War » jad.Blog

We’re still at war, by the way. Does anyone know with who?

Oct 232010

The “Ground Zero Mosque” debate (which, by the way, has all but died as we approach election day) continues to have its effects seen in televised topical conversation, melted into a gigantic pot that contains general hatred of all Muslims and the heaviest ingredient – the world since 9/11.

The most recent blowup in this never ending discussion came from The View, where two of the hosts walked off the show in disgust after Bill O’Reilly of Fox News said “Muslims attacked us on 9/11″. Vague and generalizing, such a sentiment doesn’t do much of anything to advance discussion and peer into the why behind the why behind the why – a process typically called “understanding”. Such foreign concepts are usually a good idea to research if one would actually like to understand why a conflict is going on and, better yet, how to end it.

The discussion is nowhere near that. The discussion is a lot closer to the link above. There are well thought out rebuttals that make huge strides toward actually understanding the roots of conflict, but they’re typically left to obscurity – since reason and thought aren’t good for ratings. Still, thankfully it happens (skip ahead to about 2:45 for something of relevance):

Intelligence like this, sadly, winds up tossed to the wind of the discourse, as all the mature people stand on the sidelines – trying to live their lives – hoping the day will come when the windbags of fear and broad-based discrimination finally blow their selves out.

Spare the message, shoot the messenger

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Aug 022010

If the truth fell in a forest and nobody heard it, did it happen?

The closest thing that we are going to get to the Pentagon Papers incident of our generation, the leaking of over 90,000 documents by whistle-blowing site Wikileaks to three major news organizations around the world, has so far seemed to simultaneously caused a great deal of yawning, and a great deal of questioning of why the nearly decade-long war is allowed to continue with no real end in sight, nor any real final goal that will allow us to finally leave.

The yawning, surprisingly enough, comes from media outlets their selves who trotted out experts over the past week to address the content of the information that was leaked, and the near uniform response was along the lines of this was already known or there was nothing new added here: not addressing just how terrible that truth is, or bothering to repeat that truth one more time louder, just playing things off as this is the new business as normal, and off with life we go.

More depressing still (because the information contained within the leaked documents, “known” or not, is pretty depressing for the future war effort) is that the lead headline to evolve in the days since the leak is not the content of the leak, but how the information was leaked in the first place, and the efforts of the government to track down the source of the link and the leader of the Wikileaks site itself – letting the entire reality spelled out in plain black and white by the leaked documents to continue onward almost completely undisturbed.

The Truth-as-Reported burns down at the hands of Wikileaks

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Jul 252010

War for how much longer?

This is big. A “black eye” for how the war is being conducted, and what really is and is not being accomplished in Afghanistan doesn’t begin to come close to the 90,000 documents that Wikileaks has handed off to three major news organizations. The stories began to run tonight, and this will be an embarrassment to stretch across Presidential administrations.

Where do you even begin?

The war logs also detail:

• How a secret “black” unit of special forces hunts down Taliban leaders for “kill or capture” without trial.

• How the US covered up evidence that the Taliban have acquired deadly surface-to-air missiles.

• How the coalition is increasingly using deadly Reaper drones to hunt and kill Taliban targets by remote control from a base in Nevada.

• How the Taliban have caused growing carnage with a massive escalation of their roadside bombing campaign, which has killed more than 2,000 civilians to date.

As for defense of the administration, the White House comes out swinging at Wikileaks for releasing the information…

The White House also criticised the publication of the files by Wikileaks: “We strongly condemn the disclosure of classified information by individuals and organisations, which puts the lives of the US and partner service members at risk and threatens our national security. Wikileaks made no effort to contact the US government about these documents, which may contain information that endanger the lives of Americans, our partners, and local populations who co-operate with us.”

…though they would like you to know that a majority of this happened under the other guy’s watch…

In a statement, the White House said the chaotic picture painted by the logs was the result of “under-resourcing” under Obama’s predecessor, saying: “It is important to note that the time period reflected in the documents is January 2004 to December 2009.”

The forgotten war of the 21st century is about to become a lot less forgotten. It better, because if this isn’t enough to wake people up to the reality of the failed mission and the idea that troops don’t need to be dying there any longer, nothing will.

In the meantime, cheers to the light of truth, still being shone by those brave enough to do so.

Waterboaring-lite: It’s still torture

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May 222009

While noted conservative talking head Sean Hannity has failed to take up a challenge from noted liberal talking head Keith Olbermann to be waterboarded for charity, another conservative talking head – Erich “Mancow” Muller – stepped up to the plate and found out just what waterboarding feels like, admitting that it is – in fact – torture.

Funny thing about this, though, is that compared to how it is “really” done – Mancow went through what you could only really describe as Waterboarding-lite. Current.tv has a video of Waterboarding that is much closer to how it’s actually done (skip ahead to about 3:00 for the actual act):

Somehow, I fear, the right wing echo chamber will continue shouting on despite all of this – even if it’s done to each and every last one of them.

Israel v. Gaza, and those caught in the middle

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Jan 162009

Anything I wanted to write about the current conflict is blown away by the following.

