The case for fighting terrorism and staying in Afghanistan is stated here most eloquently by Benjamin Netanyahu on September 20, 2001, to the US House of Representatives' Government Reform Committee. It is a powerful speech and it makes a lot of sense to me and maybe to you too. It was brought to my attention by a friend because of my endless search for reasons good enough for my husband to have died in Iraq. Then this year at the UN he spoke again giving his warning and admonishing the UN for both its tacit acceptance of the offensive ravings of the madman in charge of Iran and its reaction to the recent conflict in Gaza. There is no denying that the UN is accepting and approving acts of terrorism all around the globe. I don’t see any other way of interpreting their responses. I applaud Israel for pointing out this inconvenient truth to a world that does not want to listen , because to listen would mean they would have to act. They would rather turn their backs and ignore what is there. Let the US take care of it. Why should we bother? Okay, what has that to do with Afghanistan? The US was attacked in 2001 and we went after the perpetrator of that attack which led us to Afghanistan where he was hiding. Afghanistan is a large country that has been rocked by war for the past 3 decades. There is no centralized government. There are no strong security forces either in the form of police or army. Its government is corrupt. It was an easy choice for bin Laden to decide to hide there. He knew Afghanistan didn’t care.
The problem is we didn’t catch him and bring him to justice. Our attention was diverted by Iraq. We decided to go take out a guy and a corrupt government that we could find thereby creating a successful war that would bolster the Bush administration. Maybe if we did that, no one would notice that we missed the guy who attacked us. Neither decision has worked out very well for most of us. I’ve lost my husband for no damn good reason that I can see and five years later I am still angry. The US has lost forever billions of dollars to fight the war in Iraq that wasn’t going to cost us anything. It would be paid for with Iraqi oil!! How has that worked out for us so far Dick Cheney? The offshoot was great personal gains for Dick Cheney and Halliburton, KBM, Blackwater. The greatest sorrow is the senseless loss of lives of our Marines and soldiers and the never ending grief of the families of those Marines and soldiers left behind. There are also the injured and grieving soldiers that will forever be changed by what they have seen and done. But we still don’t have bin Laden, do we?
During the campaign, Barack Obama said he would end the war in Iraq and go after the war we forgot we were still fighting, Afghanistan. I always sort of looked over that part and dwelt instead on his promise to get us home from Iraq. I sit here in San Diego and still watch our Marines shipping out headed for Iraq. I was elated when I read that 3,500 replacements headed for Iraq were cancelled. Okay. Right. We are supposed to be LEAVING, why send more over there?
Now we are all wound up in what do we do in Afghanistan? I hear talk of nation-building, of WINNING in Afghanistan! What an odd concept? How do you win? Were we there to win? No, we were there to catch the man responsible for an attack on the United States, right? Or did I misunderstand? We have not declared war on Afghanistan. We are supposedly working in partnership with their government or have been, right? Did I misunderstand?
Now there is a government that was fraudulently elected. How can we support a man who tampered with the election process? Even the US found that it is hard to govern when the people have no confidence in the election process, hey George Bush? That lingering doubt about your legitimacy kept biting you in the ass, didn’t it?
So our partner in this effort to find the man responsible for the attack on the United States is in question. The rightwing in the US is clamoring for more war! More troops! We have to support our Generals! I ask you, when have you EVER heard a General ask for fewer troops? Anyone? Anyone? Also, I don’t believe General McChrystal was on the ballot for President. We have a Commander in Chief and it is Barack Obama, not General McChrystal. President Obama will ultimately be responsible for what we decide to do there. The General’s name will be long forgotten, but the President will be blamed or praised for the decision he makes here.
I hope the decision he makes is to leave. President Karzai was given 8 Billion dollars, that’s with a B, to beef up his security forces over the last 8 years. Half a billion actually made it toward that cause. Where is the rest of the money? Guess you need to ask him and his cronies. I can’t see pouring more money down that black hole.
The Afghani people want to be left alone. My friends have pointed out that if we leave the Taliban will grow stronger. Sharia law will rule. Women will be beaten down, uneducated, reduced to something akin to slavery. We need to save the Afghani people. If the Taliban get stronger they will grow more terrorists. The 9th Century way of thinking will work against the West to bring the world into chaos. If they get their hands on a nuclear weapon it will be all over. I actually believe all this is true. But I still don’t want US soldiers and Marines to be there to try to stop it.
What Netanyahu said is all correct. He also correctly addressed his most recent remarks toward the WORLD at the United Nations. Terrorism is a worldwide problem. It is not a US problem. We choose not fight to stop it in Somalia, Iran, Nigeria, Sudan, Egypt or even in our partner Saudi Arabia. Most of the perpetrators of the attack against the US in 2001 were from Egypt and Saudi Arabia, not Afghanistan. We aren’t attacking and occupying those countries. We tolerate it some places but not in others. If we stop it one place, it shows up in others like Yemen, Syria, and Lebanon. Do we take on the whole world? We can’t. We don’t have the resources. We are depleted. We are tired. We are broke. Where is the rest of the world in this? How do they feel about terrorism? Where is the outrage? Where is the action? The only action I see from the EU is trade deals with countries that enable terrorism.
If the problem is to be solved it needs to be the world working together. We need other nations to commit many, many more troops and resources to the effort. If they will not at the very least match our commitment, we go home. Simple as that. We leave a small contingent, use drones and Special Forces to still try to take out bin Laden, but other than that, we leave. So be it. Terrorism is small pockets of evil people making small guerilla style attacks against specific targets. If we fight terrorism we accept that it is not a large force offensive that will control it. It is chopping off the head of the snake repeatedly. Take out the small groups, over and over again. Stop trying to control a small group by taking over an entire country. That incites people to engage in terrorism to stop our imperialism.
If we choose to stay and fight in Afghanistan we need to start now building and staffing all the facilities we will need to treat all the heroin addicted service members as they return home. That part of this war IS just like Viet Nam. Get our people out of there now! Please! As soon as NATO, as soon as China, as soon as Japan, as soon as the UN sends troops and resources to stop the spread of terrorism we take care of us. Just us. We don’t nation build. We don’t try to fix things that don’t want fixing. We take care of our own security. We leave Iraq. We leave Afghanistan.
If, upon leaving Afghanistan, the people of Afghanistan ask for help in providing medical clinics and schools for their children, the UN can do that. We can assuage our conscience by assisting the UN or NGO’s to provide REQUESTED services. If it is too dangerous to go, the government in Afghanistan will have to answer to their OWN people for that. I am not advocating isolationism. I am advocating the end of imperialism. Bring our troops home, from Iraq, from Afghanistan. End this stupidity.
