OMNI
AFGHANISTAN (AND PAKISTAN) NEWSLETTER, #24, December 27, 2020.
Compiled by
Dick Bennett for a Culture of Peace and Justice
(#8 April 15, 2011; #9 June 10, 2011;
#10 July 3, 2011; #11 July 13, 2011; #12
Sept. 5, 2011; #13 Oct. 2, 2011; #14 Oct. 15, 2011; #15 Feb. 14, 2012 ; #16
April 27, 2012; #17 May 3, 2012; #18 Oct. 20, 2012; #19 Jan. 14, 2013; #20
August 17, 2013; #21, Feb. 4, 2014; #22, Feb. 22, 2015; #23, August 22, 2017)
Contribute
to OMNI: www.omnicenter.org/donate
CONTENTS
The Four Last Years of US Occupation of Afghanistan: 2017-2020. REPLACE THE KILLING MACHINE WITH PROTECTING THE VULNERABLE.
TEXTS
2020: 19 Years of US invasion and occupation
Ending the United States’ Longest War. UPJ United for Peace and Justice. 5-26-20
In February 2020, the United States and the Taliban signed an
agreement laying the groundwork for a full withdrawal of all foreign troops
from Afghanistan and ending the United States’ longest war. The Friends
Committee on National Legislation (FCNL) has issued a new report on a responsible
path forward which draws on extensive interviews with experts in diplomacy,
crisis response and planning, military affairs, and state-building. Read
FCNL’s “Peace in Afghanistan: Ending the War Responsibly.”
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Has
America reached its endgame in Afghanistan? Mronline.org (3-30-20). In
an extraordinary statement titled “On the Political Impasse in
Afghanistan,” Washington has admitted to the failure of Secretary of State
Mike Pompeo’s mission to Kabul on March 23, which was taken up to heal the
political rift among Afghan politicians and to urge them to form an
inclusive government so as to implement the […]
 
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The prospect of peace in Afghanistan is real—and
Pakistan is the key player.
Mronline.org (3-5-20)
The
U.S.-Taliban peace agreement signed in Doha on February 29 must be put in
proper perspective. Indeed, there can’t be two opinions that the curtain is
coming down on what U.S. President Donald Trump called the “endless war” in
which America squandered away over a trillion dollars and lost thousands of
lives with no victory […]
Source 
Afghanistan Papers
[signatures needed]
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Stephen
Miles 2-2-20 WIN WITHOUT WAR
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Feb
1, 2020, 11:21 AM (1 day ago)
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to me
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Dear James,
Last month, a U.S. airstrike in Herat, Afghanistan killed 10
unnamed Afghan civilians, including three children. Of the
7,423 bombs dropped on Afghanistan last year, it’s hard to find any real
information about the impacts on the people of Afghanistan beyond these
numbers. It’s been hard to find out any truths about the war at all.
That was until the Afghanistan Papers dropped — exposing that
senior U.S. officials withheld key pieces of information for the past 18 years,
including that the war was unwinnable, failing every single metric.
In other words: the Afghanistan Papers exposed that the U.S. war
in Afghanistan has been — and still is today — built entirely on blatant
lies.
We HAVE to use the momentum of the Afghanistan Papers to push as
hard as we can to end the endless U.S. war in Afghanistan. This starts with
hauling the liars who have been enabling this endless war into Congress to say
publicly, under oath, what we now know they admit behind closed doors. It's
time for the truth.
Tell Congress: Investigate the
Afghanistan Papers NOW and end endless war!
“We didn’t know what we were doing” said
Douglas Lute, a three-star Army general who served as the White House’s Afghan
war czar during the Bush and Obama administrations.
This is just one line in the Afghanistan Paper’s more than 2,000
pages of previously unpublished notes of interviews with people who played a
direct role in the war, from generals and diplomats to aid workers and Afghan
officials.
It’s hard to comprehend, James. Because this harrowing reality
alongside the facts of the Afghanistan war is sickening.
18 years of U.S. occupation.
At least 160,000 Afghan and U.S. casualties.
At least $1.8 trillion spent.
