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Author | Topic: The Awesome Obama Thread II | |||||||||||||||||||||||
crashfrog Member (Idle past 1467 days) Posts: 19762 From: Silver Spring, MD Joined: |
You're saying ending the Vietnam war was BAD? I'm saying that the way it was ended was worse than continuing it.
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crashfrog Member (Idle past 1467 days) Posts: 19762 From: Silver Spring, MD Joined: |
16 out of the 19 9/11 highjackers were . . . Saudi Arabian. Al-Queda was based in . . . . . Saudi Arabia. And? So what? The 9/11 attacks were planned in Afghanistan, ordered from Afghanistan, by bin Laden who was supported by the Taliban in Afghanistan. You really think there was no connection between Afghanistan and 9/11? That we just invaded a country at random?
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crashfrog Member (Idle past 1467 days) Posts: 19762 From: Silver Spring, MD Joined: |
You think it was better to continue that bloodletting? I think that an orderly withdrawal would have been better than the hasty, clumsy withdrawal prompted by Congress' defunding of the war. Who said anything about continuing the "bloodletting"?
This is a huge different topic. No, it's just another example of how you don't know what you're talking about.
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crashfrog Member (Idle past 1467 days) Posts: 19762 From: Silver Spring, MD Joined: |
Obama had desperately tried to EXTEND the Iraq war occupation. "Desperately"?
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crashfrog Member (Idle past 1467 days) Posts: 19762 From: Silver Spring, MD Joined: |
It should have been obvious all along, that we cannot solve the problems of Afghanistan. We didn't invade to "solve the problems of Afghanistan", but to attack an organization that had declared war on us.
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crashfrog Member (Idle past 1467 days) Posts: 19762 From: Silver Spring, MD Joined: |
Meanwhile, the good old USA not only gave harbor to members of bin Laden's team, it also trained them in how to fly those aircraft. Well, no. The US didn't "harbor" the 9/11 terrorists; the US was infiltrated by the 9/11 terrorists. Afghanistan, on the other hand, cooperated with bin Laden with full knowledge that he and his organization were jihadist soldiers. Mullah Omar actually reneged on a promise to turn bin Laden over to the Saudis and later fought extradition attempts after the 1998 embassy bombings because their cooperation had proved so fruitful. al-Qaeda provided training for their armies, provided fighters who assisted in the Mazar-e-Sharif massacre. The partnership was sealed in the old-fashioned way when one of bin Laden's sons married one of Mullah Omar's daughters. When Mullah Omar and the Taliban dynamited the precious Bamyan Buddhas, it was at bin Laden's request. NWR, did any of the 9/11 hijackers marry into the Bush family? No? Then I think you have to admit that there's a substantial difference in cooperation between paying money to take flight school classes under assumed identies at an open-enrollment community college, and providing support and money in exchange for training and military support as part of an arrangement sealed by marriage. You guys didn't know this stuff?
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crashfrog Member (Idle past 1467 days) Posts: 19762 From: Silver Spring, MD Joined: |
Mainly, you have to ignore the aid of Pakistan to the Taliban AND the actual historical fact that the hijackers (at least 15 of them) where Saudi citizens with no connection to Afghanistan. I don't have to ignore it, it's irrelevant. Who cares where the hijackers were from? Saudi Arabia didn't send them; Saudi Arabia was opposed to al-Qaeda and several times tried to have bin Laden extradited. Guess who it was that blocked the extradition? Mullah Omar, the leader of the Taliban. Kind of a favor to a relative, you see, since his daughter married bin Laden's son. Oh, right, that's just the "shit I'm making up."
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crashfrog Member (Idle past 1467 days) Posts: 19762 From: Silver Spring, MD Joined: |
For that, we should have gone in, attacked them, then got out. Yes, that's exactly right. But now you've shifted positions from a critique of the causus belli of the war to a critique of its prosecution. That's certainly a more reasonable position, however.
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crashfrog Member (Idle past 1467 days) Posts: 19762 From: Silver Spring, MD Joined: |
You are ascribing intentions to the nation of Afghanistan, but you are unwilling to ascribe similar intentions to the USA. Um, yes - because, manifestly, the Taliban under the rule of Mullah Omar had those intentions, but the state of Florida under Jeb Bush did not. Surely the notion of ascribing different intentions to completely different people who took completely different actions doesn't faze you.
