# US troops may stay in Afghanistan until 2024



## High_Gravity (Aug 22, 2011)

US troops may stay in Afghanistan until 2024









> The agreement would allow not only military trainers to stay to build up the Afghan army and police, but also American special forces soldiers and air power to remain.
> 
> The prospect of such a deal has already been met with anger among Afghanistans neighbours including, publicly, Iran and, privately, Pakistan.
> 
> ...



US troops may stay in Afghanistan until 2024 - Telegraph


----------



## elvis (Aug 22, 2011)

well, maybe Bush was right...

a war that will not end in our lifetime.


----------



## The Infidel (Aug 22, 2011)

What a waste of lives


----------



## Kevin_Kennedy (Aug 22, 2011)

Shocker.


----------



## The Infidel (Aug 22, 2011)

elvis said:


> well, maybe Bush was right...
> 
> a war that will not end in our lifetime.



That was the "war on terror"

There are other places we need to be, but not there.

We have done what we went to do.


----------



## elvis (Aug 22, 2011)

What's the goal in Afghanistan?  Seriously.  I'd like to know.


----------



## The Infidel (Aug 22, 2011)

Kevin_Kennedy said:


> Shocker.



Funny bumper sticker


----------



## The Infidel (Aug 22, 2011)

elvis said:


> What's the goal in Afghanistan?  Seriously.  I'd like to know.



Protect the drug trade????


----------



## elvis (Aug 22, 2011)

The Infidel said:


> elvis said:
> 
> 
> > What's the goal in Afghanistan?  Seriously.  I'd like to know.
> ...



I'm sure that plays into it.


----------



## California Girl (Aug 22, 2011)

I'd say it is a price we must be prepared to pay in order to ensure that Afghanistan can stabilize and not become a breeding ground for terrorism again.


----------



## High_Gravity (Aug 22, 2011)

elvis said:


> What's the goal in Afghanistan?  Seriously.  I'd like to know.



It changes every year.


----------



## High_Gravity (Aug 22, 2011)

California Girl said:


> I'd say it is a price we must be prepared to pay in order to ensure that Afghanistan can stabilize and not become a breeding ground for terrorism again.



What you say makes sense and is more than likely the reason we are staying however it seems like alot of Americans no longer have the stomach for this war.


----------



## tomcalwriter (Oct 18, 2011)

What a joke.  A breeding ground for terrorists?  The breeding ground is the wars we have initiated in the Middle East.  The movie, The War We Don't See," made by independent Australian journalist, John Pilger, claims 900,000 civilians died in the Iraq war.  If that isn't enough to create more terrorists, I don't know what is.

Certainly, the drug trade plays into it, as it did in Vietnam.  That's how the CIA gets its play money, through drugs.  Its budget is secret, so they do all sorts of black market stuff, like selling arms, which Sonny Bono was going to reveal before he was murdered -- at least one small operation that he was made privy to.


----------



## Meister (Oct 18, 2011)

tomcalwriter said:


> What a joke.  A breeding ground for terrorists?  The breeding ground is the wars we have initiated in the Middle East.  The movie, The War We Don't See," made by independent Australian journalist, John Pilger, claims 900,000 civilians died in the Iraq war.  If that isn't enough to create more terrorists, I don't know what is.
> 
> Certainly, the drug trade plays into it, as it did in Vietnam.  That's how the CIA gets its play money, through drugs.  Its budget is secret, so they do all sorts of black market stuff, like selling arms, which Sonny Bono was going to reveal before he was murdered -- at least one small operation that he was made privy to.



The same Sonny Bono who was "murdered" by a tree, skiing?


----------



## Ropey (Oct 18, 2011)

Meister said:


> tomcalwriter said:
> 
> 
> > What a joke.  A breeding ground for terrorists?  The breeding ground is the wars we have initiated in the Middle East.  The movie, The War We Don't See," made by independent Australian journalist, John Pilger, claims 900,000 civilians died in the Iraq war.  If that isn't enough to create more terrorists, I don't know what is.
> ...


----------



## High_Gravity (Oct 19, 2011)

tomcalwriter said:


> What a joke.  A breeding ground for terrorists?  The breeding ground is the wars we have initiated in the Middle East.  The movie, The War We Don't See," made by independent Australian journalist, John Pilger, claims 900,000 civilians died in the Iraq war.  If that isn't enough to create more terrorists, I don't know what is.
> 
> Certainly, the drug trade plays into it, as it did in Vietnam.  That's how the CIA gets its play money, through drugs.  Its budget is secret, so they do all sorts of black market stuff, like selling arms, which Sonny Bono was going to reveal before he was murdered -- at least one small operation that he was made privy to.



Put down the bong, take a hot shower, shave, get dressed in your church suit, give your mother a hug and a kiss and go out there and seek the help you desperately need.