A war now fought by U.S. servicemembers who weren’t even born when it
began.
An unwinnable war.
What’s more difficult to understand is why, when the vast
majority of the U.S. public, Congress, U.S. presidential candidates all want
THIS WAR TO END, it hasn’t ended yet.
And I’ll tell you. It’s because we haven’t made it end
yet.
So this year, we are going to do everything we can to end it. On
every must-pass piece of defense-related legislation, we will push to remove
troops and to repeal the 2001 Authorization for Military Force – the law that
keeps this war going. We will put ending the war in front of members of
Congress.
That’s why today we are pushing the House and Senate Foreign
Affairs, Armed Services, and Intelligence Committees to investigate the
Afghanistan Papers, demanding an end to the days when they can lie in public
while admitting the truth behind closed doors. Are you with me?
Will you tell the House and
Senate Armed Services, Foreign Affairs and Intelligence Committees to
investigate the Afghanistan Papers now?
When the Pentagon Papers dropped in 1971, outrage exploded
across the country about the lies that kept the Vietnam war going. Today, the
Afghanistan Papers barely filled headlines for a week, breaking a murmur only
for antiwar and veteran communities. Perhaps it’s because, sadly, people today
just expect the government to lie to us. But these lies have deadly
consequences, and it’s up to us to demand the truth. It’s on you and me
to end the U.S. war and push for peace in Afghanistan.
Thank you for working for peace,
Stephen, Kate, Tara, and the Win Without War team
© Win Without War Education Fund
2019
1 Thomas Circle NW, Suite 700, Washington, DC 20005
(202) 656-4999 | info@winwithoutwar.org
2019
The
Pentagon Papers Redux
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10:03
AM (8 hours ago)
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to bcc: me
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I Just Can't Believe We Went Down This Road Again
The Afghanistan
Papers have exposed that we truly learned nothing from Vietnam.
By Charles P. Pierce. Dec 16, 2019.
Everything
is so screwed up at this point that it’s hard to find anything about our
politics or our government that doesn’t look like it was designed by an unholy
hybrid of Edsel Ford and Mr. Natural. Ever since we opened the shebeen, we have
had one simple question about the continuing United States military involvement
in Afghanistan, in which it has been involved longer than it ever has been
involved anywhere else—namely, what exactly are we still doing there?
So, last
week, the Washington Post published
the equivalent of The Pentagon Papers in which we learn that all or most of our
leaders for the past decade and a half don’t know either, but that they were
not any more inclined to share that with us than were McNamara, and Abrams, and
the rest of those guys back in the 1960s.
“We were devoid of a fundamental
understanding of Afghanistan — we didn’t know what we were doing,” Douglas
Lute, a three-star Army general who served as the White House’s Afghan war czar
during the Bush and Obama administrations, told government interviewers in
2015. He added: “What are we trying to do here? We
didn’t have the foggiest notion of what we were undertaking.” “If the American people knew the
magnitude of this dysfunction . . . 2,400 lives lost,” Lute
added, blaming the deaths of U.S. military personnel on bureaucratic breakdowns
among Congress, the Pentagon and the State Department. “Who will say this was in vain?”
Or, as
was said by a certain former Democratic candidate for president, how do you ask
someone to be the last man to die for a mistake?
This has
been a bipartisan cock-up right from jump. None of the three administrations
involved in it comes out of this report looking like people you’d trust to wash
your car. One trillion bucks and climbing, and what have we learned? Basically,
that we haven’t learned anything. It took the Post three years
to pry these documents loose (and there’s nothing that Post editor
Marty Baron likes better than prying documents loose—just ask the Archdiocese
of Boston), and we find that the old Vietnam Syndrome wasn’t kicked very far
during our walkover wars in the 1980s and 1990s.
The documents also contradict a long chorus of public statements
from U.S. presidents, military commanders and diplomats who assured Americans
year after year that they were making progress in Afghanistan and the war was
worth fighting. Several of those interviewed described explicit and sustained
efforts by the U.S. government to deliberately mislead the public. They said it
was common at military headquarters in Kabul — and at the White House — to
distort statistics to make it appear the United States was winning the war when
that was not the case.
