we put our backs into this effort now and not give more false hopes. Our word and deeds must stand for something and we must not end up being fair weather friends, "marginally better" translates into hope but only if we stick by it.

DerbyX DerbyX:

Now none of this deals with my often used prevailing theme which is "What gave us the right?". What gave us the right to decide they are bastards and attack them? Thats the very same thing as those bastards deciding that women are bastards and treating them as such?

The will to survive. If we don't deal with this madness now it will engulf us all. Its a pay me now or pay me much more later situation. There is a vast chasm between rich and poor and it is only growing. If not Afghanistan it would be Nigeria or some other shit hole where our embarrassment of richness is driving the starving masses to madness. The free market will not solve this mess, we must be active participants in the process.

[commanderkai]

Derby did you just fucking try to compare what the Soviets did to what the Americans did? Holy shit. Just wow.

"1) We are at fault for much of that and we are simply bringing the same shit kicking and violence you just mentioned. We just have alot more resources to build things. The soviets also tried building infrastructure, schools, hospitals, whatever but they had far far less resources and nothing but international condemnation all the while fighting an enemy trained and supplied by the US."

You must be honestly kidding.

[romanP]

Scape Scape:

Mental note, I must stop mixing beer with 12 year old scotch. Perhaps rye next time.

Why would you ruin scotch by mixing it with anything?

[kenmore]

RUEZ RUEZ:

tritium tritium:

RUEZ RUEZ:

Dude WTF this is a letter to the editor. This isn't a news article.

Are you objecting to pulling out Canadian forces or do you think we should stay RUEZ.

Stay until the job is done. When that is, I'll leave up to the people that know what's going on over there. Not to Jack Layton or some Taliban mouthpiece.

well ruez start sending your cheques.. Canadians are getting sick of this no win US made war.. you can say hang in all you want because as a armchair warrior you wont be over there getting killed.. if you feels so fucking strong about it sign up... otherwise shut up...

[Scape]

romanP romanP:

Scape Scape:

Mental note, I must stop mixing beer with 12 year old scotch. Perhaps rye next time.

Why would you ruin scotch by mixing it with anything?

Generally I don't but my brother-in-law brought beers over to my firepit and I wasn't going to be rude...

[ridenrain]

Both of the next possible American presidents have comitted themselves to making Afghanistan work. We all, Canada, the US and NATO simply have too much at stake there to let this fail.

[RUEZ]

kenmore kenmore:

otherwise shut up...

Take your own advice then dumbass. You are on here spouting off about everything.

[Scape]

The brave and historical speech of Malalai Joya in the LJ


Would anyone have even heard her with the Taliban in power?


Who Owns America's Wealth?


If 1% of the US population own more than 90% of the US populations wealth combined can you imagine the wealth gap between the US and one of the poorest countries in the world Afghanistan? That disparity is what we must truly combat here or it will be the death of us all.

[DerbyX]

Scape Scape:

We all have our vices, the sicker the more extreme but vices also provide for character which endures. The disorganized rabble of Haiti were not cohesive as the Serbs and the Taliban. They did not possess the national will required to forge a nation.

What we are doing has not changed. We did not demand a new nation in Haiti, Serbia or now here in Afghanistan. The Taliban could do well to choose the path of the IRA and become legitimate and sit at the table of civilized nations to feast on its limitless bounty but they have chosen a different path and with such a choice comes consequences.

Incorrect. You may believe that on a philosophical level but in afghanistan we invaded against a legit gov't, as legit as anything they had when we helped them defeat the USSR.

We would do well to realize that it was repeated offers to the IRA to come to the table assurred of a voice and that doesn't even take into account we weren't killing Sein Fein.

Scape Scape:

We learn from mistakes and as much as history repeats itself we must stand up against the darkness not acquiesce to it. The people fighting us are in their own way reinventing the wheel because they will accept nothing that they have not made by their own hand. I admire their pluck but they aren't helping anyone and are simply reacting in a type of group think. This mob mentality ends up killing lemmings and anyone else that gets swept up in it.

Learn from our mistakes? Sadly I just don't see that at all. We didn't learn from WW1, the war to end all wars and WW2 didn't seem to stop the wars after it. We didn't learn from Vietnam and we certainly didn't learn from the soviet war in Afghanistan. The US shows no sign of learning anything from Iraq and would take only a nudge to have them repeat every mistake against Iran.

We aren't standing up to the darkness because that would have taken us to very bravely try and deal with the Taliban politically (honestly and not that bush method). We could have achieved as much as we have now if we were willing to simply swallow a little pride and helped them rebuild infrastructure and industry while tolerating their religious and cultural views as distasteful as they may have been. Reforms may have come slowly but they would have stood a better chance of being ideological reforms rather then what we have done.

Scape Scape:

The red horde was not there on some errand to better humanity, they needed access to a warm water port or their economy would collapse. Afghanistan was a stepping stone and part of that plan was pacifying them. The schools were a part of that anesthesia.

Scape, thats wrong. Unlike us the soviets had a long history of giving them aid and while we cannot ignore the reality of the whole cold war we are as guilty if nor more for the violence that surrounded the soviet intervention.

In addition, the Afghan people themselves have to recognize that they brought this violence about themselves over cultural and religious opposition to more modern thinking and time and again have shown that infighting is more important to them then trying to live peacefully. We aren't changing that. We haven't got that ability, only they do.

Scape Scape:

They may be worse but they know what side of the bread is buttered. Taliban have the option to join like the IRA did if they truly do care about the people of Afghanistan, but they don't as they only care about themselves.

Its our job to bring them to the table, not theirs. It is our responsibility to make the necessary political compromises to ensure this and if that means getting a ceasefire by promising and honouring an immediate phased troop withdrawl then thats what we do. The problem is that they are perfectly justified in demanding that and our own arrogance can't stomach us leaving under anything but our own valition.

