Afghan future threatened by ex-warlords in gov't

[laststeamtrain]

Source: AP

Afghan future threatened by ex-warlords in gov't

By TODD PITMAN (AP) – 43 minutes ago

KABUL — Warlords helped drive the Russians from Afghanistan, then shelled Kabul into ruins in a bloody civil war after the Soviets left. Now they are back in positions of power, in part because the U.S. relied on them in 2001 to help oust the Taliban after the Sept. 11 attacks.

President Hamid Karzai later reached out to them to shore up his own power base as America turned its attention to Iraq after the Taliban's rout.

With the Taliban resurging, the entrenched power of the warlords is complicating Karzai's promises to rid his new government of corruption and cronies, steps seen as critical to building support among Afghans against the insurgents.

"You can't build a new political system with old politicians accused of war crimes," said lawmaker Ramazan Bashardost, who finished third in the country's fraud-marred August election. "You can't have peace with warlords in control."

Read more: http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jdV5OHzHWb7EK80DZWzhsnEtdkfgD9BTJKPG1

[JohnyCanuck]

1. A fomer, senior British diplomat has been speaking out about this for a while

Here is snip from an article he wrote in 2007 which was published in The Daily Mail:

Britain is protecting the biggest heroin crop of all time
by Craig Murray (former British Ambassador to Uzbekistan)

snip

Our economic achievement in Afghanistan goes well beyond the simple production of raw opium. In fact Afghanistan no longer exports much raw opium at all. It has succeeded in what our international aid efforts urge every developing country to do. Afghanistan has gone into manufacturing and 'value-added' operations.

It now exports not opium, but heroin. Opium is converted into heroin on an industrial scale, not in kitchens but in factories. Millions of gallons of the chemicals needed for this process are shipped into Afghanistan by tanker. The tankers and bulk opium lorries on the way to the factories share the roads, improved by American aid, with Nato troops.

How can this have happened, and on this scale? The answer is simple. The four largest players in the heroin business are all senior members of the Afghan government, the government that our soldiers are fighting and dying to protect.

When we attacked Afghanistan, America bombed from the air while the CIA paid, armed and equipped the dispirited warlord drug barons, especially those grouped in the Northern Alliance, to do the ground occupation. We bombed the Taliban and their allies into submission, while the warlords moved in to claim the spoils. Then we made them ministers.

President Karzai is a good man. He has never had an opponent killed, which may not sound like much but is highly unusual in this region and possibly unique in an Afghan leader. But nobody really believes he is running the country. He asked America to stop its recent bombing campaign in the south because it was leading to an increase in support for the Taliban. The United States simply ignored him. Above all, he has no control at all over the warlords among his ministers and governors, each of whom runs his own kingdom and whose primary concern is self-enrichment through heroin.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-469983/Britain-protecting-biggest-heroin-crop-time.html#ixzz0WbAj8HUO

[bertman]

2. You'll never get the warlords out of the gov't. They ARE the gov't. This is just one more

item added to a list that President Obama can use for saying "we're making progress, so I'm going to send xxx thousand more troops." They're always trying to set it up as a war we can win IF WE JUST A. could get Pakistan to cooperate

B. could get Karzai to have a fair election

C. could get the warlords out of the gov't

D. could get more troops to fight the Taliban

E. could get more money for better armor and weapons

F. could get blah blah blah

Just get OUT NOW!!!

We are killing and maiming innocent Afghans and Americans. And it's all for the WAR PROFITEERS.

[Doctor_J]

3. EX warlords?

tee-hee