"Every data point was altered to
present the best picture possible," Bob Crowley, an Army
colonel who served as a senior counterinsurgency adviser to U.S. military
commanders in 2013 and 2014, told government interviewers. “Surveys, for instance, were
totally unreliable but reinforced that everything we were doing was right
and we became a self-licking ice cream cone.” John Sopko, the
head of the federal agency that conducted the interviews, acknowledged to The
Post that the documents show “the American people have constantly been lied
to.”
Frankly,
and maybe it’s because I persist in believing that the activism of the 1960s
actually accomplished something lasting, I can’t believe that we’ve gone down
this road again. Hell, we’ve made hit movies about the Pentagon Papers. That
was a watershed. Everybody learned a lesson from those documents, right?
And, of
course, the most damning thing about these revelations is that they vanished
from the media almost immediately, lost in the din of the barely organized
crazy that this administration has brought to Washington. This was a monumental
scoop, the result of dogged work by the entire news operation of the Washington
Post, and most people know far more about Giuliani’s insane overseas
ramblings than know anything about the archived failure and waste present here.
“We don’t invade poor countries to
make them rich,” James Dobbins, a former senior U.S. diplomat
who served as a special envoy to Afghanistan under Bush and Obama, told
government interviewers. “We don’t invade authoritarian
countries to make them democratic. We invade violent countries to make them
peaceful and we clearly failed in Afghanistan.”
Everything
is awful.
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WOMEN & GIRLS UN Wire
11-21-19
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AFGHANISTAN
WIN WITHOUT WAR
Dick,
10-7-19
Last month, 32 Afghan pine nut
harvesters — sitting around a fire after a day’s labor in the fields — were
killed by a U.S. drone strike. [1]
A few days later: 40+ guests at a wedding
party — including 12 children — were killed in a raid by U.S. backed Afghan
forces. [2] Last weekend: 5 more civilians were killed in a U.S. airstrike. [3]
These devastating events are far from a
one-off: a BBC investigation found an average of 74 men, women, and children
were killed every day in Afghanistan in August. [4] The leading cause
of death for civilians: airstrikes by U.S. and Afghan government forces.
Eighteen years ago tomorrow, we started the
war in Afghanistan — the longest war in modern U.S. history. And
this blank check for war, the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force
(AUMF), approved by Congress in the days after 9/11, continues to be abused
again and again to expand U.S. wars around the world with horrific human
consequences.
But right now — even with impeachment rightly
dominating political attention — our team is surging because we’re on
the cusp of closing this disastrous chapter.
Our policy and legislative team is deeply
engaged in critical behind-the-scenes negotiations between House & Senate
staffers over a must-pass defense bill that includes a House-passed end to
endless war — and while it’s not headline-grabbing work, it
is extremely consequential.
Can you make a critical $15
donation to help Win Without War end authorization for endless war and STOP
this horrific cycle of violence?
The human costs of our endless
wars goes far, far further than Afghanistan.
Just last week, Amnesty International
released an investigation into a U.S. drone-strike in Somalia that
killed three farmers driving home from work. That attack, like all other
U.S. military operations in Somalia — 2,000 miles from Afghanistan — was almost
certainly conducted under a dubious claim of authorization from the same 2001
AUMF.
There is NOTHING but death and
human suffering to show for this blank check for war.
And it’s why we are DETERMINED to end the
authorization for endless war in the must-pass defense spending bill being
negotiated right now. We are in the final stretch of a years-long fight
to get this passed — and we need your support to keep it going:
Can you make a critical $15
donation to help Win Without War end authorization for endless war and STOP
this horrific cycle of violence?
Eighteen years ago tomorrow, the U.S. invaded
Afghanistan. In the almost two decades since the war began, headlines about
farmers, weddings, and children being bombed and killed have become so
commonplace — they are the background noise in the national consciousness of
the United States. But we don’t have to accept endless wars as a reality of our
country, and the world. This war isn’t just the way things are. This
war is the way things were made. And we can unmake it,
together.
