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I'm sorry I missed this - great topic for a programme contributing some substance to the debate whilst so many of your colleagues contribute so little.

Following al-qaeda's catastrophic defeat in Iraq, I would agree that this is now the focus of the conflict.

If the local people can be engaged at a political level so much the better but people also need to accept that much of AQ/taleban is not local people. Even if the locals switched allegiance - not unknown when Afghans see the balance of power shifting - the foreigners will still need to be dealt with by military action.

Just like in Iraq.

An excellent question. Are there some specific Pashtun grievances that the NATO has to consider in their startegy to pacify Afghanistan.
The Red army had to deal with the exact same issue which the Americans took advantage of and armed the exact same tribal entities.
So if Pakistan will not be able or willing to pacify that region it appears NATO will have to go in to the Pashtun tribal areas.
Which means enlargening of the war, which means "mission creep" just like in Vietnam. We shell see how Pakistan will react to this very soon.
As for al-Quaeda (this western fiction) they are just a bunch of volunteer fighters of Moslem backround and their sympatizers which show up in all conflicts. We have seen them in Bosnia, Kossovo, Chechnia, Azerbajdzan, Iraq and now in Afghanistan. They will be defeated only by Peace! They are like a virus that breaks out in times of international stress.

ISRAEL IS GOING TO LISTEN, WHEN I SPEAK. HERE ME O PEOPLE OF ISRAEL. ISRAEL WILL, BEGIN TO MAKE PEACE WITH THE ARAB WORLD. ISRAEL SHALL, EXTEND AN OLIVE BRANCH TO ALL THE ARAB COUNTRIES. ISRAEL MUST, BECOME THE HUMBLE MEDIATOR FOR THE SAKE OF ALL MANKIND. ISRAEL SHOULD, MAKE PEACE WITH THE PALISTINIAN PEOPLE AND GIVE THEM "RESERVE STATUS" LIKE CANADIAN INDIANS. Godspeed Swift [Personal details removed by Moderator]

I missed the show, i hope that it can be found online...

It is very good (but a lot more work) to leave the chorus line

and do some original work!

Keep it up and we may reach toward a better world!

Post 1- "the foreigners will still need to be dealt with by military action".

Isn't that what the Taleban are trying to do?

This is all very worrying.

In the last week we have witnessed the moving of the battlefield into pakistan. So we are bombing the innocents of yet another soveriegn nation in the hope that we find osama.

We didn't find him in afghanistan, nor Iraq. So now lets head into pakistan.

I can't help but think we are becoming the nation that my grandfather fought against more than 60 years ago.

9/11 was our Riechstag. Both false flag terror attacks used to justify, well anything it seems.

From turning our domestic political states towards fascism and in giving us carte blanche to occupy any land in the name of terrorism.

Your assistance of the desires of the cabals that hold power is simple collaboration and nothing more.

For the sake all concerned please stop. Stop working for a propoganda machine and stop helping and assisting them in their murder of innocents.

These are incredibly dangerous times and you seem to be hellbent on making them worse.

lets not invade pakistan, lets face up to the truth about 9/11 and then lets start repairing the last 7 years and more of damage we are doing to ourselves

#7 Were the truck bomb attacks on the WTC in '92 also false flag? How about the US embassies in Africa and the USS Cole. All those happened during Clinton. If Al Qu'eda WEREN'T behind 9/11 why has no Al Qu'eda spokesman ever denied it? Surely a Russian, Iranian or Chinese newstation would sell its own granny to broadcast that interview!

Hey peter

So no Al'Qu'eda has ever denied doing 9/11.

is this a new version of investigation i have missed out on. You have to deny all crimes, surely they should only deny crimes they are actually accused of. As of yet the FBI have no accused Osama bin laden of 9/11. Their reason for not doing so is that they have no evidence.

i would also suggest that yes the truck bomb in 92' was false flag, it would help explain why one of the accused was an fbi informant who was repeatedly told to let the bombers continue with there plans. Interestinglyhe offered to supply a fake bomb but the fbi told him to supply a working bomb.

I would need to spend a few hours looking into the USS Cole and African embassy bombings before i could comment but you could add 7/7 to your list.

If they were false flag attacks they would join a very long list going from the gulf of Tonkin to the USS Liberty and beyond.

On the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ's own website today they carry a report of how our 'services' knew about the plan to bomb Omagh.

