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The real reason we’re fighting a war in Afghanistan

Calum Logan

by Calum Logan

05 Jul 05:40am

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Filed under: Afghanistan, Military, Politics, Religion, Security, Terrorism

56 comments

The recent discussion of the Afghan deployment focus on the loss of more, young Australian lives as part of a mission which is not understood. It is a tragic loss, yet fundamental re-appraisal of western aims in Afghanistan seems highly unlikely.

Why are we really there? Picture: AP

The western presence in Afghanistan is not simply a lost decade of US led Osama hunting, nor is it merely a 30 year hangover from Cold War conflict. The Western presence in Afghanistan is part of a larger mission that has dragged on for hundreds of years.

The common acceptance of the logic that underpins both sides of the public debate about Afghanistan, illustrates that this mission is so acceptable to western polities that its existence is taken for granted and passes largely unremarked.

Those who would urge greater efforts believe that ultimately Afghanistan can be tamed and brought into the orbit of western civilisation in some shape or form.

Those who argue for an end to Australian involvement point mainly to the steady evaporation of purpose, concentration and progress. There is no sophisticated interrogation of the initial motivation for intervention in Afghanistan.

An alternative perspective could put the war in a very different light. The idea that the west has the privilege, obligation and means to bring justice, enlightenment and civilisation to the world was common currency well before September 11.

Western powers have been trying to create a modern, rational world, by military means when necessary, since Europe consolidated the Enlightenment into a political package and Napoleon rolled on Egypt.

Over the hundreds of years the sentiments, the speeches, the rationales have been continuously re-arranged and re-iterated in order to keep the civilising mission current.  Scratching beneath the surface reveals the same old sentiments: safety at home is assured by security abroad; presence is critical, we must fight there rather than in our own back yards.

Britain’s colonial excursions into Afghanistan were motivated by the fear of a Russian presence in central Asia that would threaten British India and by implication Britain itself.

Just as a Russian presence in Afghanistan was guaranteed by British absence then, today western powers must be on scene lest an ambiguous security threat labelled al Qaida, or the Taliban threaten security in western metropoles.

That earlier western policies and interventions in this region played a central role in creating these same entities confronted today cannot be seriously considered, less still the possible future implications of the military capabilities western powers are currently training in the region. 

Likewise the impetus violent western occupation of these regions gives to terrorist responses cannot be considered. Often “home grown” in western polities, radicalisation serves only to provide a rationale for both continued presence in Afghanistan and an further erosion of civil liberties at home.

The logic of the mission civilisatrice demands that we must make these people, about whom we know next to nothing, conform to our ideas of democracy and our models of society, so that we can be safe. We cannot see, let alone question the recursive thinking and the sense of entitlement that has brought us this far.

For Australians, as the mission drags on, it is increasingly clear that the deployment to Afghanistan is the price of the alliance with the US, the bedrock of Australia’s foreign policy. For a security “guarantee” that is hard to qualify and has little to do with Afghanistan, Afghan civilians, Australian soldiers and their families must pay in suffering.

The callous decision to suspend refugee claims from this ongoing conflict is but another indicator that Australia has no interest in Afghan welfare. Rather Afghanistan is reworking of the colonial conceptualisation of space that deems it right, acceptable and necessary that unpleasant things take place in far away places so that a certain lifestyle can be aspired to at home.

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56 comments

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    • Eric says:

      06:17am | 05/07/10

      And what is wrong with that? Some places need civilising.

      Furthermore, al-Qaeda and its ilk are motivated not by Western intervention, but by Islamist expansionism. Better a liberal democracy than a fundamentalist caliphate, whether here, there or anywhere.

      In an us-and-them world, I’m with us.

      Reply

    • Markus says:

      09:24am | 05/07/10

      This.
      Hizb ut-Tahrir are currently touring this country saying Islam should never accept democracy, and any muslims in Australia that have embraced the Australian way of life are traitors and scum.
      Al Qaeda follow the same message, but back it up with attacks on civilian populations.
      Islamic Extremism of this nature is not going to go away through tolerance and understanding.

