cedarchopper
20th September 2010, 08:42 PM
http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayArticleNew.asp?xfile=/data/opinion/2010/September/opinion_September72.xml§ion=opinion
Bombshell from London
Eric S. Margolis
13 September 2010
The London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) is the world’s leading think tank for military affairs. It represents the top echelon of defense experts, retired officers and senior military men, spanning the globe from the United and Britain to China, Russia and India.
I’ve been an IISS member for over 20 years.
IISS’s reports are always authoritative but usually cautious and diplomatic, sometimes dull.
Last week, however, the IISS issued an explosive report on Afghanistan that is shaking Washington and its NATO allies.
The report, presided over by the former deputy director of Britain’s foreign intelligence agency, MI-6, says the threat from Al Qaeda and Taleban has been ‘exaggerated’ by the western powers. The US-led mission in Afghanistan has ‘ballooned’ out of all proportion from its original aim of disrupting and defeating Al Qaeda.
The US-led war in Afghanistan, says IISS, using uncharacteristically blunt language, is ‘a long-drawn-out disaster.’
Just recently, CIA chief Leon Panetta admitted there were no more than 50 members of Al Qaeda in Afghanistan. Yet US President Barack Obama claims has tripled the number of US soldiers there to 120,000 in order to fight Al Qaeda.
The IISS report goes on to acknowledge the presence of western troops in Afghanistan is actually fueling national resistance. I saw the same phenomena during the 1980’s Soviet occupation of Afghanistan.
Interestingly, the portion of the report overseen by the former MI-6 Secret Intelligence Service deputy chief, Nigel Inskster, finds little Al Qaeda threat elsewhere, notably in Somalia and Yemen. Yet Washington is beefing up its attacks on both turbulent nations.
Abandoning its usual discretion, IISS said it was issuing these warnings because the deepening war in Afghanistan was threatening the west’s security interests by distracting its leaders from the world financial crisis and Iran, and burning through scarce funds need elsewhere.
The IISS’s findings are a direct challenge to President Obama, Britain’s new prime minister, David Cameron, and other US allies with troops in Afghanistan. This report undermines their rational used to sustain the increasingly unpopular conflict.
It will certainly convince skeptics that the real reason for occupation of Afghanistan has to do with oil, excluding China from the region, and keeping watch on nuclear-armed Pakistan.
Meanwhile, the war in Afghanistan is turning against the increasingly wobbly western occupation forces. The US-installed Afghan leader, Hamid Karzai, openly prepares for direct peace talks with Taleban and its allies – in spite of intense opposition from the US, Britain and Canada.
Pro-government Afghan forces are increasingly demoralised. This week, Taleban leader, Mullah Omar, proclaimed the western occupiers were rapidly losing the war. He may well be correct. Nothing is going right for the US-backed Kabul regime or its western defenders. Even the much-ballyhooed US offensive at Marjah, designed to smash Taleban resistance, was an embarrassing fiasco. Civilian casualties from US bombing continue to mount. Europeans are fed up with the Afghan war. Polls report 60 per cent of Americans think the war not worth fighting.
The IISS bombshell comes on the heels of the most dramatic part of the ongoing British Chilcot Inquiry into the origins of the invasion of Iraq. Baroness Manningham-Buller the former head of Britain’s domestic security service, MI-5, testified that the Iraq War was generated by a farrago of lies and faked evidence from the Blair government. What we call ‘terrorism’ is largely caused by the western invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, she testified. The truth about Iraq and Afghanistan is finally emerging. Afghanistan may again prove to be ‘the graveyard of empires.’
Bombshell from London
Eric S. Margolis
13 September 2010
The London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) is the world’s leading think tank for military affairs. It represents the top echelon of defense experts, retired officers and senior military men, spanning the globe from the United and Britain to China, Russia and India.
I’ve been an IISS member for over 20 years.
IISS’s reports are always authoritative but usually cautious and diplomatic, sometimes dull.
Last week, however, the IISS issued an explosive report on Afghanistan that is shaking Washington and its NATO allies.
The report, presided over by the former deputy director of Britain’s foreign intelligence agency, MI-6, says the threat from Al Qaeda and Taleban has been ‘exaggerated’ by the western powers. The US-led mission in Afghanistan has ‘ballooned’ out of all proportion from its original aim of disrupting and defeating Al Qaeda.
The US-led war in Afghanistan, says IISS, using uncharacteristically blunt language, is ‘a long-drawn-out disaster.’
Just recently, CIA chief Leon Panetta admitted there were no more than 50 members of Al Qaeda in Afghanistan. Yet US President Barack Obama claims has tripled the number of US soldiers there to 120,000 in order to fight Al Qaeda.
The IISS report goes on to acknowledge the presence of western troops in Afghanistan is actually fueling national resistance. I saw the same phenomena during the 1980’s Soviet occupation of Afghanistan.
Interestingly, the portion of the report overseen by the former MI-6 Secret Intelligence Service deputy chief, Nigel Inskster, finds little Al Qaeda threat elsewhere, notably in Somalia and Yemen. Yet Washington is beefing up its attacks on both turbulent nations.
Abandoning its usual discretion, IISS said it was issuing these warnings because the deepening war in Afghanistan was threatening the west’s security interests by distracting its leaders from the world financial crisis and Iran, and burning through scarce funds need elsewhere.
The IISS’s findings are a direct challenge to President Obama, Britain’s new prime minister, David Cameron, and other US allies with troops in Afghanistan. This report undermines their rational used to sustain the increasingly unpopular conflict.
It will certainly convince skeptics that the real reason for occupation of Afghanistan has to do with oil, excluding China from the region, and keeping watch on nuclear-armed Pakistan.
Meanwhile, the war in Afghanistan is turning against the increasingly wobbly western occupation forces. The US-installed Afghan leader, Hamid Karzai, openly prepares for direct peace talks with Taleban and its allies – in spite of intense opposition from the US, Britain and Canada.
Pro-government Afghan forces are increasingly demoralised. This week, Taleban leader, Mullah Omar, proclaimed the western occupiers were rapidly losing the war. He may well be correct. Nothing is going right for the US-backed Kabul regime or its western defenders. Even the much-ballyhooed US offensive at Marjah, designed to smash Taleban resistance, was an embarrassing fiasco. Civilian casualties from US bombing continue to mount. Europeans are fed up with the Afghan war. Polls report 60 per cent of Americans think the war not worth fighting.
The IISS bombshell comes on the heels of the most dramatic part of the ongoing British Chilcot Inquiry into the origins of the invasion of Iraq. Baroness Manningham-Buller the former head of Britain’s domestic security service, MI-5, testified that the Iraq War was generated by a farrago of lies and faked evidence from the Blair government. What we call ‘terrorism’ is largely caused by the western invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, she testified. The truth about Iraq and Afghanistan is finally emerging. Afghanistan may again prove to be ‘the graveyard of empires.’