Ending endless war — even
though it’s a huge feat — is possible.
Thank you for working for peace,
Tara, Kate, Stephen, and the Win Without War
team
[1] Reuters, "U.S. drone strike kills 30 pine nut
farm workers in Afghanistan"
[2] Reuters, "At least 40 civilians at wedding
party killed during nearby U.S.-backed Afghan army raid"
[3] Stars and Stripes, "Afghan officials: US airstrike
targeting Taliban adds to civilian death toll"
[4] BBC, "Afghanistan war: Tracking the
killings in August 2019"
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Peace is
a word that the West has taken from the Afghans.
mronline.org
(6-14-19)
The war on Afghanistan has
been ugly. Death is one consequence of war—2019 has been the
deadliest year for civilians since the United States
first began to bomb Afghanistan in 2001. Starvation is another—according to
the UN, half of the population will need food assistance over the course of
this year. Source
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[Video]
End Endless War
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Stephen
Miles WIN WITHOUT WAR
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Jul 20, 2019, 10:17 AM (1 day ago)
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to me
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Dear Dick,
For almost 20 years, the US has been fighting an endless,
worldwide, and brutal war.
500,000 people have been killed — almost half of them civilians
— in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Pakistan ALONE since Congress handed over a
blank-check for war called the “Authorization of Military Force” in 2001, and
then doubled down by authorizing the invasion of Iraq in 2002.
Five years ago we made Ending Endless War one of our key
campaign demands — and this year we’ve seen it picked up like never before.
So the Win Without War team put together an awesome video
featuring some of the most prominent politicians from across the ideological
spectrum today adding their support to End Endless War.
Thank you for working for peace, Stephen, Liam, Kate, and
the Win Without War team
© Win Without War Education Fund
2019
1 Thomas Circle NW, Suite 700, Washington, DC 20005
(202) 656-4999 | info@winwithoutwar.org
2018: 17
Years of US invasion and occupation
Agriculture
the "backbone" of Afghan economy: FAO says amid severe drought.
UN News Centre (11/27) . UN Wire,
11-28-18
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Tell
Congress: End the 17-year U.S. war in Afghanistan NOW
WIN WITHOUT
WAR
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12:19
PM (7 hours ago)
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to me
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Seventeen years of U.S. war in
Afghanistan is seventeen years too many. Tell Congress: End this war now
>>
Dick— seventeen years ago today, the United States
went to war in Afghanistan.
This war is still raging. At seventeen years, it’s the longest
war in U.S. history. This war has cost countless lives and forced a entire
generation of Afghan and American young people to grow up in the shadow of
violence. Even the former top U.S. military commander in Afghanistan said
that we must end this war. [1]
Today, we demand that our Members of Congress mark the
anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan by acting to end this
war now.
Here’s what’s different about today than the past seventeen
years. This country is about to see a potentially monumental midterm
election, that could break the stalemate in Congress that’s blocked efforts
to end the war.
For seventeen years, our Members of Congress have been willing
to gamble countless American and Afghan lives to avoid simply doing their job
and voting on this war. That ends today.
Let’s set a new status quo for the new Congress by demanding
an end to the U.S. war in Afghanistan. And let’s make it our baseline for
what it means to be a foreign policy leader.
Tell Congress: End the U.S.
war in Afghanistan NOW.
The simple truth is that no amount of warmaking is going to
bring peace to a country that has seen four decades of conflict. We know
beyond question that this war cannot be resolved with more bullets and bombs.
And it’s time to try something different.
Seventeen years of war means that American children not even
born with this war started can now enlist to fight in it. Seventeen years of
war means that for their entire lives, the young people of Afghanistan have
only ever known a time when American bombs were falling on their country.
Seventeen years ago, 40% of Afghans feared for their personal safety; today,
nearly twice as many do. U.S. war has forced an entire generation of Afghan
youth to grow up under fear and violence.