    • DD Ball says:

      07:19am | 05/07/10

      I heard Smith on channel 10’s Meet the Press say that we weren’t in Afghanistan to change things. We weren’t there to secure democracy and improve the lives of individuals. It sounded to me like he was aiming low and not expecting success. It reminded me of why the socceroos lost 4 - 0 to Germany .. playing defensively instead of towards strengths. If our troops are not over the re to do anything, please stop putting them in harms way.

      Reply

    • Tedd says:

      08:08am | 05/07/10

      The Princess Royal Fortress in Albany, Western Australia - Stephen Smith’s home state - is the “series of forts constructed around the coast to defend against invasion by the Russians or French at the end of the 1800s” - specifically after Russia [first] invaded Afghanistan about 1885, as describe on one inscription at that site.

      See the brief entry for Princess Royal Fortress here

      http://www.albanygateway.com.au/what-to-do/museums-and-historic-places.html

    • John A Neve says:

      07:25am | 05/07/10

      Calum,
      Has used a lot of words to say simply, the West has stuffed up!!  More importantly, he points out that most people do not understand the real reason for us being in Afghanistan.
      It used to be called Imperialistic Fear,  politicians use it to convince the people that “we are best”, when of course we are not. It is all part of that great scourge called Nationalism. It’s only good point, if there is one, is that it keeps millions employed in armaments factories, puts money into the pockets of big business and gives pollies an excuse to strut the world’s stage.

      If the money spent in Afghanistan had been spent on health, we’d have the best health service in the world, just think on that.

      Reply

    • Wink says:

      08:05am | 05/07/10

      If the money spent in Afghanistan had been spent on health and welfare IN AFGHANISTAN, we’d have won the population over so fast you wouldnt believe it - but no, its preferable to kill them to convince them of our noble intentions. der.

      Reply

    • Robert Smissen Rural SA says:

      05:59pm | 05/07/10

      Sorry Wink, it wouldn’t work, as much as it sounds like a good idea, the health workers would be rounded up & shot, as they have been in the past because it destroys the anti west propoganda of the extremists

       

       


      sorry wink

    • Eric says:

      08:14am | 05/07/10

      “If the money spent in Afghanistan had been spent on health, we’d have the best health service in the world, just think on that. “

      I’ve thought on that, and it’s so ignorant it just isn’t funny.

      Australia’s total military budget is about one quarter of our total health budget. The money spent in Afghanistan is just a tiny portion of our military budget (only 2,000 of our 40,000 soldiers are there).\

      So spending that money on health would make no significant difference at all.

      If only you took the trouble to learn about the things you talk about, you migtht make more sense.

      Reply

    • Dino says:

      09:14am | 05/07/10

      Eric, this might be obvious, but I think Wink was referring to ALL the money spent on the war in Afghanistan. The US have spent over US$280 Billion over there (source: http://costofwar.com/). A tenth of this money could have made a huge dent in humanitarian efforts. Just saying.

    • T.Chong says:

      09:24am | 05/07/10

      We are in Afghanistan, purely to serve the interests of US colonialism.
      We all know 9/11 was perpetrated by mostly well educated Saudis, (cant recall any Afghans being amongst the hijackers), but the US could not do anything to Saudi Arabia, so it decided to attack Afghanistan , just to show those damn Muslims that no one messes with the US.
      The western alliance uses the term “Talibaan” to descibe any and everyone who opposes the invasion and occupation.
      If Australia was invaded, even for our own good (like we tell the Afghans), by an Islamic Coalition, wouldnt we all see ourselves fighting for our country?
      Who here would willingly become a quisling for an occupier?
      Why do we expect the Pushtan and other tribes to act any different, since they were invaded and occupied?

    • John A Neve says:

      09:30am | 05/07/10

      Eric,
      Just think about what you have posted, it matters not what the relationship is between the amount spent in Afghanistan and the amount spent on health.
      If “one quarter of our total health budget” extra was spent on health would we not be better off?
      Come on Eric, try taking a deep breath.

    • Steve Smith says:

      09:35am | 05/07/10

      Great to hear Eric, can you point us in the direction of these figures?

