America = doomed (merged many times)

[Skybird]

General Patreus short time ago admitted that the afghanistan war is likely to become the longest war in the history of the US. With Pakistan being on the brink of becoming a no longer functioning state anymore, the region promises to become the most difficult and threatening problem of american foreign policy. And I would not rule out at all that the future will bring major military engagement not only on the soil of Pakistan but against Pakistan itself. With recent terror strike taking place inside pakistan, foreign investors start to avoid the country. On the other hand, China seem to be willing to take over their role and pay for the ticket of enjoyng a place in the first row to observe how the west is struggling and looses ressources whose absence in other fields make Chinese soft powerpolitics easier to succeed.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/...584616,00.html

At almost the same time, a diplomatic briefing between the British ambassador in Kabul, a man known for his directness, and a French diplomat was leaked. Sir Sherard Cowper-Coles said the current situation in Afghanistan was "bad; the security situation is getting worse -- so is corruption -- and the government (of President Hamid Karzai) has lost all trust." The American strategy, he said, "is doomed to fail."

Internally, US intelligence agents have arrived at a similar assessment. In the most thorough analysis of the war in Afghanistan to date, the National Intelligence Estimate, which is to be released after the US presidential election in November, the 16 US intelligence services involved write that Afghanistan is in a dangerous "downward spiral." The report mentions mounting violence and a government consumed by corruption and barely capable of resisting the Taliban uprising. Last Thursday Admiral Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the US Armed Forces, spoke of a similarly poor outlook when he predicted that the situation would become even worse next year.

Trapped in the Afghan maze.

Some days ago it was reported that NATO troops now should engage in supressing and battling the farming of poppy. If that becomes true and the loss of money will be felt by the big names in business (and that are mostly not the Taleban anymore, but "private" warlords), tis will become real fun, for these people do not need to just accept the destruction of their income basis, and suffient numbers of those who so far kept out of taking sides in the fighting will then chose sides and make the change a reality in the battles on the ground that NATO will bring to struggling even more. Add to that the hidh level of corruption within the Karzai government, which had been a problem with this man since he was implemented.

Also, there is still no functioning plan how to make the farmers farm different products so that they have an income to feed their families. the agricultural competitveness of them had been shattered by establishing trade patterns that shipped plenty of foreign grain into the country, by control of the UN, so that the prices the Afghnaistan farmers would need to demand were so high in comparison to the cheaper import that nobody could or would buy from them, and so they turned for poppy. If you take away poppy, you will have a similiar effect like after disb anding the Iraqui army: you suddenly will have hundreds of thousands of desperate men with weapons who need to bring the bread home for their family, and thus willthink twice to fight for the taleban and the warlords for a small fee, and also to defend that remaining rest of their pride. The Afghan society is relatively young. Young men are over-represented in it's society.

The taleban will love to see NATO destroying poppy fields. NATO could as well offer the farmer a reward if they would join the taleban in fighting. On the other hand, the country has once again become the greatets poppy producer in the world, and that stuff lands on Wetsern streets, fuels Western organised crime and killes Wetsenr young people. So, whatever you do regarding poppy, you are doomed.

Trapped in the Afghan maze.

Nevertheless the german government, having no real longterm strategy anymore, and at home in berlin suffering from seriously distorted illusions, voted to send 1000 more troops. Just what realistically is to be acchieved in Afghanistan, on that nobody had to say a single word different from the usual braindead propaganda slogans. They probably wait for the good fairy to clean up their mess, or hope for an invasion from Planet Mars to establish a new world order, and until then hope to sit it out.

In recent time there seems a parallel to the Iraq war emerging that so far has not been spend much attention to: the lack of longterm planning for the time after the field battle. In Iraq, this lack of preparation and realoistic plans that took into account the realities on the ground decided the failure of the war already on the first day of the field battle. In Afghanistan, off-reality expectations and totally surreal assumptions as well as failures in support and ensuring a tough fight against corruption let the opportunity window close over a slightly longer period of time, but now it is obvious that it is shut. The chances for a "win" in Afghanistan (a not too hostile to the West government in command that is accepted and has enough authpority to prevent corruption and to stand above the local ethnic tensions) I initially estimated to be 30-50% at best, but now I see these chances to be almost non-existant. The point is - Afghanistan, like Iraq, is a homemade-failure. and nobody seems to have an exit-strategy. you do damage by staying, and you do damage by leaving.

Trapped in the Afghan maze.