The video is from Israel’s Channel 10. The man on the other end of this call is a doctor in Gaza who has called the station frequently to give reports from how things are going within Gaza – a bit of a ‘get’ since most media is not currently allowed in Gaza.

Shortly before this call began, the doctor’s house was hit by an Israeli tank shell, instantly killing his three children. What follows is the uncomfortable situation of people on one side of a conflict having to listen to and face the consequences of their country’s actions being vividly laid out before them on the other end of that phone call.

The most surreal moment for me watching this is wide-shot as the reporter is leaving the set, with what must be the main graphics for the war coverage, a smiling Israeli soldier.

Bits like this must make it hard to stay on message.

h/t (kos)

“Taking matters into our own hands”: U.S. attacks inside Syrian territory

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Oct 262008

From the “oh now what!?” files, via the BBC…

US helicopter-borne troops have carried out a raid inside Syria along the Iraqi border, killing eight people including a woman, Syrian authorities say.

The official Syrian news agency Sana said the raid took place in the Abu Kamal border area, in eastern Syria.

It said that American soldiers on four helicopters had stormed a building under construction on Sunday night.

Follow up:

If true, I can see this being explained as a needed cross-borer raid to go after high value targets, or something of that sort. Believable? You decide.

With the collapse of our financial system taking up most of the headlines it’s easy to get that the situation in Iraq has basically been fought to a stalemate on all sides: there’s little political progress between Sunni, Shia, and Kurd. Beyond political stalemates there is also a stalemate in the Middle East powder keg, which occasionally has a match tossed its way but has thankfully yet to light. Whether it be the Turks raiding northern Iraq (Kurdistan) or the Kurds hitting back, whether it be this seemingly new U.S./Iraq v. Syria “interaction”, whether it be Iranian allegations of allied backing of terrorists in their west or our allegations of backing of terrorists in Iraq’s east – or hell, the Saudis getting twitchy seeing Iran as the new, and rising, kid on the block… there’s a lot of explosive energy here just waiting for the next bad policy decision.

While the media may spin this as an opportunity for McCain – if it ever even gets discussed – let us not forget to mention to those on the fence that Mr. Obama’s foreign policy ideas will take us further away from the threat of regional war or stirring up hornet nests that are best left alone.

…and let us hope that we can get through the next nine days without one last epic international sendoff from the Bush/McCain/New American Century administration.

Update from MSNBC:

A U.S. military official said the raid by special forces targeted the foreign fighter network that travels through Syria into Iraq in an area where the Americans have been unable to shut it down because it was out of the military’s reach.

“We are taking matters into our own hands,” the official told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because of the political sensitivity of cross-border raids.

The attack came just days after the commander of U.S. forces in western Iraq said American troops were redoubling efforts to secure the Syrian border, which he called an “uncontrolled” gateway for fighters entering Iraq.

Oh. Just. Peachy.

Battle between Georgians, Russians continue

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Aug 092008

UPDATE: Georgia claims Russian jets targeted the important BTC Pipeline (the pipeline which is mentioned in this article) [per Reuters]

While the rest of the world is captivated with the Olympics in Beijing, Russia is playing for keeps on its southern border with the tiny nation of Georgia over the disputed South Ossetia region. Heading toward the third day of fighting, it is somewhat impressive that such a small country is picking a fight with such a vast neighbor. Russia isn’t unleashing all its might on Georgia but its forces just available in the region compared to what Georgia has as a nation pose a rather daunting challenge for the Georgians. Estimates of force strengths give Georgia 33,000 troops (though the country is calling up reservists), 287 tanks, and 82 aircraft. In the area and presumably ready to deploy, Russia has 100,000 troops, 620 tanks, and 320 aircraft – though 2 of those so far have been shot down by the Georgians.

Russia has escalated the conflict by hitting targets beyond the tiny South Ossetia region. The parcel of land being fought over is not that large: about 3,900 square km. By comparison, just off to Georgia’s northeast lies the formally disputed region of Chechnya, which covers 15,300 square km. That conflict showed that Russia is rather determined to hold on to every bit of land it can in the area, especially since the neighboring Caspian Sea holds the world’s 3rd largest oil and gas reserves.

That latter fact leads us into some deeper analysis of what may be going on here. Follow the jump, and click on the map.

War: Russia invades Georgia

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Aug 082008

In one of the world’s long simmering hot spots, the Caucus Mountains on Russia’s southern border, things have hit a boiling point today as the nation of Georgia attacked pro-Russia rebels in a break away region of the country known as South Ossetia. A fierce bombardment by the Georgian military on the rebels last night (our time) has been met with instant invasion by Russia, and a defacto state of war between the two countries.

Instead of the invasion causing hostilities to cease, the Russians and Georgians have been engaged in combat, reportedly, with varying reports on the number of troops killed.

4,000

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Mar 232008

Now official…

AP via MSNBC: BAGHDAD – A roadside bomb killed four U.S. soldiers in Baghdad on Sunday, the military said, pushing the overall American death toll in the five-year war to at least 4,000.

The grim milestone came on the same day that rockets and mortars pounded the U.S.-protected Green Zone, underscoring the fragile security situation and the resilience of both Sunni and Shiite extremist groups despite an overall lull in violence.

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