"Why don't you just poke me in the eye with a needle? You've got to be kidding me … I'm sorry, we just gave you $11.6 billion and now you're telling me, 'I don't really care'?"
That’s what Major General Peter Fuller, deputy commander of the NATO training mission in Afghanistan, had to say about President Hamid Karzai and his Afghan government in a recent interview with Politico concerning Karzai’s earlier statement to a journalist that Afghanistan would side with Pakistan if it were to go to war with the United States.
Karzai's statements are "erratic," said General Fuller. Major players in the Afghan government are "isolated from reality." “You can teach a man how to fish, or you can give them a fish," Fuller explained. "We're giving them fish while they're learning, and they want more fish! [They say,] 'I like swordfish, how come you're giving me cod?' Guess what? Cod's on the menu today."
For this candid bit of truth telling, Fuller was relieved of his duties "effective immediately," according to a statement released by General John R. Allen, commander of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF).
"These unfortunate comments are neither indicative of our current solid relationship with the government of Afghanistan, its leadership, or our joint commitment to prevail here in Afghanistan, said Allen. “The Afghan people are an honorable people, and comments such as these will not keep us from accomplishing our most critical and shared mission-bringing about a stable, peaceful and prosperous Afghanistan."
Solid relationship; what solid relationship? Hamid Karzai is crooked enough to make a corkscrew look like a three penny nail. In his crafty Afghan criminal mind, a solid relationship with the United States means him receiving power and money, while the U.S. receives nothing, period!
And now he tells the world that he’d side with Pakistan against the United States if push came to shove. Little wonder that General Fuller might liken it to a poke in the eye with a needle. That’s exactly what it is.
What kind of friend is Hamid Karzai? If it weren’t for U.S. involvement in his corrupt administration propping him and his cronies up, and the deaths of thousands or our soldiers, Hamid Karzai, assuming he were lucky enough to still be alive, would be living in a cave and picking poppy flowers somewhere in the Afghan hinterland.
Karzai takes our blood and treasure while stabbing us in the back. We should be firing him instead of General Fuller.
After ten long years in Afghanistan I thought the most critical and shared mission was to rout the Taliban for its part in harboring Al-Qaida and Osama bin Laden. We did that.
But now we learn that all the billions of taxpayer dollars spent and lives lost were for “bringing about a stable, peaceful and prosperous Afghanistan." America’s prosperity is going down the toilet while America’s mission is to make Afghanistan prosperous.
I have a bit of fresh news for the Obama administration and General Allen. Afghanistan, for thousands of years, was not a stable, peaceful and prosperous nation before the Taliban took over; is not a stable, peaceful and prosperous nation now that the U.S. put Karzai and his ilk in power; and will not be a stable, peaceful and prosperous nation anytime within the foreseeable future, whether the U.S. stays or goes; and there is nothing President Obama or anyone else can do about it.
The United States has wasted its time, money and blood in Afghanistan, a backward nation of savages and criminal warlords. That is the simple truth of the matter and General Fuller should not have been fired for telling it.
Amen to that. The British method of containment and whacking them on the snout when they ventured out has proved it's worth. If the tribes of the area want to live in rubble then give them rubble.
ReplyDeleteThat goes for the duplicitous theives and liars that go to make up the nation of Pakistan as well. You want nukes? Have nukes! We'll fly them in.
George