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Guantánamo survivor on the war on terror’s failure

theguardian.com

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Re: Guantánamo survivor on the war on terror’s failure

#201

Post by wintermutestwin »

koheripbal wrote: post #107
the-dude wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hague (NL) Invasion Act : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Service-Members%27_Pr...

Given that this thread is driven by the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, I think it's important to remember that the invasion of Afghanistan was a NATO operation after NATO invoked Article 5 (Collective Defence) in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks that Al-Quaeda launched, organized by their leadership based in Afghanistan under the protection of the Taliban. There are a few additional facts folks forget since this i…

>There were also a number of Taliban leadership that directly aided in the planning and execution of 9/11.

Source? I've never heard that. All we ever heard was "harboring AQ."

Re: Guantánamo survivor on the war on terror’s failure

#202

Post by 2OEH8eoCRo0 »

shapefrog wrote: post #189
2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Military service members committing crimes during war is not new but it's far different than war crimes being ordered from the top of the US govt. The closest thing is the prisoner mistreatment but even then, those soldiers did things that were definitely not authorized.

Guess I didnt have 'its not a crime if it wasnt ordered by he commander in chief' on your list of potential excuses. lol at 'war crimes are inevitable'

I make no excuses. Those who commit war crimes should be held to account- and they almost always are.

This thread seems to want senior US leadership held to account for war crimes when they never ordered anything illegal.

War crimes are inevitable- war is waged by humans and humans make mistakes or do bad things to one another. Humans are not perfect. It's about what you do about them when you discover them. We have soldiers serving life sentences without parole for war crimes.

Re: Guantánamo survivor on the war on terror’s failure

#203

Post by YeGoblynQueenne »

em500 wrote: post #199
YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it entirely unthinkable to not invade instead?

The initial invasion in 2001 had 100% support Congress and IIRC 80%+ popular support. So yes, not invading was unthinkable.

That's a very heavy accusation to lob at the US people I think. Who says this and where does the 80% number come from?

And why would the US people want their country to invade a country on the other side of the world, that was no threat to them and was clearly not capable of defending itself against the might of the US army? Why would the US people want their country to invade anyone? And 80% of them? This I find very hard to believe. Maybe the "80% support" was for something else entirely, e.g. killing Bin Laden or destroying Al Qaeda, rather than invading Afghanistan?

Re: Guantánamo survivor on the war on terror’s failure

#204

Post by dragontamer »

rbanffy wrote: post #54
bambax wrote: post #31

Trump wasn't the worst US President. Bush2 was. And he is still a guest at late-night TV shows. Incredible.

Worth noting Trump ordered the release of their leader, Abdul Ghani Baradar, from prison.

More importantly: Trump negotiated that release without consulting the Afghan government last year, while also setting a May deadline for US forces to leave.

The Taliban used that as a recruitment call. We're months late on the original timeline, and they knew we were leaving last year. Of course the Taliban would surge in this timeframe.

The question now is: is it worth to counter-surge to hold back the tide? It seems like the overwhelming opinion is that we should leave, so we're leaving.

Re: Guantánamo survivor on the war on terror’s failure

#205

Post by VictorPath »

bayesian_horse wrote: post #76

You also shouldn't forget to hold the other powers to account that made it impossible to have peace in Afghanistan. Russia put out bounties on US soldiers, Iran armed the Taliban, Pakistan sheltered them and I'm sure China had their fingers in there just as well. The Taliban have never been the legitimate, much less the benevolent government of the Afghan people. If you've seen "The Handmaid's Tale" you have a genera…

> The Taliban have never been the legitimate, much less the benevolent government of the Afghan people. If you've seen "The Handmaid's Tale" you have a general idea of what happened in the 90's

That is because the USA armed and bankrolled the jihadists who overthrew the secular, left-leaning PDPA in the 1980s. Here is Ronald Reagan with the jihadists in the White House

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=c9RWtx8myQc

It's inane for Americans to arm a jihadist insurgency against a left-leaning secular government, and then tear their vestments in some feigned moral superiority that the jihadists would take over the country thirty years later.

