Endless War category archive

PolitialProf sees parallels between the conclusions of two of America’s Great and Glorious Patriotic Wars for a Lie, one coming to a close today and another that ended half a century ago. A nugget:

Notably, the “let’s blow people up for freedom” crowd who led us into Afghanistan (and Iraq, and Vietnam) are predictably using the unspeakable tragedy that is going to come to Afghanistan to make a desperate, last-minute effort to shame the United States into staying there and perpetually supporting the wildly corrupt, utterly illegitimate “government” of Afghanistan. They argue that the horror of Taliban rule justifies – indeed compels – the United States to remain in Afghanistan and lead it to create a stable, effective, non-Taliban government.

This argument has a very real appeal. It is undoubtedly the case that what the Taliban are going to do to Afghanistan’s women is beyond brutal. Whatever else US intervention did, it changed the status of lots of Afghani women for the better. What’s coming is almost certainly beyond imagination.

The thing is, you know what twenty years of US intervention did towards building a stable, non-Taliban Afghan government? Virtually nothing.

At the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Dan Simpson tries to draw some lessons from America’s war in Afghanistan. A snippet; follow the link for the full piece:

There had to be a reason why the British and Russian empires ended up crawling away from Afghanistan . . . .

I get that there will be wailing and gnashing of teeth about President Biden’s committing to withdraw from Afghanistan. And I share Bob Cesca’s fear that the Taliban will rise again and his concern that the Taliban’s holding power next door to Pakistan, which has nuclear weapons, is disquieting.

Mongers of war, believers that the sword is the ultimate solution to every problem, fans of false macho, and manufacturers of weaponry will wail and gnash their teeth. But, frankly, after twenty years, what have we accomplished? An endless running-in-place.

Zilch, nada, nothing.

We should sacrifice no more lives on the altar of pretending that it was not a fool’s errand from the git-go, and two decades has shown us that we cannot fix Afghanistan’s internal problems from afar, however in need of fixing some of them might be.

This may be President Biden’s bravest act to date–to stand up to the mongers of endless war.

Image via Job’s Anger.

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David and his guest. Phil Gurski, a Canadian intelligence veteran, explore the origins of terrorism.

What’s more alarming: That Trump lies all the time about everything or that the Trumpettes willingly believe him without question?

E. J. Montini invites you to play.

In a similar vein, David Niose discusses the conditioning. A snippet:

Through a combination of cultural forces, some overt and others subtle, Americans are taught from a young age to accept their country’s militarism without question. This conditioning has numerous ingredients. Themes of nationalism and militarism are frequently injected into public life through the media and other institutions, for example, as is a sense of righteousness, a rarely challenged belief that the country is almost always a force for good.

Fear is also a major element in conditioning minds for war. Americans of all ages are often reminded, by their government and the media, that perceived enemies pose a constant danger. The Soviet threat was used to justify military spending and adventurism around the globe for much of the latter twentieth century . . . . More recently, through constant reminders of the “war on terror,” Americans are effectively conditioned to see evildoers as always looming.

Via Juanita Jean.

Via Job’s Anger.