And if we are to talk about foreign news agencies why not mention that Russian TV and German TV both carried documentaries which concluded that 9/11 did not happen as we were told.

It seems we will be the last to be told the truth, just as the citizens of Germany were the last ones to find out about the concentration camps.

Sorry Hank but Al Queda members actually claimed responsibility for 9/11. So unless someone more senior in their hierarchy denies it then it has to be taken as truth.

Stop trying to deflect responsibility onto anyone else because until you admit who ws responsible you wont be looking in the ight place for a solution. And by that I dont mean looking for the right place to bomb, I mean looking for the right causes and problems to tackel in a mature and sensible way.

To be fair hackerjack, I only said that Osama has not claimed responsibility or been formally accused. As for Al-Qaeda members claiming responsibility, are you talking about the guys who were waterboarded in GitMo as i don't know how seriously we can take a confession extracted through torture.

If you are believing that OBL is the head of Al-Qaeda, then surely his denial of responsibility 6 days after the event is enough for you.

I found today that even Dick Cheney has said that OBL is not responsible for the attacks of 9/11.

So if you want to go further up the chain of command why not go to the top and ask a few questions of the man who set up the Al-Quaeda.

Zbigniew Brzezinski.

That would be the same chap who is now Obamas head of foreign policy and all this comes just a week after Obama has said the battlefield must move to Pakistan. Which brings us back to this blog supporting the new policy of attacking Pakistan.

Its almost like it is coordinated propoganda. The sheer fact that the CEfP has been cited as a reference should ring alarm bells

As for the responsibilty, the only way we will ever find out the truth of that will be through an Independent inquiry. I am sure you have faith in the official story and that those 19 saudis were responsible, which makes me wonder, if you think that then once we have brought death to the people of Pakistan if we should turn our aim towards Saudi Arabia.

I am not trying to deflect anything, I am just trying to work out how we became a nation that invades, murders, rapes and tortures all on the basis of a terror attack that has never been properly investigated.

Hi Hackerjack (10) could you provide a (credible) link to some evidence of these claims of responsibility? I sort of remember at the time being surprised that nobody immediately claimed responsibility, but it's all so long ago now-----

Pakistan has been allowed to provide a sanctuary for al Qaeda and their Taleban allies since 9-11-01. The threat will not end until they are eliminated. If the Pakistani Army is not up to it, NATO will have to get the job done as completely as possible no matter how ruthless they have to be. The alternative is more 9-11s or worse. The entire world has been held hostage to these people. The time to deal with them effectively once and for all is long overdue. It would be a grave mistake to allow a border whcih can't be enforced to stand in the way of the civilized world defending itself. Even Moslems will be far better off with them gone forever.

Marcus, we are not going to agree on the root cause and perpetrators of 9/11. you think it was men in turbans, i think it was men in suits.

But you can't seriously think that any nation or coalition who admit, i repeat admit, to rape, murder and torture could ever be described as civilised.


Then again you have already stated that you think all Americas enemies are savages so i am guessing I am not going to get anything from you beyond your usual anti-european anti-muslim ranting.

btw.

thanks for borrowing a few trillion from the (european owned) federal reserve to pay the bankers who gambled the FMay and Fmac money away. You basically just gave us 30,000 dollars of your money to a bunch of guys in the city of Lond

#7

Makes several serious points

that seem quite valid

without and independent of the "false flag" idea.

Discard the false flag assumption and see how the rest fits.

Reality in our World does not reside in the official explanations.

Hank_Reardon #14

"Marcus, we are not going to agree on the root cause and perpetrators of 9/11. you think it was men in turbans, i think it was men in suits."

I didn't know Osama bin Laden wore a suit.

"But you can't seriously think that any nation or coalition who admit, i repeat admit, to rape, murder and torture could ever be described as civilised."

So does that mean that Great Britain admits to those crimes it committed countless times during its centuries of merciless persecution of people around the world in its empire on which the sun never set or during its feudal period when most people were treated by the aristocrats like slaves to be beaten, raped, and murdered at will with impunity? The rest of Europe's empire builders are just as guilty. If you want me to say that they are no civilized, OK, I'll say it, they are savages.

"Then again you have already stated that you think all Americas enemies are savages so i am guessing I am not going to get anything from you beyond your usual anti-european anti-muslim ranting."

That's a lie. I am not anti Muslim.

