“All war is based on deception.” — Sun Tzu, in The Art of War
The decade-old Afghan war, which was built entirely on lies, has claimed innumerable lives and caused destruction too huge to be measured in terms of money. In October it will be ten years since the United States invaded Afghanistan, but it still remains unclear when, and whether, the occupation will ever end.
Aside from direct military action, US forces have been guilty of repeatedly bombing wedding parties and funerals. A recent review of Afghan military documents has revealed more than 1,100 instances in which US-led forces used white phosphorus against non-combatants, and in residential areas.
The 9/11 attacks were planned in Germany and Spain, and conducted by US-based Saudis, but a bloody war was imposed on the people of Afghanistan thousands of miles away. The majority of Americans, who have been conditioned to believe whatever their corporate media tells them, swallow the lies of their rulers with all the gullibility of a child.
The war’s biggest untruth is that the US is in this region in order to defeat terrorism. In fact, the Americans invaded Afghanistan with their eyes on the oil reserves of Central Asia. The Caspian Sea region has the world’s largest oil and gas reserves. Afghanistan occupies a strategic position between the Caspian and the markets of the South Asian subcontinent and East Asia.
The US claims that it is trying to liberate the people of Afghanistan from Taliban tyranny. Nothing can be farther from the truth. Since the beginning of the war in October 2001, the Pentagon and the CIA are aiding a rough coalition of armed groups, called the Northern Alliance, whose record is just as bloody as the Taliban’s. For the people of Afghanistan replacement of Taliban by the gangsters of the Northern Alliance is hardly an acceptable alternative. As for the Taliban and Al-Qaeda, it is also a matter of common knowledge now that in the late 1990s the CIA was planning to use Al-Qaeda to stir up Muslim Uyghurs against Chinese rule.
The Bush administration claimed that the US is fighting a war in Afghanistan to defend the values of civilisation. However, one of the things that have become absolutely clear in these ten years that the Americans’ involvement in Afghanistan is strictly about the defence of their global interests.
Nor is the US in Afghanistan to “fight international terrorism,” as the Americans insist. In fact, the United States’ enemy in Afghanistan is a national resistance movement. The organisation has become decentralised, with nerve centres around the globe.
Now it is being claimed that the US is going to withdraw all of its troops from Afghanistan in 2014. But credible media reports say that the Pentagon is exploiting all available options, including bribing the Karzai government, to accept the presence of US troops on Afghan soil for an indefinite period of time. In this regard US military generals are also pressuring President Obama to back down on his commitment to withdraw troops from Afghanistan.
After a decade of occupation, the US finds itself fighting an irregular conflict with no clear victory conditions. One must inevitably say that the longer this war goes on, the more of a disaster it becomes for the people of Afghanistan. The death and destruction that the US government wreaks around the world are increasing the likelihood of terrorist attacks. Disturbingly, this war is only about the extension of the power of a small section of elites in the US having nothing to do with bringing the terrorists to justice.
http://www.thenews.com.pk/TodaysPrintDetail.aspx?ID=61705&Cat=9
News International
August 9, 2011
Rizwan Asghar