    • Soames says:

      12:02pm | 05/07/10

      T.Chong says,
      “but the US could not do anything to Saudi Arabia, so it decided to attack Afghanistan”

      The US and UK, under Bush and Blair respectively, attacked Iraq, after 9/11, not Afganistan, on the false assumption of WMD.

    • Nathan says:

      02:50pm | 05/07/10

      The problem with the current wars, Being either Afghanistan or Iraq is that we are not in them to win them. in Iraq, the coalition troops conquoted the Iraqi forces but when it got to the crunch with the insurgents, the commanders pussy footed around for too long. Same thing is happening in Afghanistan.

      Its time to sit down and evaluate if there is a job to do, if there is, well give them all the manpower required to do the job. Lets stop pussy footing around talking about exit strategies and troop withdrawals, lets get them all in there, overwhelm and kill the enemy and then leave when the job is done.

    • no war says:

      09:22am | 05/07/10

      “The real reason we’re fighting a war in Afghanistan”

      what i get from the article, is that there is NO ( good )  reason. If thats right, then i totally agree, and have been saying so since we illegally and immorally invaded.

      I like how some say that the cost ( in dollars ) is small, shouting ignorance, while ignoring the human cost of innocent lives lost, lives displaced, the cost of resettlement, and how all that is insignificant.  it just isnt funny.

      this war and those who partake in it, do not have my support.

      Reply

    • wink says:

      09:24am | 05/07/10

      dear eric i was referring to the west, ie the yanks, not just us. their reprehensible orwellian “continual peace thru continual war” approach to the third world should have been exposed a long time ago for what it is: the profiteering of their military industrial complex (hello dick cheney and halliburton) that has no interest in seeing the use of peaceful solutions… so i stand by my der.

      Reply

    • Markus says:

      10:35am | 05/07/10

      So your argument is if the world’s largest economy decided to give Australia a large portion of their military budget to invest in our health system, we would have a strong health system?
      Some groundbreaking discoveries there Wink…

    • Markus says:

      10:49am | 05/07/10

      Apologies Wink, I read John A Neve’s comment as yours.

      I still disagree that sending unarmed aid forces into a hostile country would have achieved anything besides a massacre by Taliban forces.

    • John A Neve says:

      12:06pm | 05/07/10

      Markus,
      Don’t blame me for your stuff-up, I have made no mention of America.
      So many of you fail to read what is written, you already have preconceived ideas, most of which are based on untruths.

    • Markus says:

      01:16pm | 05/07/10

      John,
      I already acknowledged that I mistakenly linked wink’s comment back to your original one and not wink’s, the only difference between the 2 comments being the addition of “in Afghanistan”.
      You’ve already backpedalled from your ridiculous statement of “best health service in the world” to “better off” so I wouldn’t be one to accuse others of preconceived ideas based on untruths.

    • John A Neve says:

      02:27pm | 05/07/10

      Markus,
      You are at it again, please point out where I have “backpedalled” or where I have used the term “better off”?
      Give that sweet sherry away Markus, it’s getting to you. Just stick to what I say, not what you think I say. It makes for better debate and you don’r end up looking a fool.

    • Markus says:

      04:41pm | 05/07/10

      John A Neve
      7:25am
      “If the money spent in Afghanistan had been spent on health, we’d have the best health service in the world”
      9:30am
      “If “one quarter of our total health budget” extra was spent on health would we not be BETTER OFF?”
      From ‘best in the world’ repealed to ‘better off’ in the space of 2 hours.

    • John A Neve says:

      06:52am | 06/07/10

      Markus,
      They way you take things out of context, you must be a budding wannabe pollie?
      What I wrote in two seperate posts in no way contradicts each other. But a good try on your part.

    • Sherekahn says:

      09:43am | 05/07/10

      When morals get in the way of logic then you have Afghanistan.
      Forget troops on the ground, just bomb the hell out of them from a distance!