We are the ones setting an example and its their country. We should be the ones doing whats right.

In addition, I think your buttered side comment belies the fact that the opium lords have a vested interest with growing poppies and shrugging their shoulders and blaming the taliban whom they need us to keep fighting so we won't go after them. Thats assuming that your points about Karzai's gov't actively supporting a narco state aren't 100% correct and we have become the defacto opium lords.

Scape Scape:

We are fighting them and training a country at the same time. Yes, there is much to be wary for but this is no simple plan, no easy outs here. However, if the world does not do anything to close the huge gap between the haves and the have nots we will end up with more than just planes flying into tall buildings we will reap a bitter harvest of hate and chaos that will never relent.

We could have far better addressed the wealth disparity through my method rather then a violent method that has so far seen us enact a vastly more corrupt gov't which we simply see as "the devil we know" which we willingly tolerate because we are fighting the very people we need to help bring peace to the country.

We can barely do anything about the weath disparity in our own country let alone one controlled by criminals supported by us because we decided to label and target people we think are worse.

Scape Scape:

No, I want a START and you have to work with the tools you have on hand. In time this can be improved upon but only if we put our backs into this effort now and not give more false hopes. Our word and deeds must stand for something and we must not end up being fair weather friends, "marginally better" translates into hope but only if we stick by it.

Garbage in means garbage out. Our word and deeds is exaclty what I am talking about. No reasonable excuse to support our invasion doesn't do anything for our credibility. Knowingly supporting the gov't we are suporting simply assures everything we do will be tainted.

Now is the time to take the high road, suck up our pride and do whats neccessary to bring all sides to the table. Its entirely why Karzai has said it time and again and only we can achieve this. Even if it requires us to do something we find distasteful.

Scape Scape:

he will to survive. If we don't deal with this madness now it will engulf us all. Its a pay me now or pay me much more later situation. There is a vast chasm between rich and poor and it is only growing. If not Afghanistan it would be Nigeria or some other shit hole where our embarrassment of richness is driving the starving masses to madness. The free market will not solve this mess, we must be active participants in the process.

Thats twice know you have used commentary more suitable to socio-economic polices and not about dealing with religious and cultural strife. Under the taliban their was little wealth disparity, nobody had any wealth.

I will point out that we are attempting to bring them western society but its in our society that the greatest disparity of wealth exists and we are responsible for much of that.

Your viewpoint about wealth disparity (and I agree with you) seems a point for a debate concerning taxes and fiscal policies but it does not justify an invasion of Afghanistan.

If I didn't know better that point could be used to justify us being invaded in order to share North Americas wealth with the world or to justify changing to a communist system of gov't.

Always remember: Liquor before beer never fear, beer before liquor never sicker.

Dosvidanya comrade.

[DerbyX]

commanderkai commanderkai:

Derby did you just fucking try to compare what the Soviets did to what the Americans did? Holy shit. Just wow.

"1) We are at fault for much of that and we are simply bringing the same shit kicking and violence you just mentioned. We just have alot more resources to build things. The soviets also tried building infrastructure, schools, hospitals, whatever but they had far far less resources and nothing but international condemnation all the while fighting an enemy trained and supplied by the US."

You must be honestly kidding.

I think you need to learn more about the truth. The fact is that unlike us the soviets/russia has had a long history of aid with Afghanistan. They were helping them build schools and infrastructure back in the 50s and only sent in troops after that regions gov't was on the verge of collapsing due to internal strife and only after being repeatedly begged to do so. They certainly weren't much worse then the US in Vietnam.

The US saw this as a great chance to give the USSR its own Vietnam and thats exactly what happened. The US wasn't concerned with anything but drawing the USSR into a long and bloody conflict. They cared nothing for the people hurt in the process and used propaganda to play up the whole jihad angle, the very angle we are now fighting against.

$1:

Like many other anti-communist movements at that time, the rebels quickly garnered support from the United States. As stated by the former director of the CIA and current Secretary of Defense, Robert Gates, in his memoirs From the Shadows, the American intelligence services began to aid the rebel factions in Afghanistan 6 months before the Soviet deployment. On July 3, 1978, US President Jimmy Carter signed an executive order authorizing the CIA to conduct covert propaganda operations against the communist regime.

Carter advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski stated "According to the official version of history, CIA aid to the mujahideen began during 1980, that is to say, after the Soviet army invaded Afghanistan, 24 Dec 1979. But the reality, secretly guarded until now, is completely otherwise." Brzezinski himself played a fundamental role in crafting U.S. policy, which, unbeknownst even to the mujahideen, was part of a larger strategy "to induce a Soviet military intervention." In a 1998 interview with Le Nouvel Observateur, Brzezinski recalled:

We didn't push the Russians to intervene, but we knowingly increased the probability that they would...That secret operation was an excellent idea. It had the effect of drawing the Soviets into the Afghan trap...The day that the Soviets officially crossed the border, I wrote to President Carter. We now have the opportunity of giving to the Soviet Union its Vietnam War.

Much of the conflict was a result of what the tribesman and muslim populace saw as a threat to their traditional and religious way of life when efforts to introduce modern reforms were initiated back in the mid 70s.

Does that sound familiar?

The fact is that because the west was fighting the east in a massive childish global game they decided to help anybody against the soviets. Enemy of my enemy is my friend. They knew exactly what type of people they were helping but didn't care and when the soviets were driven out the US promptly dropped them like a hot potatoe and took no responsibility for the massive arms they had given what was essentially a whole slew of loosely banded warring factions and the rest is history.

We were the architects of much of the problems so yeah, my statement rings pretty true.