The Post has uncovered a treasure trove of documents that bring to light the many falsehoods and failures of three Administrations from both political parties to prosecute the War in Afghanistan, bring it to an end, or even tell the truth about it.
For 18 years, America has been at war in Afghanistan. As part of a government project to understand what went wrong, a federal agency interviewed more than 400 people who had a direct role in the conflict. In those interviews, generals, ambassadors, diplomats and other insiders offered firsthand accounts of the mistakes that have prolonged the war.
The full, unsparing remarks and the identities of many of those who made them have never been made public — until now. After a three-year legal battle, The Washington Post won release of more than 2,000 pages of “Lessons Learned” interviews conducted by the Office of the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction. Those interviews reveal there was no consensus on the war’s objectives, let alone how to end the conflict.
To augment the previously undisclosed interviews, The Post also obtained hundreds of confidential memos by former defense secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld from the National Security Archive, a nonprofit research institute. Known as “snowflakes,” the memos are brief instructions or comments that the Pentagon leader dictated to his underlings as the war unfolded.
Together, the interviews and the Rumsfeld memos reveal a secret, unvarnished history of the conflict and offer new insights into how three presidential administrations have failed for nearly two decades to deliver on their promises to end the war…
Inserted from <Washington Post>
Scroll down almost to the bottom of the page for text of 611 documents.
Here’s the video.
Exclusive: A secret history of the war in Afghanistan, revealed
Finally, we need to examine earlier history to understand this better.
Let me be clear that Barack Obama was wrong to continue the war, which I said several times at that time. In addition, he was wrong not to challenge the lies of the GW Bush Regime about Afghanistan. But this war is a product of the Republican Party. In the 1980s the CIA under the Ronald Reagan administration created Al Qaeda by funding and arming Osama Bin Laden and other Wahhabi terrorists to commit terrorist acts against the Russian troops occupying Afghanistan. Without this Republican Terrorism, 9/11, the war in Afghanistan, the war in Iraq, and ISIL would never have happened.
Finally, please keep the Post article as a resource. It’s the best source I’ve seen.
RESIST!!
8 Responses to “Afghanistan: 18 Years of Lies”
Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.
This is so overwhelmingly sad.
I w/read the rest later this afternoon.
Good WP video too.
Thx, Tom for post & information re: this.
There are certain places in the world which, for different reasons, which can only be discovered through knowledge of centuries of their history, function as sinkholes for any nation waging war there, whatever the motives. Afghanistan is one. Vietnam was another. If you look at how long France was in Vietnam, you what happened during that period, you may conclude we dodged a bullet to get out at all (and we never should have gone in.) Afghanistan – that goes back even longer. Probably pre-Mohammed. A mountainous terrain is both physically difficult to navigate if you weren’t born to it … and psychologically difficult to navigate if you weren’t born to it (tink of all the stereotypes about hillbillies – mostly unfair – but they do describe people who are fiercely independent.)
We should never have been there. If we wanted to take revenge on those responsible for 9/11, we should have attacked Saudi Arabia. And we knew it then. Going into Afghanistan was merely a gesture to appease geographically ignorant Americans.
OK, rant over. For now.
“…and get on our knees, and pray we don’t get fooled agin!”
St. Reagan is responsible for soooooo much of the tragedy of our times!
The WaPo article is a master-class in journalism as it should be practiced.
But disappointed (and surprised) the YT video has no CC.
The Russians pulling out after a disastrous nine-year war should have been enough to warn America not to go in but it only made the US cocky in thinking they would, of course, do so much better. Just like it would do so much better in Vietnam after the French left; bring democracy to Irak after freeing it from Sadam and rid the world of the Da’esh if it interfered in Syria and allied with the Kurds…
There is a pattern here. After their success in ending WWII with the help of Canada, the UK, Australia, Russia, Poland and many others I forgot, America stood in the firm belief that whatever conflict in the world they entered, that conflict would be resolved. However, the real pattern here is that both the old-world and the new-world imperialists don’t seem to learn from earlier mistakes. And that is why America will “set straight” countries like Iran and North Korea and invade them when it is politically opportune, and why its will join in happily.
I expect your reference is to the US’s current relations – or lack thereof – with North Korea. But it did remind me that the Korean War of the fifties was a “UN Peacekeeping Mission,” not a war we started on our own initiative. But I fear that very fact went to our heads.
Great article and video, TC.
Have to agree with others that we should of never stepped foot over there.
To think that it has been going on for 18 years is despicable.
I question why are we still over there??? All the lives loss and still facing danger.
Not speaking of all of the money wasted and still being spent. It’s insane.
Wish it would end. And I do mean in a peaceful way.
Thanks and pooped hugs to all.