Despite continuous war and dehumanization, the Afghan people
are envisioning a future free of conflict. This
spring, a multi-generational group of Afghan activists completed a “peace
walk” across the country. Afghan girls and women delivered flowers to the
Taliban requesting an extension to the ceasefire for Eid al-Fitr [2].
We should be uplifting the demands of Afghan activists
fighting for peace against all odds by insisting that our elected leaders use
their power to end this war. This is our moment to act.
Tell your Members of Congress
now: End the war in Afghanistan and give the Afghan-led peace movement a
chance to self-determine their future.
U.S. militarism, following generations of Soviet and British
invasions, has exacerbated decades-long cycles of violence in Afghanistan
that have killed and hurt far too many. Afghan youth deserve to live free of
war and to heal their psyches, bodies, lands, and infrastructure from the
scars of war. And American servicemembers deserve not to be asked to die for
a war that cannot be won.
Seventeen years is far, far too long for any war, particularly
one this futile. Let today mark an end to it.
Thank you for working for peace,
Amy, Mariam, Tara, and the Win Without War team
---
[1] New York Times, "‘Time for This War in Afghanistan
to End,’ Says Departing U.S. Commander"
[2] Truth Out, "How Afghanistan’s Peace Movement
Is Winning Hearts and Minds"
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Here is a recent article on Afghanistan: https://okobserver.org/attack-on-afghan-farmers-underscores-high-human-cost-of-u-s-middle-east-policy/
Attack
On Afghan Farmers Underscores High Human Cost Of U.S. Middle East Policy
ByOklahoma Observer
on
March
27, 2018
BY JEREMY
KUZMAROV
On
Saturday, March 17, two days after the 50-year anniversary of the My Lai
massacre, Afghan intelligence officers backed up by U.S. helicopters gunned
down seven innocent farmers in Nangarhar Province, the same province which the
Trump Administration had dropped the Mother Of All Bombs.
Mohamed
Israr, whose brother was killed in Manno, one of the villages attacked, told
the New York Times that “it was 4 a.m. My two brothers were
out to channel the water and we had informed the security post that we would be
watering our post. I was upstream and the helicopters came and fired at my
brothers. They were killed shovel in hand.”
According
to the Times report, the victims ranged in age from 14 to 40
years old and included Atiqullah, aged 20, who had just gotten married three
months ago.
The crop
the farmers were irrigating was opium, which the authorities have tolerated in
spite of an $8 billion American effort to curb the industry.
A few
kilometres away in Idyakhel village, five farmers were inside a mosque
when security forces barged in and starting firing, witnesses told Al Jazeera.
“The
security forces were probably tipped off that there were fighters hiding in the
mosque,” said Mohammed, a witness who requested to withhold his last name. He
told Al Jazeera that 27 people were arrested in the raid and several people
were killed including civilians.
These
latest attacks, which some sources reported were overseen by U.S.-NATO
advisers, underscored the heavy human cost of America’s long war in
Afghanistan.
President
Donald Trump has sent more U.S. troops into the country and vowed to bring
victory, though what that victory would look like he does not say.
The
Taliban have been getting stronger every year, and been able to capitalize on
the population’s war weariness and aversion towards foreign occupation.
With bin
Laden and Al Qaeda long gone from the country, a main motive for perpetuating
the war at this point appears to be accessing Afghanistan’s untapped mineral
wealth and preventing it from being exploited by the Chinese.
Speaking
to employees of the CIA after his inauguration, Trump said the United States
had erred in withdrawing troops from Iraq without holding on to its oil. “The
old expression ‘To the victor belong the spoils,’” Trump declared. “You
remember?”
In Yemen,
where the U.S. has been backing Saudi Arabia’s war against the Houthi, the
spoils is access to the Socotra Island which the U.S. covets as a potential
site for a military base.
Since
2015, the United States had provided the Saudis with air-to air refueling,
intelligence assessments and military advice along with sophisticated weaponry
that has been used to target Houthi rebels.
Raytheon
Corporation, the major defense contractor, is currently lobbying the State
Department and Congress to allow it to sell 60,000 precision guided missiles
which in the past were used in air strikes that killed civilians, according to
Human Rights Watch.