----------



## California Girl (Oct 19, 2011)

Meister said:


> tomcalwriter said:
> 
> 
> > What a joke.  A breeding ground for terrorists?  The breeding ground is the wars we have initiated in the Middle East.  The movie, The War We Don't See," made by independent Australian journalist, John Pilger, claims 900,000 civilians died in the Iraq war.  If that isn't enough to create more terrorists, I don't know what is.
> ...



That tree was a CIA plant?


----------



## Ropey (Oct 19, 2011)

California Girl said:


> Meister said:
> 
> 
> > tomcalwriter said:
> ...



They're still rooting it out....


----------



## High_Gravity (Dec 30, 2011)

McManus: A long goodbye to Afghanistan








> This week, the last convoy of U.S. troops in Iraq drove noisily across the border into Kuwait and shut the gate behind them. The next drawdown comes in Afghanistan, where American forces are scheduled to disengage from most combat by the end of 2014.
> 
> But the Afghanistan withdrawal won't be anywhere near as final as the one we just saw. U.S. military leaders are working on a new slimmed-down strategy that would keep some American troops in combat against the Taliban for years to come, long after 2014.
> 
> ...



U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan will be a long process - latimes.com


----------



## Mr. President (Dec 30, 2011)

Civilians don't have the stomach for the numbers.  But our military still has the stomach for the war.  Why is it that countries are inspecting the U. S. presence but the world is not asking why the Afghan and Iraqi governments are not capable of running a country themselves yet?  We didn't stay in Iraq as long as we did for US interests.  Every time we left an area they started killing each other and we had to come back.  Barring the Kurds in the North.


----------



## High_Gravity (Dec 30, 2011)

Mr. President said:


> Civilians don't have the stomach for the numbers.  But our military still has the stomach for the war.  Why is it that countries are inspecting the U. S. presence but the world is not asking why the Afghan and Iraqi governments are not capable of running a country themselves yet?  We didn't stay in Iraq as long as we did for US interests.  Every time we left an area they started killing each other and we had to come back.  Barring the Kurds in the North.



The Kurds are the only ones in Iraq who really liked Americans and who have their shit together, the rest of the country will probably descend into chaos and a civil war pretty soon. As far as staying longer in Iraq, correct me if I'm wrong but wasn't one of the main reasons we left is because the Iraqis were going to waive immunity for our troops and try them in Iraqi courts if they made a mistake and killed some civilians? I don't know about you but I DEFINENTLY do not want any American troops being tried in Iraqi court rooms.


----------



## hipeter924 (Dec 31, 2011)

I think if you are to argue against American intervention in Iraq and Afghanistan you really have to understand the circumstances of what it was like before America intervened in the first place.

Before I begin: I dislike the term 'soviet invasion', that's just as incorrect as 'American invasion' as it makes the assumption that people didn't want either there, that the nation was an ideal/stable place to live in the first place, and that the government wasn't invited there in some fashion by the government at the time.

First Afghanistan was not a stable nation for most of its history, eventually a semi-democratic government came to power in a popular revolution, this later resulted in a military coup that placed a communist government in power which encouraged America (under the auspices of the cold war) to fund/support terrorists and religious extremists like the Taliban. The Soviet government later entered the country with the support of the communist government, eventually taking military control of the country (but keep it mind it was ALREADY a military government). 

However American intervention was not the sole reason for the Talibans victory, as religious extremists had been pouring in from Pakistan and developing internally as a result of the religious persecution of the government. So when the Soviets lost the war and left, the entire government system collapsed or was deliberated destroyed by the religious extremists (which would become the Taliban we know today) that took over the country.

So no matter how bad American intervention has been in Afghanistan, it is better having a nation run by relatively sane people, than people that believe that they are gods (the Taliban believed they were the divine Representatives of Allah and could do what they liked, that meant running a state that makes Iran look like paradise). 

I doubt we even need to start on the human rights record of the Taliban. On that basis I would support American intervention in Afghanistan. As for Iraq that is another story, but similar justification could be established (genocide of the Kurds, Saddam's terror squads anyone?), and no matter how bad Iraq is, under Saddam and the sanctions it was far, far worse.


----------



## Jos (Jan 2, 2012)

Trans-Afghanistan Pipeline - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


----------



## JStone (Jan 2, 2012)

> The breeding ground is the wars we have initiated in the Middle East.



Everyone knows that islime is a religion of peace  


Iran Iraq War, 1 million dead
Lebanese Civil War, 250,000 dead
Algerian Civl War: 300,000 dead
Bangladesh Civil War: 500,000 dead
Black Sept., Jordan's King Hussein murders, expells 80,000 Palestinians
Syrian army kills 20,000 Syrians at Hama
Iraq gases hundreds of thousands of Kurds
1400 year conflict between Sunnis and Shiites
Fratricide between Hamas and Fatah
Syria/Hizballah assassinate Lebanese PM Rafik Hariri

Alexis de Toqueville...