      Logic says that if world population had stabilised in 1950, the West would not need to ‘secure’ oil supplies in the Middle-East.
      Al-Qaeda would not exist.  America would still be making wonderful musicals annoying no one.
      In 1950 isolationism should have been adopted by the West instead of greed, expansionism, economic Colonialism.
      Logic says that Stalin should have been exterminated.  Logic says that Mao Tse Tung should have been exterminated.
      The Atom bomb should have been used against any critters threatening “isolationism.”
      Action speaks louder than threats.

      Wow, that’s the past dealt with, now with more logic than morals, let’s deal with the future!

      Reply

    • nate says:

      12:12pm | 05/07/10

      Not that I agree with your “solutions with the past”, but as they say, hindsight’s 20/20. It’s so easy to look at history and proclaim what we could have done better.

      The challenge comes when we have a chance to learn from the past in order to make smarter decisions in the future. When you have the answer let me know

    • Jo says:

      09:46am | 05/07/10

      The West can’t force democracy on Afghanistan - the populace has to want it themselves. Only when they are ready will it work. However, while I don’t support the war itself, any action against proven terrorists with proven plans against the West should be the extent of any military action taken.

      Reply

    • Daniel says:

      10:14am | 05/07/10

      I think Howard was so obsessed with the USA he would have led Australia into a war with ourselves.

      Reply

    • Steve Putnam says:

      11:14am | 05/07/10

      The Taliban regime gave solace to al Qaida providing a base for its operations. As such it was a state that sponsored terrorism, which to my mind justified the invasion. The problem was when (according to CIA operatives inside Afghanistan) we were only weeks possibly days from capturing bin Laden, Cheney and Bush thought the war on terror would be a good smokescreen to steal Iraq’s 15.8% of the world’s known oil reserves.As a result we are fighting a needless two front war which has drained our resolve and that of our allies.

    • Tedd says:

      11:51am | 05/07/10

      It would be interesting to know what Howard’s response would have been if he hadn’t been in NY on That day - he was probably the only world leader there, as Bush was down South somewhere and stayed hiding out there for the rest of the day.  I remember footage of Johnnie and Janette being escorted off to some bunker in NY.  He looked pretty distressed.

    • 6c legs says:

      02:25pm | 05/07/10

      “Tedd”, Howard was in Washington DC - with a window view of the Pentagon (and hence the carnage). He may have been taken to NY later that morning, but he was not there when the Towers were hit and went down.

      (I told my sons that night: ” that the world as we knew it, just changed for us [the little plebs] forever”... but if nothing else 9/11 forced me to get educated on world history. )

    • Tedd says:

      05:44pm | 05/07/10

      Cheers, 6c legs - I knew he was in a target city, yet I should have checked.

      Yeah, we all thought the world had changed.  Would have changed less if they had had the courage to turn the other cheek, improving monitoring at home, and been more diplomatic.

    • Syd Walker says:

      11:06am | 05/07/10

      The 2001 invasion of Afghanistan was justified on the basis of the events of 9-11. There are compelling grounds for believing those events were a false flag operation.

      But even if Bin Laden had actually been responsible for planning 9-11 (something that never proved - and which he denied at the time), invading Afghanistan was not an acceptable or appropriate response. His arrest was a criminal matter; the then Afghanistan Government stated willingness to hand him over to appropriate judicial authorities - as long as some evidence of his guilt was provided. The response of the US Government (and allies) to this eminently reasonable request was to invade.

      Even if one draws a line after the illegal invasion in October 2001, the actions of the invading forces thenceforth were not likely or, it seems, ever really intended to provide the basis for a rapid exit of occupying forces. Eventually, the oppressive armed occupation gave rise to widespread resistance. That was entirely predictable.

      Whereas by 2001, with UN assistance, the Taliban Government had reduced opium production with remarkable success, after 2001 production climbed sharply and has remained high ever since. The occupying forces support some of he most notorious drug lords; it now seems clear that Russia is a major dumping ground for the excess of cheap heroin from the region.

      The invasion of Afghanistan was immoral, illegal, unwarranted and utterly ill-conceived. The notion that the Afghan people ‘need’ westerners to bring them civilization is grotesque.

      Countries such as Australia that have participated in this abomination of 21st century imperialism should withdraw their troops immediately and commit to paying substantial long-term reparations to the Afghan people.