"btw.

thanks for borrowing a few trillion from the (european owned) federal reserve to pay the bankers who gambled the FMay and Fmac money away. You basically just gave us 30,000 dollars of your money to a bunch of guys in the city of Lond"

Thanks for lending it to us. It's the least you could have done for getting your bacon out of the fire, first from the Kaiser, then from Hitler, and then from the USSR. Any one of those times, you'd have been a gonner without us. I'm sure you won't mind if we devalue that money by printing a few trillion more of them. Our Treasury's printing presses are ready to go. The way I've got it figured, you'll be lucky to get 40 cents on the dollar. We do this every single time too.

I would agree with Hank.Try and look at both sides of the picture.No evidence was found in Iraq having nuclear warheads, yet USA invaded it and still stays there wasting billions of dollars every year.They said Usama Bin Laden was behind it.....do they have any evidence ?NO.

USA's intelligence has always proved to be misleading used for its own benifit to promote its governing party politically and also to divert the comman man's attention away from the more pressing issues.

I sure hope that their conscience let's them live in peace for having killed so many innocent people in Iraq, Afghanistan and now Pakistan.

USA should stop being the poilceman of the world and start setting the more pressing issues in its own homeland right.....economy,unemployment and education.

These incursions by the USA will only increase distrust,hatred and more extremism.They do not understand the culture,religion or privacy of the people of any country.Taking a gun and using it against innocent civillians, should not be an option at any point in time.

"Try and look at both sides of the picture.No evidence was found in Iraq having nuclear warheads, yet USA invaded it and still stays there wasting billions of dollars every year.They said Usama Bin Laden was behind it.....do they have any evidence ?NO."

This is utter nonsense! Saddam didn't have nukes therefore Bin ladin wasn't behind 9/11???? That makes no sense. In any case no-one seriously alleged Saddam did have nukes. He was accussed of having WMD: poison gas, germs and wanting to develop nukes. The evidence for his previous ownership of WMD is overwhelming.

The main reason I don't believe 9/11 was a false flag was that such a plot if unneccesarily complicated. It would have been far easier to have 12 Israelis in turbans (they'd look like arabs on Fox) do a Beslan school massacre and make sure delta force didn't leave any survivors when they stormed the school. That plane plot was far too likely to go wrong and need far too many people in on the plot.

I hope that NATO will be able to pacify Afghanistan.

One of dozens of seperate claims by al-queda members over the past 5 years.

#20. Exactly. Not only that- why would the US devise a false flag attack using 19 SAUDI'S based in Afghanistan to justify attacking Iraq? Why not frame 19 Iraqi's? The conspiracy theory has holes in it so big you could fly a 767 through them.

#6 "Post 1- "the foreigners will still need to be dealt with by military action".

Isn't that what the Taleban are trying to do?"
===============

Yep, the taleban dealt with another two wicked 'foreigners' yesterday - two doctors on the UN polio vaccination programme, killed by a 'martydom bomber'

Still think the programme was a good idea...If we are to defeat AQ in afghanistan/pakistan like we did in iraq we will need to understand and engage with the local population.

jon112uk

"If we are to defeat AQ in afghanistan/pakistan like we did in iraq we will need to understand and engage with the local population."

Is that how we defeated the Japanese and Germans, by engagning the local population? Is that how we defeated the Soviets? We sure wasted a lot of money on bombs, planes, ships, and other military effort if we did. I know Chamberlain tried. He brought Britain "peace in our time." Well at least for a few months.

#23...

Marcus:

The US tried bombing and shooting their way to victory in Iraq - they just got a good spanking and very nearly another vietnam. If Obama had been elected this time last year we would have been seeing the last few yanks being helicoptered off the embassy roof by now.

The Iraqis threw al-qaeda out of Iraq, sometimes assisted by the US.

I'm pleased to see US soldiers patrolling alongside Iraqis to finish off the last few al-qaeda in Iraq and I hope we can have the same sort of success in Afghanistan by engaging with the pashtuns - that's the value of the programme in the editors blog.

If you read my original post (#1), it's all about the necessity for a military solution to the core members of taleban/AQ. I don't accept the value of 'engaging' with them.

Remind me again about how you tie Al Qaeda to 9/11 since Bin Laden isn't being persued by the FBI (no proof), the hijackers were instantly named (but where's the proof they were the hijackers?), Barbara Olsen's phone call never happened (according to the FBI), there has been no air crash investigations and the 9/11 Commission never investigate the money chain.