> I studied the Koran a great deal. I came away from that study with the conviction there have been few religions in the world as deadly to men as that of Muhammad. So far as I can see, it is the principal cause of the decadence so visible today in the Muslim world and, though less absurd than the polytheism of old, its social and political tendencies are in my opinion to be feared, and I therefore regard it as a form of decadence rather than a form of progress in relation to paganism itself.


----------



## High_Gravity (Jan 31, 2012)

On the Ground in Afghanistan, a Taliban Whose Momentum Seems Anything but Broken









> The hundreds of bullets, mortar shells and rockets that slammed into the boulders behind which they were taking cover peppered the men of 1st Platoon with high-velocity rock shards and jagged bits of shrapnel. Just below Outpost (OP) Shal, a newly constructed mountaintop aerie in Afghanistan's violent Kunar province on the Pakistani border, insurgent fighters were moaning and screaming from wounds suffered over eight days of heavy fighting. That scene, just three months ago, of the outnumbered American platoon fighting to maintain its foothold offered a sobering contrast to President Barack Obama's statement, in last week's State of the Union address: "The Taliban's momentum has been broken."
> 
> Like the battle scene witnessed by TIME, the recent National Intelligence Estimate on Afghanistan reportedly also casts doubt on the confidence expressed by President Obama on the state of the Taliban's war effort. The top-secret assessment "takes a dim view of possible futures in Afghanistan," Reuters was told last week by a U.S. official speaking on condition of anonymity. The report, which represents the consensus view of 16 U.S. intelligence agencies, warns that the Taliban has not given up on its aim of retaking full control of Afghanistan and concludes that the gains made by the troop surge ordered by President Obama two years ago may be unsustainable, according to McClatchy Newspapers.
> 
> ...



Read more: Afghanistan: The Taliban's Momentum Seems Not Broken - TIME


----------



## eots (Jan 31, 2012)

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUTYL8HfCGo&feature=g-vrec&context=G2a42b8dRVAAAAAAAABQ]Ron Paul Correctly Predicts Obama Lie - YouTube[/ame]


----------



## High_Gravity (Feb 2, 2012)

The Hard Way Out of Afghanistan








> For years, in the village of Juz Ghoray, at the remote fringes of the Musa Qala District in northern Helmand Province, the Taliban enjoyed free rein, collecting taxes from local poppy farmers and staging attacks on any foreign patrol that moved within shooting range of an abrupt desert prominence called Ugly Hill. After a Marine unit found nine I.E.D.s hidden beneath Ugly Hills scarred and caverned faces last year, coalition forces seldom ventured near it. Until one night this October, when members of Echo Company, from the Second Battalion, Fourth Marines  known since Vietnam as the Magnificent Bastards  quietly sneaked into Juz Ghoray and posted signs on peoples doors and windows. Their idea was to co-opt the infamous Taliban practice of intimidating government sympathizers with night letters threatening execution. The Marines signs were bordered with the nations colors, and in Pashto and Dari they announced: The Afghan National Security Forces are coming. Two weeks later, about 60 members of Echo Company, along with 30 Afghan National Army soldiers, traveled on foot through the night and took Ugly Hill without a shot. At dawn, as villagers emerged from their homes, they found laborers stacking bastions to fortify a new Afghan police post. And something else, which many residents of Juz Ghoray had never seen before: an Afghan flag raised on a wooden pole.
> 
> For the government, the new post represents a palpable extension of its reach, a triumph however modest. But not one without some cost. Before the Afghans could claim Ugly Hill, two marines had to sweep it for mines. Joshua Lee, a 26-year-old sergeant from Arkansas, located the first I.E.D. using a metal detector. As he set to work on the device, Lee identified a second bomb, and while readjusting he stepped on a third. The blast shattered his right leg, cocking it sideways below the knee and leaving mangled pieces of foot hanging loosely from flesh and bone.
> 
> ...



http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/05/magazine/afghanistan.html?_r=1&hp


----------



## High_Gravity (Feb 6, 2012)

U.S. Plans Shift to Elite Units as It Winds Down in Afghanistan








> WASHINGTON  The United States plan to wind down its combat role in Afghanistan a year earlier than expected relies on shifting responsibility to Special Operations forces that hunt insurgent leaders and train local troops, according to senior Pentagon officials and military officers. These forces could remain in the country well after the NATO mission ends in late 2014.
> 
> The plan, if approved by President Obama, would amount to the most significant evolution in the military campaign since Mr. Obama sent in 32,000 more troops to wage an intensive and costly counterinsurgency effort.
> 
> ...



http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/05/w...n-afghanistan.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all?src=tp


----------



## Sunni Man (Feb 6, 2012)

The Afghan people have endured and resisted countless centuries of occupiers and invaders.

Whether we pull out in 2024 or 3024 makes no difference.

After we are gone from their country.

The people of Afghanistan will just return to their time honored way of life and culture.

And wait for the next Empire stupid enough to once again invade their home.


----------