      When ‘the west’ speaks of democracy, women’s rights and social justice in Afghanistan, it speaks with a forked toungue.

      The elected Government of Afghanistan in the late 1970s was left-wing, generally popular and had female participation. It was systematically undermined by the CIA and other western rogue agencies and forced to request Soviet assistance to withstand an assault from ‘Islamic fundamentalists’, trained and finded by the CIA & co! This history is no longer supposition; Zbigniew Brzezinski boasted how successful the strategy had been, in an interview several years ago.

      We who invaded Afghanistan are the ones who need civilizing. We certainly need an education. And we need to move forward in morality from the days when the UN was established - not slide ever further backwards into ‘might-is-right’ wickedness.

      Reply

    • Jon says:

      02:59pm | 05/07/10

      Syd Walker, I think we should have let the Soviet have Afghanistan, Zbigniew Brzezinski was helped by right wing Christians senators that funded the CIA to train the so-called ‘freedom fighters’ to get rid of those Russian Atheists. That was their holy war!

      However, I don’t buy with cultural relativism argument. Western Secular Society is still best model, not perfect but better than Islamic theocracy. Bush was born again Christian, so what we are doing in Afghanistan has nothing to do with promotion of the separation of mosque and state.

      The Islamic political agenda was alive and well in Saudi Arabia in the early 80, before 9/11 and the embassy bombing in Africa. The plan for Islamists was to reawaking Jihad, dominant in Islam since the rise of Western powers by using Petro dollars to fund groups around world. So pulling out won’t change anything although Pakistan could become a failed state with nuke’s. This is always a rock and hard place kind of debate.

    • Nafe says:

      03:00pm | 05/07/10

      Do you have proof of this 1970’s CIA involvement?

    • Eugene Bamtree says:

      11:37am | 05/07/10

      Did everyone see the story where they found millions or billions of dollars worth of resources in the Afghan soil?

      That’s a clue.

      Things aren’t always as they seem. Why did they put man on the moon in the 60’s? A publicity stunt. The real reason - to test ICBM’s.

      Reply

    • Eric says:

      11:56am | 05/07/10

      JAN, you still fail to make sense. First of all, I proved that your claim that “if the money spent in Afghanistan had been spent on health, we’d have the best health service in the world” was nonsense.

      Now you think spending the whole defence budget on health would improve the health system. Yes, it would, but then we would have no military, which in turn would inevitably lead to annexation by some greater power. Considering the fate of the Tibetans and the East Timorese, that would result in a huge decline in health.

      Steve Smith, the information you seek has been cleverly concealed by the Government on its Budget website. Go to http://www.budget.gov.au/2010-11/content/overview/html/index.htm and download the chartpack near the bottom of the page. Then find the chart called “G Where Tazpayers Money is Spent.jpg”. This will give you a general breakdown of all federal government spending.

      From it you will see that defence is less than ten per cent of Federal spending, and about one third of Federal spending on health alone. The chart, of course, doesn’t include state expenditures on health.

      Every Australian should be familiar with this simple chart - then nobody would make mistakes like John did.

      Reply

    • John A Neve says:

      12:11pm | 05/07/10

      Eric,
      Do you have trouble reading?
      Where have I mentioned spending the “whole defence budget on health”?
      Just try sticking to the truth and keep your half baked views to yourself.

    • Markus says:

      04:47pm | 05/07/10

      John A Neve
      Eric says:08:14am | 05/07/10
      “Australia’s total military budget is about one quarter of our total health budget”.
      John A Neve says:09:30am | 05/07/10
      ‘If “one quarter of our total health budget” extra was spent on health would we not be better off?’

      Unless you were referring to some completely non-military related “one quarter of our total health budget”?

    • Eric says:

      06:07pm | 05/07/10

      There you go telling porkies again, John.

      You said ‘If “one quarter of our total health budget” extra was spent on health would we not be better off?’ That was a clear reference to my statement that the total military budget for Australia is one quarter of the health budget.

      Anyone can read our posts above, and see that you are simply faking it.