Secretary
of Defense James Mattis has urged Congress that restrictions on military aid
would increase civilian casualties and reduce American influence with the
Saudis, whom the United States has long relied on for cheap oil [and to trade
its oil in U.S. dollars], military bases and as a hedge against Iran.
The media
has long been fixated with the abuses of Syrian Prime Minister Bashir al-Assad
and destructive consequence of Russian air strikes there; however, American
actions in Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan are deserving of equal condemnation and
attention.
For too
long, we have so dehumanized Arab and Middle Eastern people that few appear to
care about those whose lives have been destroyed by errant night raids and
bombing strikes and arms supplies.
This is a
moral disgrace and also dangerous to our security given the prospect for
blowback.
Jeremy
Kuzmarov is author of numerous books on U.S. foreign policy including The
Russians are Coming, Again: The First Cold War as Tragedy, the Second as Farce [New
York: Monthly Review Press, 2018].
2017
Refusing
to Learn Bloody Lessons
November 29, 2017 (Also
in Peace in Our Times)
https://consortiumnews.com/2017/11/29/refusing-to-learn-bloody-lessons/
President
Trump’s continued Afghan War pursues the same failed path as the prior 16
years, with the U.S. political/media elites learning no lessons, says former
Marine officer Matthew Hoh in an interview with
the American Herald Tribune.
Interviewer
Mohsen Abdelmoumen: As an expert, how do you see the evolution
of the political process in Afghanistan?
Matthew
Hoh: Unfortunately, I have not seen any positive evolution or change in the
political system or process in Afghanistan since 2009. What we have seen are
three national elections that have been ruled to be grossly illegitimate and
fraudulent by outside observers, but have been validated and supported by the
American government through the presence of tens of thousands of soldiers and
the spending of tens of billions of dollars.
We
have seen the creation of extra-constitutional positions in the government,
such as the Chief Executive Officer position occupied by Abdullah Abdullah,
which was done at the behest of the American government. Additionally, bargains
and compromises that were brokered by the American government in an attempt to
create more a more inclusive government, reduce corruption and heal fractures
among the political bloc that once supported Hamid Karzai and the American
presence has failed to achieve those things. Corruption is
still the dominant feature of the Afghan government, and the political support
for the rule of Kabul has deteriorated and splintered by the corruption and the
machinations of the Karzai and now Ghani governments.
Most
importantly, the political process, by being so corrupt, by seating successive
governments that won by fraud and by disenfranchising various political
communities, has alienated many, many Afghans, and not just those Pashtuns who
ally themselves with the Taliban, from the government in Kabul. This has
allowed for greater support for militia commanders and warlords outside of
Kabul, as well as the Taliban, and has allowed the war to progress with no real
hopes for reconciliation, negotiations or a cease-fire anywhere in the near
future. (By supporting and growing a kleptocracy, a system of have and have
nots, that system has by its nature and necessity produced more people out of
the system than people in the system every year. This causes resentment,
grievances and a desire to share in the spoils and gifts of American occupation
that leads to greater violence, more political chaos and a dearth of hope for
the future).
Can
you explain to us what was the disagreement that led you to resign? MORE
https://consortiumnews.com/2017/11/29/refusing-to-learn-bloody-lessons/
You
received the Ridenhour Prize for Truth Telling in 2010. What can you tell us
about this award?
It
was a very great honor. The prizes are awarded in the name of Ron Ridenhour,
the soldier who helped alert people to the massacre at My Lai during the
Vietnam War. It is and has been very humbling to be included in such a
prestigious group of men and women who have followed their consciences, looked
past the risk and did what was right.
Matthew
Hoh is a Senior Fellow at the Center for International Policy
(www.ciponline.org). Matthew formerly directed the Afghanistan Study Group, a
collection of foreign and public policy experts and professionals advocating for
a change in U.S. strategy in Afghanistan. Matthew has served with the U.S.
Marine Corps in Iraq and on U.S. Embassy teams in both Afghanistan and Iraq.
[This slightly edited interview is published with Hoh’s permission.]