A more accurate assessment would be that there was no nation of Afghanistan, just a bunch of tribal groups. I'm sorry? Afghanistan has been a recognized and independent nation since 1919. And it's precisely the point that we didn't go over there to fight "a bunch of tribal groups", but the ruling coalition which had seized power by force of arms, called the "Taliban." And it was precisely the Taliban which harbored, aided, and abetted al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden, as I've demonstrated. You're just fundamentally wrong about the political situation in Afghanistan. Like I said, Jeb Bush didn't marry off one of his daughters to one of bin Laden's sons - but Mullah Omar of the Taliban did.
I am saying that there is more evidence that USA did, than that Afghanistan did. Well, perhaps you'd like to consider presenting some of it.
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crashfrog Member (Idle past 1467 days) Posts: 19762 From: Silver Spring, MD Joined: |
Do the tribal groups within Afghanistan which are fighting one another view each other at Afghanistani or as Tribe X and Tribe Y. "Afghan" (or sometimes "Pashtun") is the word you're looking for, and no, it's not just a bunch of tribes in a valley. There's a coherent Afghani identity, a national currency, they've been ruled by a central authority since the 19th century, there's even a national dress. There's tribes, yes; but even here in the United States we have states, but your identity as a Californian or mine as a... Marylander? Marylandian? (I'm kind of new here)... don't mean that we're not both Americans. I just don't see how anyone can claim that there's not a coherent Afghani national identity. We didn't go there to fight one tribe or another, we went there to crush the Taliban, the ruling Afghan government which attacked us on 9/11 via al-Qaeda proxies.
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crashfrog Member (Idle past 1467 days) Posts: 19762 From: Silver Spring, MD Joined: |
Where does Afghanistan show up as a supporter for Bin Laden, the attacks or financial backing? I already told you. Via Mullah Omar, the leader of the Taliban. Any further questions?
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crashfrog Member (Idle past 1467 days) Posts: 19762 From: Silver Spring, MD Joined: |
The Taliban funded al-Qaeda, and received training and soldiers in response. At what point did Pakistan fund al-Qaeda? Please be specific.
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crashfrog Member (Idle past 1467 days) Posts: 19762 From: Silver Spring, MD Joined: |
Yes, we went to attack the Taliban, but that doesn't mean that there is a coherent Afghanistan. No, it's the fact that there's been a coherent Afghanistan since the 19th century that means there's a coherent Afghanistan. You can elide all my evidence by being snide if you like, but I've given copious examples of Afghan national and cultural unity that would more than establish that Afghanistan is not some artificial or synthetic collection of tribes, but a coherent nation that also has tribes. Scotland has clans, but that's not evidence that there's not really any such thing as "Scotland" or that Scots, clannish as they may be, don't view themselves as belonging to a distinct group called "Scots."
There's no uniting them, no controlling them. For fuck's sake, what could possibly be your basis for these statements?
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crashfrog Member (Idle past 1467 days) Posts: 19762 From: Silver Spring, MD Joined: |
Of course Pakistan isn't DIRECTLY funding Al Qaeda, but they do so indirectly through funding the Taliban. And Pakistan has cooperated with our efforts to defeat al-Qaeda and the Taliban. So, again, I don't see the point.
Pakistan should have been the target, not Afghanistan. Target for what? Pakistan is our cooperating ally.
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crashfrog Member (Idle past 1467 days) Posts: 19762 From: Silver Spring, MD Joined: |
Neither Pakistan nor Afghanistan shoud have been the target. But, again, I think Afghanistan and the Taliban were a pretty reasonable target considering that bin Laden was hiding out in Afghanistan as a guest of the Taliban. Why would you invade Pakistan when bin Laden was in Afghanistan? Recall that when we did get bin Laden, it was in Pakistan, with Pakistan's help.
If Pakistan isn't targeted for indirectly aiding Al Qaeda by funding the Taliban and supporting Bin Laden, then neither should have Afghanistan. That makes zero fucking sense.>
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