    • John A Neve says:

      06:58am | 06/07/10

      Eric,
      Like Markus, all you have done is take comment out of context. I support your suggestion that, if interested people read my osts for themselves.
      I am sure they would come to the conclusion that you are a manipulator of the facts. But then we all know that from the content of your other posts.

    • Lee from WA says:

      12:15pm | 05/07/10

      Islamic jihadists are coming for us whether we like it or not. At least if we can keep the Taliban out of Afghanistan and Pakistan, they have one less place to train them.

      Reply

    • T.Chong says:

      02:22pm | 05/07/10

      Lee, which jihadists ? from where?
      How, exactly are jihadists going to control Australia ? An AK carrying insurgent on every street corner ?
      Extreme jihadists are not a unified force, have no overall stragic plan.
      These types of claims give rise to paranoia, and xenophobia, whether intended , or not.

    • Tedd says:

      02:51pm | 05/07/10

      what about the other 95%?

    • Lee from WA says:

      01:48am | 06/07/10

      @T Chong: Iran, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, Iran, Turkey, Indonesia, Malaysia, China, Pakistan, Eastern Europe, Northern Africa - you name it, there will be a small amount of people who will be willing to go and wage violent jihad against the West. You stop them from coming by denying them opportunities to be trained and to be financed. They are a united force when you give them space to get organized - look at al-Qaeda. It aspires to be a massive organization that co-ordinates violent jihad against the West. We evacuate Afghanistan, allowing a power vacuum to evolve, and we give them the space to train up people to wage war against us.

      Whether we like or not, they are coming for us. They aren’t coming to control but to destroy. If they get their way, they will establish a Islamic Caliphate across the Middle East that will then constantly wage war against anyone who doesn’t submit to the will of Allah.

      I don’t live in fear of Muslims because, like us, the vast majority want to live in peace and have normal lives. But those who don’t, they will use fear, intimidation and violence to impose their will on the Islamic world and they we will rue the day we pulled out of Afghanistan.

    • A Bob says:

      12:41pm | 05/07/10

      And there was me, thinking we were in Afghanistan to allow gay Afghani’s to marry!

      Reply

    • Ray Graham says:

      01:30pm | 05/07/10

      I agree that if the money involved had been spent on Health in Afghanistan or Austraslia it would heve been wiser spent.

      The fact is that by continuing our presence we are sacrificing our males ( all 16 deaths are male). This is a very distasteful topic,but if we are going to have a female PM maybe she needs to send females to the front to be killed in the name of equality. I said its distastefull and it is, but sometimes things need to be said.

      The young men are not expendable fodder, and should be unequivocly respected. I bleed every time I see these outcomes and shake my head at the emotion shed each time. Then we continue with more of the same. Expendable males, Centuries old mentality.. Please get out of Afghanistan. To stay there to honour those already lost is just committing more to the same fate. And for equality, one in all in (girls).

      Reply

    • Stewart Henstock says:

      03:43pm | 05/07/10

      We are over there because like the US we are in the ideas business.
      If they don’t like our way…our ideas…our western democracy ...we put a bullet in their head.
      Unless we are under direct attack the decision to go to war should be debated first in Parliament and not when the US clicks it’s fingers.
      You’re never going to win a war against IED’s.

      Reply

    • stephen says:

      03:56pm | 05/07/10

      Whenever i read the words ‘conceptualization of space’, or other some such new-media drivel, i turn off and hit the sack, so it’s good-night from me Calum.

      Reply

    • The Redman says:

      04:44pm | 05/07/10

      This is a bit of a bugbear of mine, I must say. Calum barely mentions Russia’s, or more correctly the USSR, history in Afghanistan, and one wonders if things would be different if the US did not intervene for it’s own political purposes.

      The USSR clearly saw the danger represented by the original Taliban, the mujahadeen. Instead of either staying out of it altogether or offering military support or at least publically supporting the suppression of muslim extremists (see the parallel here?), the US decided to actively arm and train the very muslim extremists that they fight today, including Osama bin Laden. It’s a supreme irony that the very RPG’s and surface to air missiles used against NATO troops today were very likely supplied by the good ‘ol US of A. And all because the US couldn’t stand the thought of another communist state bordering the USSR. Political expedience alone guiding their policies.

