"Can American Money Buy Peace In Afghanistan?"

US Army Ambushed by Taliban 2009

Trumpeting a victory against careless spending, President Barack Obama on Wednesday signed a defense bill that kills some costly weapons projects and expands war efforts. In a major civil rights change, the law also makes it a federal hate crime to assault people based on sexual orientation.

The $680 billion bill authorizes spending but doesn't provide any actual dollars. Rather, it sets guidance that is typically followed by congressional committees that decide appropriations. Obama hailed it as a step toward ending needless military spending that he called "an affront to the American people and to our troops."

The White House put most of its focus on what the bill does contain: project after project that Obama billed as unneeded. The bill terminates production of the F-22 fighter jet program, which has its origins in the Cold War era and, its critics maintain, is poorly suited for anti-insurgent battles in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Yet the legislation still contains an effort by lawmakers to continue development — over the president's strong objections — of a costly alternative engine for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, the Air Force's fighter of the future. A vague White House veto threat about that never came to fruition. (Read Full Article)

The defense bill President Barack Obama will sign into law on Wednesday contains a new provision that would pay Taliban fighters who renounce the insurgency, Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin said on Tuesday.

The provision establishes a program in Afghanistan similar to one used in Iraq where former fighters were re-integrated into Iraqi society, Levin told Reuters.

Obama plans to sign the bill authorizing Pentagon operations for fiscal 2010 on Wednesday, the White House said. (Read Full Article)

The claim that Ahmed Wali Karzai has been on the payroll of the CIA for the past eight years, as reported in the New York Times on Tuesday, won't come as a surprise to most Afghans, who have long considered his brother, Afghan President Hamid Karzai, to be an American puppet. The revamped allegations that Karzai frÈre is deeply involved in Afghanistan's annual $4 billion drug industry isn't much of a shocker either - on the streets of Kabul and Kandahar, the name Wali has long been synonymous with someone who can get away with a crime because he has friends in the right places. Diplomats, counternarcotics officials and commanders from the International Security Assistance Force, NATO's military wing in Afghanistan, have all privately (and not so privately) expressed frustration with President Karzai for not reining in his brother. In fact, the people most likely to be shocked by the revelations are Americans back at home, who are already wondering why they should be sending more soldiers and money to a country whose leadership has rarely proved an adequate partner.

To be sure, as one of the most powerful men in Kandahar, Wali Karzai would be a valuable asset in a region that has plagued U.S. and international forces for the past eight years. Kandahar is the spiritual birthplace of the Taliban and is still a hotbed of militant activity. Karzai's influence over local tribes, augmented by his brother's place in the presidential palace and his access to security assets, development contracts and U.S. money, would be substantial. As President Barack Obama deliberates signing a new bill that would allow money to be allocated for insurgents who jump the fence and fight on the side of the government, as was done in Iraq's Anbar Awakening, Karzai would be a key point person for mediating between the Taliban and the presidential palace. (Read Full Article)

   In the Defense spending bill that was just singed by President Barack Obama, a bill touted to stop defense spending waste, billions of dollars have been allocated to buy off Taliban fighters, which in my mind is a complete waste, just as wasteful as the money being given to the Karzai Administration in Afghanistan. Unlike the Sunni insurgents in Iraq, the Taliban are principled but pragmatic fighters who will take the American money foolishly given them and use it to finance their own insurgency. American money cannot buy peace in Afghanistan. Increased troops in Afghanistan can not win peace in Afghanistan. Afghanistan is and will continue to be a waste of American lives and money. War is all about Big Business and wasteful spending. End the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan Mr. Nobel Peace Prize winning President. That would bring real peace,as I see it.

tags: afghanistan  obama  politics  war  warpeace  war on terror  

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