Thursday, December 03, 2009
Meliss Roddy on Af-Pak
Melissa Roddy writes about Pakistan and Afghanistan in the Huffington Post. I think she does a good job of describing the situation, don't you?
Wednesday, December 02, 2009
on obama af-pak strategy 2.0, which is more of the same failed 1.0
dec 2nd, 2009
excerpts from what i wrote; will post the full article as soon as it is published.
[category India, Afghanistan, US, Pakistan]
Obama's Af-Pak speech: America will declare victory and leave soon
Rajeev Srinivasan concludes the winners are China and Pakistan; India loses again
There is no doubt the US President Barack Obama had a difficult task to perform in making his long-awaited
Afghanistan speech on Tuesday. There has been a clamor of different voices urging him to take
every position from digging in for the long term all the way to an immediate withdrawal, and the only
option Obama really had was to take a median position that would certainly disappoint large sections of
his voters.
...
The root cause of the problem in Afghanistan, unlike in Iraq, is simple: the Americans are laboring
mightily to ignore the elephant in the living room, Pakistan's agenda. It is as clear as daylight to the
casual observer that Pakistan has no interest whatsoever in bringing stability to Afghanistan, in
preventing the Taliban from coming back to power there, or in capturing Osama bin Laden and other
Al-Qaeda operatives: and these are the alleged reasons why the Americans are in Afghanistan.
...
There is the possibility that, given the deadline of 18 months that Obama has outlined for the exit, there
will be a headlong and ignominious retreat from Kabul. I remember the photographs from Saigon in
1975 with the last helicopters taking off from the American embassy with people attempting
desperately hanging on. Vietnam scarred America's soul, but Communism did not win, and the Domino
Theory turned out to be wrong: communists are susceptible to the charms of the market.
The Afghan game is altogether different: it may crush America's soul altogether. If the jihadis gain
sustenance from the American defeat there, there will be no respite: they will keep on attacking, as they
are not easily distracted from their goal of global dominance, which they believe is within their grasp.
Indeed they may be right, because there is a short window of opportunity when vast petro-dollars are at
their disposal. The near-default of sovereign debt in Dubai shows that the petro-dollars may well be
ephemeral, and that they had better strike when the iron is hot.
...
Tuesday, December 01, 2009
uranium shortage looms
dec 1, 2009
yet another reason why nuclear fantasies are dangerous and counterproductive, on top of the sabotage and terrorism fears.
yet another reason why nuclear fantasies are dangerous and counterproductive, on top of the sabotage and terrorism fears.
there is now a uranium shortage, just in time for india's nuclear power plans.
china orders indians to stop building road in j&k
dec 1, 2009
india stops building a road in j&k on its own territory because china army orders them to!
christopher hitchens' view of manmohan visit to the US
nov 30th, 2009
RT
: Prime Minister Singh's visit was almost eclipsed by the silly Salahi story. (SLATE, 11.30.2009)
so what if the Swiss ban the Minarets...
There is still United Queendom where there are enough limeys to welcome Islam with open arms. Watch this Brit woman 'overwhelmed' by all the din from the call to prayer from the scores of mosques in Jeddah,
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)