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 . '/' . substr('9780805083385',-6,3) . '/' . '9780805083385' . '.jpg'; ?>)
By Michael Dirda
Tom Brokaw
$23
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Bob Englehart, Cagle Cartoons, The Hartford Courant —
Posted on Mar 18, 2011
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Monte Wolverton, Cagle Cartoons —
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Flickr / Department of State
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U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has some choice words for Taliban fighters in Afghanistan, warning of increasing military pressure as the U.S. prepares to resume heavy fighting. “They cannot defeat us,” Clinton said as the war in Central Asia is catapulted into its 10th year.
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news.bbc.co.uk
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In apparent response to a Pakistani military action that killed some 40 rebels, a suicide bomber in Pakistan has killed at least 43 people in an attack on a mass of people receiving aid in the northwest town of Khar.
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news.bbc.co.uk
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Attacks on two Afghan military bases killed at least 13 members of the country’s security forces. One of the attacks, blamed on the Taliban, was against a training center on the outskirts of the capital, Kabul.
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President Obama took to the podium Thursday to declare that “we are on track to achieve our goals” in Afghanistan, although the war there “continues to be a difficult endeavor.” This assessment wouldn’t have anything to do with two big setbacks ...
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Laura Flanders points out that Interpol’s pursuit of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange over sexual assault allegations is yet another example of women’s bodies serving ulterior political motives. Where is Interpol, Flanders asks, for the sexually assaulted women of the U.S. military or those in Haitian refugee camps?
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Wikimedia Commons
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Some records are made to be broken, from the 100-meter dash to Nathan’s Hot Dog Eating Contest. But who would covet breaking the nine-year, 50-day Soviet record for its military campaign in Afghanistan? And the winner is … the USA.
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By William Pfaff — To adapt to secular use a phrase from medieval mysticism, “the cloud of unknowing” deepens as the war-waging countries of North America and Western Europe approach their NATO “summit.”
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Flickr / openDemocracy (CC-BY-SA)
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Hamid Karzai is acting up. The Afghan president, who rankled top U.S. brass earlier this year with hints at split loyalties, has again come out with some fightin’ words against the American war effort in his country.
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Flickr / kimberlyfaye
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In an odd flipping of the political script, the Taliban has called on the U.S. Congress to dispatch a “fact-finding mission” to Afghanistan to probe what it calls the lies and propaganda used by the Pentagon and U.S. generals to extend and justify the war.
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AP / Mohammad Iqbal
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Two bomb attacks on mosques left more than 60 people dead and scores injured in northwestern Pakistan. The Taliban claimed responsibility for the most lethal attack, in which a 17-year-old suicide bomber struck a Sunni mosque during Friday prayers.
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AP / Rodrigo Abd
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By Robert Scheer — It’s over for the U.S. in Afghanistan, but that doesn’t mean the death and destruction are about to stop. Quagmires don’t just go away. However, the signs are everywhere that the American course in that nation is doomed.
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Wikimedia Commons / The White House
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On Sunday, The New York Times reported that Afghan President Hamid Karzai’s administration had been secretly accepting millions of dollars in cash from the Iranian government. Sketchy! And on Monday, Karzai owned up to his part in the clandestine funding program ... (continued)
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AP / Carolyn Kaster, pool
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Nothing is certain on this front yet, but the U.S. is reportedly considering opening up some channels of communication to the Taliban in Afghanistan, and between the Taliban and the Afghan government, in the interest of long-term peace goals.
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Patrick Chappatte, Cagle Cartoons, The International Herald Tribune —
Posted on Oct 11, 2010
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Here’s a sobering reminder, from the vigilant filmmakers at Brave New Films, about exactly what has been lost (thousands of Afghan civilians, more than 1,200 U.S. soldiers, over $1 trillion) in the last decade of the war in Afghanistan. Ten years—and at least someone is counting.
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U.S. Air Force / Staff Sgt. Bradley Lail
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The Afghan government claims to have had contact with the Taliban, though the insurgent group denies this. The White House signaled its support, but said such contact, which the Washington Post reports is at the “secret, high-level talks” stage, “has to be done by the Afghans.”
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AP / Shah Khalid
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In an incident that could lead to even more tension between the U.S. and Pakistan, NATO has confirmed that one of its aircraft engaged in an attack across the Pakistani border, purportedly to fire on suspected militants.
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Wikimedia Commons / CIA
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Although there’s no official confirmation from the U.S., Pakistani officials said Tuesday that a senior al-Qaida operative, Sheikh Fateh, was killed Saturday by an American drone attack in north Waziristan, according to the BBC.
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AP / Gemunu Amarasinghe
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On Monday, just two days after the parliamentary elections in Afghanistan, reports that the polling process was corrupted by incidents of voting fraud had sparked an investigation, according to the Los Angeles Times.
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AP / Saurabh Das
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With an eye on Saturday’s parliamentary elections, the Taliban is evidently making sure that Afghans don’t forget the recent Quran-burning hubbub in the U.S. (thanks a lot, Pastor Jones), as some 800 people gathered in Kabul for ... (continued)
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Wikimedia Commons
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At the same time that Afghan President Hamid Karzai organizes a nationwide council to try to broker peace with Taliban insurgents, the U.K.‘s senior military commander forecasts that violence in Afghanistan will get worse before it gets better.
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youtube.com
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American servicemen and -women stationed on U.S. Army and Air Force bases around the world won’t have the option of playing one video game in particular, Electronic Arts’ “Medal of Honor,” because it gives players the option of ... (continued)
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U.S. Marine Corps / Sgt. Joshua Greenfield
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Gen. James Conway, the head Marine in charge, says of the president’s promise to withdraw troops from Afghanistan by next summer: “In some ways, we think right now it’s probably giving our enemy sustenance.”