I suppose there was the confessions extracted by torture by the CIA - that's reliable... (not)

If you saw mine Jon it was about wanting to see some hard evidence that such a thing as Al-qaeda are responsible for 9/11 before we kill more innocents.

jon112uk

The US has not bombed anyone since Hiroshima and Nagasaki. If they had, there would be nobldy left alive in Baghdad....or Belgrade...or Hanoi. And it doesn't take nuclear weapons. Even the UK was able to create a firestorm over Dresden before nuclear energy. The US has been very careful not to inflict any more casualties among civilians than was absolutely necessary. Perhaps that is where its biggest mistake lies. You don't win wars by winning hearts and minds. You win wars by finding and destroying the enemy before he destroys you. We don't do that any more. American hasn't won a war because of it since 1945.

"You win wars by finding and destroying the enemy before he destroys you. We don't do that any more. American hasn't won a war because of it since 1945." MarcusAureliusII


I think you just won one in Iraq.

- al-qaeda has certainly lost and they weren't running back to Afghanistan during the 'let's bomb them into submission' phase of Falujah etc., that was when you had your highest casualties and came close to loosing altogether. Far easier to let the Iraqis find the enemy and destroy them for you like you are so succesfully doing today.

That's why the programme on the Pashtuns is so relevant.

You think they US has won in Iraq?????

Nope.

Also Al-Queda were never really prevalent in Iraq, it was all about removing Sadam because of the seperate threat that he supposedly posed to the US. In that sense I suppose you could say objective has been achieved, but I don't think that finishing a war with a higher sucurity threat to your people than there actually was at the start of it (no matter what the intel said) is wining.

#29 hackerjack

US won in Iraq? ...

* Regime changed (stated war aim)
* Saudis forced to trash al-qaeda in Saudi-Arabia (real war aim)
* US now taken seriously, at least feared, like you would fear a big angry dog, not treated with contempt as they were under Clinton (real war aim)
* Sadam no threat to anyone anymore
* Former Sunni insurgents patrolling alongside US troops
* Former Shia insurgents off the streets
* Al-qaeda fled or dead
* Elected government in place
* US to withdraw in good order before 2011

(Oh, and oil flowing like water if you really must be cynical)

You may not like that result, you may have wanted another Vietnam. And no one likes the cost. But that will not stop me making the (oh so slightly provocative) comment - the US has 'won' in Iraq.

I still think the programme on the Pashtuns was a good idea.

I occurs to me that if the US are to win in Afghanistan they eventually need North Pakistan to be occupied by a sympathetic military force. Who could do this, unlikely that the Pakistani army have the rescources or will to do this, also unlikely that any democratic pakistani Gov't could survive attempting this. The US would be hard pushed. Indian involvement would be the most practical but be potentially disasterous.
But this is where i fear things are heading, i find it impossible to see how the US can conclude its Afghani campaign with out N Pakistan being occupied.

Post 11

'how we became a nation that murders, rapes tortures all on tha basis of a terror attack that was never properly investigated'

i am glad to see that people with a conscious still exit among the american nation who are not blinded by the fasle tags and false terrorism stories of their leaders.

as for the pashtun dilemma, i think that US or the NATO forces would be the last ones able to bring peace in the region, and that too by bombing...war is not the solution to address the grievances of people...U KILL ONE , A HUNDRED MORE RISE AGAINST YOU....the hatred spreads like a virus from generation to generation...how many generations can america KILL inorder to, so called 'secure itself and bring peace to the world'...this is not peace...this is bloodshed...killing innocent, poor people, whenever and wherever it wants...

US never won in Afghanistan and they will NEVER win in Pakistan either....

Sadly I missed the program....but to go back to the original question "Do the Pashtuns have specific grievances with the governments in Kabul and Islamabad which have led to their involvement in the violence?" i am reminded of long conversations i had in the 1950's with a retired member of the Indian Raj security services who knew the Pashtuns well [including incidently their defecating/eating etiquette which puts a whole new meaning on lefthand/righthand!!] Major U - who came from a family of Russian immigres - firmly believed they were a law unto themselves in his day, and that's how they traditionally they saw themselves: Pashtuns. Not Afgans, Pakastans, or any other 'ans. And if anyone thought otherwise, they's fight them. History, i think, has much to tell us about what's going on now.

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