How the U.S. Funds the Taliban

[babsbunny]

http://www.alternet.org/world/143898/how_the_u.s._funds_the_taliban_/

By Aram Roston, The Nation. Posted November 13, 2009.

The U.S. government is funding the very forces its troops are fighting -- funds that add up to a huge amount of money for the Taliban.

On October 29, 2001, while the Taliban's rule over Afghanistan was under assault, the regime's ambassador in Islamabad gave a chaotic press conference in front of several dozen reporters sitting on the grass. On the Taliban diplomat's right sat his interpreter, Ahmad Rateb Popal, a man with an imposing presence. Like the ambassador, Popal wore a black turban, and he had a huge bushy beard. He had a black patch over his right eye socket, a prosthetic left arm and a deformed right hand, the result of injuries from an explosives mishap during an old operation against the Soviets in Kabul.

[Taverner]

1. Karzai, Opium Smuggler, is on the CIA payroll, that's how

And how does said Opium get into the hands of Karzai's brother?

The Tal-EE-Ban!

[leveymg]

2. Recent Chinese saying, "To get rich is glorious." Same in Afghanistan. Spreading the American way,

one opium field at a time.

[lyonn]

3. Apparently we can't even buy our way out of Afghanistan

Paying the enemy for services rendered, transporting supplies to our troops, and yet they plant IED's where our troops get blown away?? on those same roadways? The Karzai govt. knows our moves, apparently, and can attack us accordingly. I want outa there....you can imagine how the troops feel.....

[Life Long Dem]

4. I'd let the President do his job.

You said yourself, The Karzai govt. can attack us accordingly.

[lyonn]

5. You talkin' a set-up?

Referring to Karzai knowing our moves. Possibly, but it only takes a few of them to kill many of ours and they are not dumb. Many of our troops are out there in no mans land, vulnerable.

I have very high hopes that Obama knows a hell of a lot more than I do, but, he also listen to those Generals. This is not a black or white situation, it's the grey area that concerns me. If anyone needed brilliant advisors it's Obama. With health care, the economy and these wars his burden is mind boggling.

[NightWatcher]

6. What about when we first knew them as "mujahideen"

We were their sponsors and paid, advanced, and armed them to act against the Soviets in Oil-ville to throw the Soviets out so that our oil companies could come in and lay a pipeline to get the oil to our streets after being refined by Shell, BP, and the such.