John Kiriakou. Trump Falls for the Afghanistan Trap.
Reader Supported News, 23 August 2017
Kiriakou writes: "Donald Trump on
Monday evening fell into the same trap that presidents George W. Bush and
Barack Obama fell into before him. He caved in to his generals, not just to
remain in Afghanistan, but to increase the US troop presence by 4,000 soldiers
and to waste more billions of US taxpayer dollars."
READ MORE
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Trump says more war, we say no! ANSWER COALITION, 8-25-17
On
Aug. 21, Donald Trump gave a major speech endorsing the war in Afghanistan
and pledging to continue the brutal occupation that has lasted nearly 16
years. While refraining from releasing specific plans, Trump made it clear
that he plans to deploy additional U.S. troops to the country and escalate
the war. The ANSWER Coalition demands that the United States immediately
withdraw all of its troops and contractors from Afghanistan.
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Afghanistan:
America's longest war - CNN.com
www.cnn.com/2017/05/31/middleeast/gallery/war-in-afghanistan/index.html
Sep 19, 2017 - The war in Afghanistan,
code-named Operation Enduring Freedom, lasted for 13 years until being brought
to an end in December 2014.
U.S. Antiwar Leaders Call for Actions to
Oppose the Escalation of the Afghanistan War During the Week of the 16th
Anniversary of the Invasion, October 2 – 8, 2017. Join Us
October 6, 2017 marks the 16th anniversary
of the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan – the longest foreign war in U.S. history.
The Afghan
war, which has been a thoroughly bipartisan effort, was originally railed
against by Donald Trump when he was running for president. He claimed to be
against U.S. troop involvement in Afghanistan. Now he is moving forward with a
“secret” plan of escalation that will also include Pakistan. He says the
secrecy is to keep the “enemy” from knowing his plans, but it also keeps the
U.S. people from knowing what he is doing in our name and from judging the
human costs for the people of Afghanistan, Pakistan and the United States
What we do
know is that military escalation has repeatedly failed to bring peace in
Afghanistan. It has caused more destruction and more deaths of civilians and
soldiers alike and has cost trillions of dollars that could be spent on meeting
basic needs here at home while repairing the destruction we have carried out
abroad.
Trump also
emboldens the war machine here in the US against Black and Brown people and
immigrants by fanning white supremacy and xenophobia and continuing the
militarization of the police and ICE to incite racially-motivated violence and
justify repression, including mass incarceration and mass deportations. US wars
of aggression and militarism abroad go hand-in-hand with increased state
repression and militarization of the police state here at home.
Trump’s
new escalation comes at a time when there is no end in sight to the continuous
wars, including drone and mercenary warfare, throughout the region and when he
is threatening military action against Venezuela, North Korea, Russia, Iran and
other countries.
Therefore,
we the undersigned antiwar leaders in the U.S. are calling for non-violent
protests in cities across the country during the week of the 16th anniversary
of the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan. We appeal to all antiwar organizations in
the United States and around the world to join us. [OMNI’S ALLIES]
·
John Amidon, Kateri Peace Conference,
VFP
·
Jessica Antonio, BAYAN
USA
·
Bahman Azad, US Peace
Council
·
Ajamu Baraka, Black
Alliance for Peace
·
Medea Benjamin, Code
Pink
·
Toby Blome, Code Pink, Bay Area
·
Brian Becker, ANSWER
Coalition
·
Reece Chanault, US Labor
Against the War
·
Bernadette Ellorin –
International League of People’s Struggle
·
Sara Flounders,
International Action Center
·
Bruce Gagnon, Global
Network Against Nuclear Power & Weapons in Space
·
Larry Hamm, People’s Organization for
Progress
·
Kathy Kelly, Voices for Creative
Nonviolence
·
Margaret Kimberley, Black
Agenda Report
·
Ed Kinane, Upstate Drone Action
·
Matthew Hoh – Veterans for Peace
·
Joe Lombardo, United
National Antiwar Coalition (UNAC)
·
Marilyn Levin, United
National Antiwar Coalition (UNAC)
·
Judith Bello, Upstate
Drone Action
·
Jeff Mackler,
Mobilization to Free Mumia Abu-Jamal
·
Alfred Marder, US Peace
Council
·
Maggie Martin, About
Face: Veterans Against the War (formerly IVAW)
·
Ray McGovern, Former
CIA Analyst and Presidential Advisor
·
Michael McPhearson, Veterans
For Peace
·
Nick Mottern,
Knowdrones.com
·
Malik Mujahid, Muslim
Peace Coalition
·
Elsa Rassbach, Code
Pink & UNAC, Germany
·
Bob Smith, Brandywine Peace
Community
·
David Swanson, World
Beyond War
·
Debra Sweet, World Can’t Wait
·
Now
Trump’s War. Profiting from
America's Longest War: Trump Seeks to Exploit Mineral
ttps://www.commondreams.org/.../profiting-americas-longest-war-trump-seeks-explo...
