On OBL, USA and Murder

[Aurielius]

That it was American counter terrorism operatives who conducted the assassination on the sovereign soil of a foreign country is an even more important marker. Many see the assassination of rogue individuals as a violation of sovereign immunity and even "playing God," a right that no nation can arrogate to itself. This is false. It is a powerful symbol of our collective evolution that individual perpetrators are targeted for their crimes rather than entire societies punished in wars.

 

Over the past decade, international law has evolved in such a way as to justify such direct interventions, if only we could act more quickly on the thicket of protocols and deliberations we have invented. The International Criminal Court which oversaw the trial of Serbian war criminal Slobodan Milosevic, has indicted sitting heads of state such as Omar Bashir of Sudan. The Responsibility to Protect (R2P) doctrine, ratified in 2005 by the United Nations General Assembly in 2005, sets forth a process for determining whether the international community can be obligated to intervene to prevent crimes against humanity.

 

The core principle behind these institutions and treaties is that sovereignty is a responsibility, not a privilege. This applies not only to dictators and terrorist fugitives, but to the governments that give them safe harbor.

[Quetzlsacatanango]

Don't F with the USA.

Right or wrong, for better or worse, how hard is that to understand?

[Aurielius]

Don't F with the USA.

Right or wrong, for better or worse, how hard is that to understand?

Is that a variant of "Don't mess with Texas"?

[RZ1029]

Don't F with the USA.

Right or wrong, for better or worse, how hard is that to understand?

Is that a variant of "Don't mess with Texas"?

Difference is, Texans mean it.

[Quetzlsacatanango]

Don't F with the USA.

Right or wrong, for better or worse, how hard is that to understand?

Is that a variant of "Don't mess with Texas"?

 

Yeah but doesn't go quite as well on t-shirts.

[Sync182]

ight or wrong, for better or worse, how hard is that to understand?

 

That's what I keep telling the missus, and I still get ragged on. :wallbash: :thumbsup:

[DeTomaso]

A participation of the Taliban in exploratory talks on Afghanistan's future wouldn’t be just 'fine', it's mandatory, or the round table isn't worth its wood, I fear. Unfortunately the US has insisted to talk exclusively to low-ranking Taliban and the Taliban have cabled to talk to the other Afghan factions first after the withdrawal of all 'occupation forces', which would exclude the US from these talks. Well, in this way we can hardly speak of seriousness, neither on US nor on Taliban side.

After the US announcement to withdraw all troops from Afghanistan by the end of 2015, the question which side might have the better cards on the long run is already again obsolete. The reason for the upcoming spring offensive by the Taliban might thus to be seen under strategic aspects as an intended upgrade of the own negotiating position in the forefront of such future internal exploratory talks in Kabul.

It seems to me as if it'd be high time to bring the regional powers Pakistan, Russia, China and the Iran into the diplomatic play to solve the Afghanistan problem; the West has failed unfortunately, politically and probably culturally as well. The military status quo of the Western forces is still the status quo ante of late 2002 and this alone is a military success on Afghan soils, for it could have been much worse. That's apparently the quintessence of a fruitless ten-year war against the Taliban and the flourishing opium.

Edited May 13, 2011 by DeTomaso

[ginnyfizz]

I seem to remember the Russians making one hell of a mess the last time they tried anything in Afghanistan, so I am not convinced that bringing them to the table would solve anything (despite them being near neighbours and certainly a legitimately interested party as it were) and might even make things worse. As for the Taliban, why assume that they are a united group/party? With whom exactly would one negotiate? I suspect that the Taliban are as tribally/locally fractured as has ever been the case in Afghanistan. And it would be idealistic but unrealistic to imagine that there can ever be lasting peace, whether negotiated or at the point of a gun. The British Empire at the height of its pomp and power never managed that in Afghanistan, despite there being soldiers' boots on the ground in vast numbers. The more recent Russian attempt to sort them out failed and now the Western alliance is getting bogged down.

[DeTomaso]

The rules of the game have to be changed in Afghanistan to stop permanent war. As long as it appears as an artificial British colony construct, centrally ruled by Kabul to the exclusion of almost a third of the Afghan people, nothing will ever turn to good account, no matter who may temporarily "rule" in Kabul or what skin and culture a foreign occupation actually may have.

 

I believe it is far more illusionary to hope for an end of the not winnable Afghan Wars without changing anything systematically, especially those imperial structures that were grafted upon the Afghans by former colonialism, for example the central government.

 

The Taliban are no people but an Islamist movement that is founded in a mixture of radical Deobandism and the Pashtunwali code of honor, an armed political faction as homogenous as any faction on the ground in Afghanistan, this includes the Western Alliance. They are communities of purpose as usual. The Taliban in charge for talks is thus, to this day, their chosen leader - Mullah Omar. US attempts to split the Taliban are most certainly doomed to fail. Now the US that has installed a chameleon named Hamid Karzai in Kabul rejects any talks with Mullah Omar due to his family connection to the bin Laden clan and some critical vetoes he has put in against the Taliban jirga (assembly) in favor of Osama bin Laden. And it goes both ways. These two opponents almost paralyze each other and are thus stumbling blocks on any road to peace in Afghanistan. Unfortunately the Afghan Northern Alliance has no token left since the astonishing assassination of the famous warlord Ahmad Shah Massoud just two days before 9/11. And after his fatwa against the US in 2001 and the closing of ranks with al-Qaeda the former Afghan Prime Minister Gulbuddin Hekmatyar is doubtlessly by far more obstructive for a peace process in Afghanistan than Mullah Omar as the new bogeyman could ever be. On the contrary, the future role of "Gucci Mujaheddin" Karzai as the friend of literally everybody but especially of himself and his outfit is probably already sealed, we'll find him in the fashion exile again.

 

I think the main difference between Russia and the US on the matter is that the former had to learn what the latter has already again forgotten, namely the fact that military superiority is everything but a garantor for political success, especially not on Afghan soils.

Not by chance I have mentioned Russia, China, Pakistan and the Iran as possible parties to the Afghan deal, two political axes, a former and a future one that are directly related to Afghanistan. By means of geografical distance alone we, the West, have predominantly just imperial, that is strategic interests in Afghanistan and no big interest in the Afghans as such. But Afghanistan policy against or past the Afghan people doesn't work, it never did since the days of Alexander the Great.

Edited May 14, 2011 by DeTomaso

[ginnyfizz]

That's just the point, though - Mullah Omar is probably no more than a figurehead, primus inter pares at the moment, or more likely, just one name that we know as opposed to being the real power. I suspect that in reality the Taliban, much as has always been the case, it is a rather loose collection of tribal and family factions, likely to fracture at any moment. I totally agree that the colonial structures failed, for the same reason that a negotiated settlement isn't going to happen - because that just isn't the way they like to settle disputes in Afghanistan. Sadly sword or gunpoint has ever been the way. I don't think the war is working either, don't get me wrong. But we are in something of a dilemma - is it safer to pull out and let them carry on as they have always done, human rights abuses particularly of women and non-Moslems notwithstanding, terrorist bases notwithstanding? Or do we stay and make an attempt to referee and keep an eye on them?