The Long War

The war in Afghanistan has now raged for longer than the war in Vietnam (after the Gulf of Tonkin resolution). Vietnam is widely acknowledged as the first "television war", in that TV cameras allowed combat footage to be shown on the evening news. Indeed, TV news played a large part in the changing of public opinion against the war. 58000 US personnel died in that war, and by some estimates, over 3 million civilians died. The NVA rolled into Saigon and communist expansion did not occur as projected by the US government.
Around four decades later, the war in Afghanistan continues, and shows no sign of stopping anytime soon. Later this year, politicians will vote to increase funding for the war. Over 1700 coalition deaths have occurred since the war began. Civilian casualties are unknown at this point, but it is clear that the rate is accelerating with the increase in bombings and drone strikes. Is the lower death toll one reason why the resistance to the war in the US is less widespread? Or are modern wars more professionally manged, in terms of censorship and propaganda?
Here is a documentary in which John Pilger explores those themes in 1983:



Great efforts have been made to avoid direct comparisons to the Vietnam war, and yet the similarities are becoming more and more apparent. Will we continue this long war? Can we afford to? Will public opinion turn against the war, or are we bored or immune to the stories of deaths now?

Soldiers Of God

In 1998, a twenty-four part documentary, entitled "Cold War", was first broadcast. Each episode dealt with a different aspect of the Cold War and covered the entire span from it's origins prior to 1945, to the fall of the Wall in 1989 and beyond. This series was available on VHS, but Bush II had some footage re-classified, and this is probably the main reason why it is no longer available for sale. Episode 20, Soldiers Of God, dealt with the US-supported resistence to the invasion of Afghanistan by the Soviet Union. I really should have posted this yesterday (since it was Groundhog Day).



From Wikipedia: "Episode 20, "Soldiers of God", shows Zbigniew Brzezinski in 1980, giving a speech to the mullahs and mujahideen fighters between the borders of Afghanistan and Pakistan encouraging the Muslim mujahideen fighters through his Pakistani translator saying "We know of their deep belief in God and we are confident that their struggle will succeed. That land over there is yours. You will go back to it one day, because your fight will prevail and you'll have your homes and your mosques back again, because your cause is right and God is on your side." — while assuring them of unconditional American government support; and interviewed State Department officials confirming that the United States uncritically supported the Pakistani government for the sake of American interests in Afghanistan."

Happy Thanksgiving

If you think about it, Thanksgiving can be a lot like global politics. People pretend to like eachother in front of relatives, while looking for opportunities to make some passive aggressive comments and figuring out how far they can push their hosts. This doesnt apply to everyone, but I'm sure there is at least one in each gathering!

It seems that our old friend Blackwater (or Xe, as they like to be known as now), is at work for Uncle Sam again. VIP protection must have become boring, so now Blackwater is performing special ops missions alongside the CIA and the Special Ops Command. Those operations now include missions in Pakistan.

"The source, who has worked on covert US military programs for years, including in Afghanistan and Pakistan, has direct knowledge of Blackwater's involvement. The source said that the program is so "compartmentalized" that senior figures within the Obama administration and the US military chain of command may not be aware of its existence."

At the very least, they are conducting snatch missions and intelligence gathering (in a country we are not at war with). However, there have been persistent rumors of "false flag" operations in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and even Iran - acts of terrorism conducted by groups loyal to, or at least paid by, the US Govt.

Here's a gift idea for the person who has everything - The Official CIA Manual of Trickery and Deception
The Boston Globe has an interesting article on the book here

Which ex-president does this remind you of?