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bbc.co.uk
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Having assumed the position of the top commander of U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan, Gen. David Petraeus offers his guarded assessment of the status of the war in Afghanistan in this BBC interview, and he apparently believes ... (continued)
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AP / Mark Lennihan
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By Robert Scheer — The irrational attack on Muslims everywhere by the GOP’s leadership is not only deeply subversive with regard to the American ideal of religious tolerance but also poses a profound threat to our national security.
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U.S. Air Force / Staff Sgt. Angelita Lawrence
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Responding to a U.N. report that found that most of the civilian casualties in Afghanistan are caused by Taliban attacks, the insurgent group released a statement calling for the creation of a joint committee to investigate the deaths of noncombatants. The U.N. and NATO are considering the proposal. (continued)
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No doubt Gen. David Petraeus had a certain Rolling Stone interview in mind when he conducted a lengthy interview, which aired Sunday, with “Meet the Press” anchor David Gregory about his hopes, fears and prognosis about the war in Afghanistan.
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Flickr.com / mindfrieze
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It doesn’t look like WikiLeaks is going to heed the Pentagon’s request to “do the right thing” and refrain from releasing 15,000 documents about the war in Afghanistan that the site has yet to share with the world.
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AP / J. Scott Applewhite
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Now that Gen. Stanley McChrystal has departed the scene, Gen. David Petraeus has assumed command of U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan, and in a tactical document released Sunday he revisited one of his predecessor’s ... (continued)
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It seemed like nobody in a position of power in Washington thought that the shocking details about the war in Afghanistan, our “allies” in Pakistan and other gems from this week’s WikiLeaks melange of madness were all that “new.” (continued)
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AP / Maya Alleruzzo
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By Robert Scheer — What WikiLeaks did was brilliant journalism, and the bleating critics from the president on down are revealing just how low a regard they have for the truth.
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wikileaks.org
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It’s not surprising that the Pentagon is conducting “a very robust investigation” to find the source of the latest Wikileaks heard ’round the world. And it’s also to be expected that the military and intelligence communities are shoring up ... (continued)
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U.S. Army / Tech. Sgt. Efren Lopez
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By Bill Boyarsky — The release of 92,000 pages of secret military documents by the website WikiLeaks points to the futility of the war in Afghanistan and the double-dealing of our so-called ally Pakistan.
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Flickr / U.S. Army
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By Bill Boyarsky — After last week’s two-day congressional hearing on the Afghanistan war, I have two questions: One, why did Gen. David Petraeus faint under questioning? Two, why are we still in Afghanistan?
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AP / Allauddin Khan
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A new report issued by the London School of Economics claims that Pakistan’s intelligence agency is not only funding and training Taliban insurgents in Afghanistan but also holds sway in the insurgency’s leadership council.
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Wikimedia Commons / The White House
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Rumors are swirling in Afghanistan that the country’s president, Hamid Karzai, has lost faith in the ability of the West to defeat the Taliban, and some are even accusing Karzai of trying to strike his own deal with the Taliban and archrival Pakistan.
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news.bbc.co.uk
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Simultaneous attacks on two mosques in Lahore, Pakistan, killed more than 80 people Friday morning as militants targeted a minority Islamic sect.
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AP / Carolyn Kaster
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Relations between the U.S. and Afghan administrations have been less than cozy in recent months, but President Obama’s crew, headed by Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, attempted to warm things up this week by giving visiting President Hamid Karzai the royal treatment in Washington.
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Screen capture from cnn.com
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The bumbling alleged Times Square bomber had backing from the Taliban in Pakistan, Attorney General Eric Holder said Sunday, claiming the U.S. has evidence that the Taliban helped facilitate, and likely financed, the attempt.
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DoD / Cherie Cullen
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A professional kidnapper and Taliban commander was released from an Afghan prison 10 years early and may have won a hush-hush pardon from Afghan President Hamid Karzai, the BBC reports. Karzai’s people say the president “could not recall the matter.”
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youtube.com
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So, about that whole joining-the-Taliban quip that Afghanistan’s President Hamid Karzai supposedly made last weekend? Didn’t happen, according to Karzai spokesman Waheed Omar, who had apparently shifted into backpedaling mode on Wednesday.
Posted on Apr 7, 2010
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Wikimedia Commons / The White House
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Relations between the U.S. and Afghanistan were further strained over the weekend after the White House caught wind of Afghan President Hamid Karzai’s musings that he might join the Taliban as a reaction to pressure from the West to make some changes in his country.
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AP / Richard Vogel
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By Robert Fisk — It’s sleek, it’s glossy, it’s in eloquent Arabic, Pashto and Dari, and it pours derision on American and NATO forces in Afghanistan; it is the brand new propaganda wing of the Taliban: not just Internet video of attacks on the Western armies in Helmand and Kandahar, but professionally produced magazines.
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Five young Muslim American men who went missing from Virginia in November and were arrested the following month in Pakistan were indicted on terrorism charges Wednesday. The accused claim they were tortured in custody and deny that they were trying to align themselves with al-Qaida-affiliated groups, according to the BBC.
Posted on Mar 17, 2010
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youtube.com
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America’s top military commander in Afghanistan, Gen. Stanley McChrystal, took to the Afghan airwaves Tuesday to apologize for the deaths of 27 civilians in an airstrike led by U.S. forces last week, according to The Christian Science Monitor.
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Quelle Surprise! Haiti on the Mend
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