Behind the Curtain of the new "Good War"

[bemildred]

Ted Rall speaks a hard truth here, one that goes unspoken across the political spectrum, including among innumerable anti-war dissidents:

"The war against Afghanistan is no different, no more justifiable, and no more winnable than the war against Iraq. Both were underfunded, poorly planned and based on lies. Neither had anything to do with 9/11."

The absence of this truth from the national discourse guarantees that the country will continue to barrel down the dangerous, self-defeating road of misguided militarism. You should read the whole thing, but here are some excerpts:

Taking Our Brain Off the Ball (via The Smirking Chimp)
…. George W. Bush's war against Iraq, most Americans believe, was a distraction from the war on terrorism. But so was Afghanistan. Osama bin Laden has been in Pakistan since before 9/11. Bush knew that. Nevertheless, he bombarded the military dictator of Pakistan, who financed the Taliban and Al Qaeda's training camps and hosted bin Laden, not with cluster bombs but with millions of our taxdollars. He never tried to catch Osama.

Empire Burlesque

[eallen]

1. There's only one part of that with which I agree....

The Afghanistan war was underfunded and poorly planned.

But I think it's pretty silly to deny the connections between bin Laden and 9/11. One of the big differences between the Afghanistan war and the Iraq war is that the former was related to 9/11. Those who deny this largely undercut their ability to criticize the Iraq war, because it shows they fail to draw real distinctions, and that their views are formed by ideological koolaid every bit as strong as that drunk by the freepers who believe Saddam ordered 9/11. Just a different flavor, is all.

[bemildred]

2. Sort of agree.

A better point would be whether invasion and occupation was the right answer to Taliban complicity with al Qaeda, whether conventional military operations are the right way to deal with terrorist gangs.

[eallen]

3. That's a legitimate issue. Bush makes nation building seem futile...

That doesn't mean it is. I suspect an adequate commitment to Afghanistan would have produced a drastically different result there. I can't prove that, of course. It's the kind of historical claim that requires the effort be tried, to know with any certainty how much difference it would have made.

But the converse is also true: you cannot look at Bush's failure, and declare because of it, that we could have done no better.

[razors edge]

4. I must have missed something,

Didn't Colon Power promise to show the world irrefutable proof of Usama Binladen's guilt and just as every other promise made by these s**tbags, never fulfilled his assertions?