Re: Guantánamo survivor on the war on terror’s failure

#206

Post by bishoprook2 »

cmrdporcupine wrote: post #194

I'm amazed at how many people still see the Iraq and Afghanistan interventions as correct moves. Just last week I was having a friendly mostly non-political conversation with two of my coworkers and then the topic verged to the military and then to the Iraq wars. (For context, I'm Canadian and they're both US ex-pats in Canada.) Both had the opinion, still, that the Iraq war was the correct move at the time. But coul…

> Someone on the conservative side of the spectrum, please enlighten me what the reasonable argument for justifying the past military action there is at this point...

I'd say that it's possible (quite possible) to be conservative and to be against foreign adventures. It's probably better to view a country as being occupied by multiple cohorts of political thought, one of which is a ruling class that likes to play Risk.

That ruling class has shifted party allegiance and probably will do so in the future.

In any case, from my uninformed armchair, it seems pretty obvious that it's easier to run foreign policy by attempting to influence the existing dictator (whether it's in Iraq or Libya or Syria) rather than install a new one with the attendant cost in blood and treasure.

Re: Guantánamo survivor on the war on terror’s failure

#207

Post by dragontamer »

hirako2000 wrote: post #25
beckman466 wrote: post #3

Abby Martin from Empire Files made a beautiful video about the war in Afghanistan: https://youtube.com/watch?v=C3LFbOSPfrE

Great summary of events. It is sad once again that it took over a decade for the obvious to start spreading. I remember 2001, Bush and Co throwing silly justifications to engage. At that time most people felt that we should fight terrorism where it spawns. Years later Ben laden is supposedly caught, killed, and dropped deep in the ocean far off the coast, god knows where. No trial, no question asked really. Just the…

The Taliban wanted to surrender in 2001. https://www.nytimes.com/2001/12/07/news/rumsfeld-rejects-pla...

The surrender was rejected, and the Taliban became an insurrection force we know today. We won the war in 2001, then lost it when we refused the surrender terms. We wanted to nation-build instead.

-----------

EDIT: Never turn the government of a country into an insurrection force. The Taliban, for all of their flaws, was the government of Afghanistan (or the closest thing to a government that they had in the decades before 9/11). They knew how to run their country. We didn't kill the Japanese Emperor when we won WW2, we let the Emperor live a life of dignity and remain a culturally significant icon while negotiating surrender terms.

Re: Guantánamo survivor on the war on terror’s failure

#208

Post by cmrdporcupine »

bishoprook2 wrote: post #206
cmrdporcupine wrote: post #194

I'm amazed at how many people still see the Iraq and Afghanistan interventions as correct moves. Just last week I was having a friendly mostly non-political conversation with two of my coworkers and then the topic verged to the military and then to the Iraq wars. (For context, I'm Canadian and they're both US ex-pats in Canada.) Both had the opinion, still, that the Iraq war was the correct move at the time. But coul…

> Someone on the conservative side of the spectrum, please enlighten me what the reasonable argument for justifying the past military action there is at this point... I'd say that it's possible (quite possible) to be conservative and to be against foreign adventures. It's probably better to view a country as being occupied by multiple cohorts of political thought, one of which is a ruling class that likes to play Ris…

I don't disagree. I'm not saying all conservatives support(ed) the Iraq war in retrospect. But there are some who do and I'd like to understand why.

Re: Guantánamo survivor on the war on terror’s failure

#209

Post by linuxftw »

mschuster91 wrote: post #158
koheripbal wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given that this thread is driven by the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, I think it's important to remember that the invasion of Afghanistan was a NATO operation after NATO invoked Article 5 (Collective Defence) in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks that Al-Quaeda launched, organized by their leadership based in Afghanistan under the protection of the Taliban. There are a few additional facts folks forget since this i…

> IMO, "nation building" is always an impossible mission. The objective should have been to attack, destroy the enemy, and leave - immediately. Punishing the sponsors of the 9/11 attacks, not entrenching an ideological split. That's bollocks. I'm German, had the Allied Powers followed the Morgenthau plan Germany would be essentially an Afghanistan today - an agro state and nothing more. But you all followed through w…

Germany is still occupied by Americans. We're still defending you from the same foreign adversary, Russia.

If the US pulled out of Germany in 1965, what would have become of the place? IMO, it's clear. The communists would have been conscripted into war, West Germany would have surrendered rather than fight their countrymen. This is exactly what happened in Vietnam and it's what is happening in Afghanistan now.

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