Oct 15, 2017
- While the heads of the
state discuss profiting from the mining sector, the US war in Afghanistan is
escalating. by. Benjamin Dangl.. 3 Comments. In an effort to justify the continued and
expanded presence of US troops in the country, President Trump is seeking
a ...
Benjamin Dangl. “America's Longest War.” Z
MAGAZINE (DECEMBER 2017). Trump opens new
chapter in America's longest war | PolitiFact
www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/.../trump-opens-new-chapter-americas-longest-war/
Aug 23, 2017 - In his first major policy
address, Donald Trump declared he would dramatically alter American strategy in
Afghanistan, marking a new chapter in the longest war in U.S. history.
Trump laid out his plan in a televised speech Aug. 21 following what he
described as a comprehensive policy review that would ...
END AFGHANISTAN:
US LONGEST WAR #24
PUT FOLLOWING
AT END
Contents Afghanistan
and Pakistan Newsletter #23, August 22, 2017
http://jamesrichardbennett.blogspot.com/2017/08/omni-afghanistan-pakistan-newsletter-23.html
President Trump’s New
Afghan Policy August 21, 2017
“Trump Affirms U.S.’ Role in Afghan Fight” August
22
“Trump Settles on Afghan Strategy Expected to Raise
Troop Levels” August 20
The Peace Movement Opposes
the War and Occupation: Remove US Troops
Beware
Another Surge
Danny
Sjursen, “Tread Carefully”
Veterans for Peace
VFP Calls for No More War
The Nation editorial (2015): Remove the Troops from Endless War
WAR CONTINUES
Complications of the
Occupation and Civil War
(C-Span
8-21-17 offered a panel of specialists who presented highly complex pictures of
Afghan and Pakistani relations and their internal relations to ethnic and
terror groups. We’re skimming surfaces
here.)
Taliban in Afghanistan
The Guardian: “The War America Can’t
Win” (2017)
New
York Times: Insider Attacks Aid
Taliban: “Afghan Police Officer”
ISIS in Afghanistan
PBS Frontline
(2015): Rise of ISIS
ISIS vs. Taliban
C-SPAN 8-21-17 Islamist State in Koresan Province ISKP
US in Afghanistan
Gerald Sloan
(poem), After Dropping the Biggest Bomb in History
Thurston,
Hollywood Distorting Afghanistan
Bacevich,
Fiasco Within Fiasco
Gelvin, Trump
Follows Saudi Arabia
Film: “War
Machine” (2017), Black Comedy
Review of Anand Gopal’s book on the US, Taliban, and Afghans: “the War Through Afghan Eyes” (2015)
Bombing the Doctors Without Borders
Hospital in Kunduz 2015
Medecins Sans Frontierres MSF
Kathy Kelly, “Danger,” Huffington Post
Human Rights Watch, “War Crimes Probe”
Common Dreams v. Pentagon Report
Koehler, Huffington, US Savagery
UN Report on
Civilian Victims from US War
Opium:
Taliban’s Not So Secret Weapon
Koehler: The Savage, Trillion Dollar War Is NOT Over
Contents #22
END AFGHANISTAN (AND PAKISTAN) NEWSLETTER #24