      What would the recent history be like if the US had engendered an arms embargo in Afghanista in the 1980’s, rather than arming the extremists to the teeth (and being paid in opium, I might add) and engineering the defeat of USSR forces? One can only speculate.

      And when the time came and the USSR was forced to withdraw, did the US officially intervene to ensure moderate Afghani’s, neither mujahadeen/Taliban nor communists where able to form a stable government? No, the US did not. The US ran a mile and allowed the very muslim exremists that they had armed and trained take over the country. And we all know the result of that, not least the Afghan people themselves.

      What to do about Afghanistan today? Well, the amateur military historian in me says that if the US and NATO dedicate D-Day like numbers of troops, aircraft and support, they can defeat the Taliban in a matter of months. If they can persuade the Russian’s to move in from the north, it’s a done deal. Then perhaps carve up the country ala Germany post WWII for a decade. It’s worked before, but does anyone have the political will to do this, and do the people have sufficient belief in the cause to allow a million soldiers to overrun Afghanistan? Because that is what it will take. Other than that, NATO can’t win.

      Reply

    • Jotun says:

      04:44pm | 05/07/10

      Mr Logan, thanks for confirming what everyone sort of suspected and never believes wholly. I wonder if Bush’s basic agenda was for a nice populist rise in the polls. In any case, it seems the only reason for invading Afghanistan now is to try and impose our political processes on unwilling allies, so as to assume control of the puppet strings in times of true conflict. Kabul’s a nice place to launch a war on the Chinese or North Koreans from, maybe?

      Reply

    • Brian B says:

      05:07pm | 05/07/10

      Thanks for the history lesson, Calum, but it does not solve the vexing problem of murderous religious extremists wanting to bring their stone aged ways to the Western world.

      You sound like a bright lad - come back when you find a solution.

      Reply

    • Robert Smissen Rural SA says:

      06:03pm | 05/07/10

      I had the priviledge to tutor a young Afghani boy of 15, he thinks Australia’s presence is such a good idea, he has chosen to learn Arabic to add to his English & Farsi so he can return as a Australian digger to wok as an inturpreter, has been here just 4 short years & thinks Oz is the greatest country on earth

      Reply

    • Ben says:

      09:16am | 06/07/10

      What a load of Rubbish,

      There is no legitimate reason to be fighting in Afghanistan, We are fighting a Bogus war on Terror, the likes of which will move to IRAN a country that has not declared war on anyone and a proxy war in Pakistan.

      Drugs and oil pipelines are the name of the game.. that is the reason were in Afghanistan.

      Question you should be asking is who is benefitting from all this.. 

      Iraq and Afghanistan, what a joke how many years now since the false flag at 9 / 11

      you all need to stop believing the constant feed of government crap and our troops need to come home.

      Reply

    • Frederick hegel says:

      01:19pm | 06/07/10

      It is a flux confusion between modernity and post-modernity which of course few people understand. Neither can ever make sense to the other because they apply different method’s in understanding all things. Modernity and unhealthy emphasis on the human mind alone to answer the deep questions of metaphysics and of morals fails near the end of the 17 th century and postmodernism is born. An unhealthy emphasis on the human mind in the area of non-reason the answer the same questions. The only end is a Christian revival or civil war as history has shown us. Politics can never affect the cultural authority of a country and it is this cultural authority that is the problem> Mostly not understood by anyone actually.

      Reply
 
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Daniel Piotrowski

drpiotrowski 24 May 13 11:38AM

@bjaxon1987 Excellent! thanks.

Daniel Piotrowski

drpiotrowski 24 May 13 11:21AM

Attention, attention. Can I call Caboolture "semi-rural"?

Paul Colgan

Colgo 24 May 13 11:20AM

@ShaneOliverAMP noted this week that one of the big post-GFC market patterns may be coming to an end http://t.co/xSYzBDezda

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What @joehildebrand said... http://t.co/lmP6gDQLEE

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