Obama’s war

[Admin 1]

<p>The American president’s new plan for Afghanistan is roughly what the generals ordered</p><p>AMERICA will win in Afghanistan, said Barack Obama on December 1st. He told an audience at West Point, a military academy, “our cause is just, our resolve unwavering. We will go forward with the confidence that right makes might”. Yet he made it clear that his patience is limited. At a time when many Americans are out of work and struggling to pay the bills, he promised that “America has no interest in fighting an endless war in Afghanistan.”</p><p>President Obama outlined a three-pronged strategy for “disrupting, dismantling, and defeating” al-Qaeda and the “ruthless, repressive and radical” Taliban. The first prong will be a military surge. He promised to send 30,000 more troops early next year, to join the 68,000 Americans and 39,000 other NATO forces already in Afghanistan. NATO allies will also send reinforcements. This is about 10,000 less than requested by his commander in Afghanistan, General Stanley McChrystal, but some of the difference will be made up by greater contributions from NATO allies. The new force will be large enough to seize back the initiative from the Taliban, he predicted, by killing insurgents and protecting population centres. ...</p>

Posted on Wed, 02 Dec 2009 05:37:47 GMT at http://www.economist.com/world/na/displa...1&fsrc=rss

[danhshubin]

the Pentagon estimates cost of $ one million per soldier per year for the Afghan war with the increase of 30,000 troops. This is $30,000,000,000 (30 billion dollars) per year to be pumped into the failing US economy, plus $68 biilion per year for the existing 68,000 troops, at the cost of US and Afghan and UN coalition lives and the destruction of their country.

A lot of people make their living in military-industrial manufacturing plus the members of the military. A lot of people will also become very wealthy. These people support the US in their patriotism and are not about to speak against the war or US foreign policy, so they do not bite the hand that feeds them. But it only lasts as long as the war lasts.

This is not what Jesus taught.

The same money could be pumped directly into the US economy via education, infrastructure, social services, and the like, which will do more for both the US and Afghanistan. But this is too simple and objective.

The war will end when finally people get tired of all the killing in futile cause. Afghanistan is another Viet-Nam, part of the self-destructive cycle of warfare since Cain killed Abel, and it will never end. Just as Jesus said, "There will be wars and rumors of war."

Good video to watch is the Russian response to Omaba decision to increase troop level, after USSR in 1979 invaded Afghanistan and attempted occupation and failed after 15,000 lives and billions of rubles that almost bank-rupted the country.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/asiapcf/12...index.html

People do not want a pacifist Messiah; they want a militarist messiah. But we must not be part of it, as Jesus said, "We are in the world, but we are not part of the world."

(12-02-2009 07:01 AM)Admin 1 Wrote:  <p>The American president’s new plan for Afghanistan is roughly what the generals ordered</p><p>AMERICA will win in Afghanistan, said Barack Obama on December 1st. He told an audience at West Point, a military academy, “our cause is just, our resolve unwavering. We will go forward with the confidence that right makes might”. Yet he made it clear that his patience is limited. At a time when many Americans are out of work and struggling to pay the bills, he promised that “America has no interest in fighting an endless war in Afghanistan.”</p><p>President Obama outlined a three-pronged strategy for “disrupting, dismantling, and defeating” al-Qaeda and the “ruthless, repressive and radical” Taliban. The first prong will be a military surge. He promised to send 30,000 more troops early next year, to join the 68,000 Americans and 39,000 other NATO forces already in Afghanistan. NATO allies will also send reinforcements. This is about 10,000 less than requested by his commander in Afghanistan, General Stanley McChrystal, but some of the difference will be made up by greater contributions from NATO allies. The new force will be large enough to seize back the initiative from the Taliban, he predicted, by killing insurgents and protecting population centres. ...</p>

Posted on Wed, 02 Dec 2009 05:37:47 GMT at http://www.economist.com/world/na/displa...1&fsrc=rss

[RedOctober]

Its in the interest of the US economy as well, to keep the troops abroad right now due to massive unemployment.

And I agree that all that money and labor could be better spent here in fixing our current crumbling infrastructure, such as replacing water lines, repaving roads, maintaining and updating the national and state parks, etc. Doing that would even provide a direct benefit to the US economy. Except their would be one small problem....

Every right wing hack would be screaming at the top of their lungs "Its Socialism!!!". And they would be right, it is socialism. And of course they will ignore that much of the present infrastructure that we all use and take for granted was built under work programs and policies first started under Franklin Roosevelt. The free market did nothing to accomplish it. For example, in the Central Valley of California, many don't realized that their farm water is heavily subsidized. Majority of the dams were built under the Bureau of Reclamation with tax payer funds that was started under Roosevelt. Granted the Bureau existed prior to his Presidency, but didn't really get the funds for most of its projects until then.

Because of the political indoctrination of the Cold War Era (that is being told about the "socialist nightmare" in the news media constantly and of course having it hammered into school students since the 1950's), it has become more an acceptable economic practice to send and pay troops to kill and destroy the people of another country, rather than fund public works programs that benefit everyone in society.