Turban bomb kills ex-Afghan president

[Contrary1]

MR. President...Please get the US out now. There is no "winning" anything here.

"KABUL, Afghanistan — A suicide bomber hiding explosives in his turban assassinated former Afghan President Burhanuddin Rabbani, who headed a government peace council trying to negotiate with Taliban insurgents. Four of Rabbani's bodyguards also died and a key presidential adviser was wounded in the attack at Rabbani's Kabul home Tuesday.

The attack dealt a harsh blow to efforts to bring peace in Afghanistan after a decade of war. Rabbani's death also came days after a daytime assault by insurgents on the U.S. Embassy and NATO headquarters in the capital, deepening a sense of insecurity in the country.

President Hamid Karzai cut short a visit to the U.S. and issued a statement condemning the killing. Rabbani's death was a "martyrdom" Karzai said, as he called on Afghans to remain unified in the face of the tragic death.

'His turban exploded'
Fazel Karim Aimaq, a former lawmaker from Kunduz province and a friend of Rabbani's, told reporters outside the former president's home that Rabbani had come back from a trip to Iran in order to meet with a man who had been described as a high-ranking Taliban contact. The visitor was shown into the house but not fully searched, Aimaq said. When Rabbani appeared, the man shook the former president's hand and bowed as a sign of respect, Aimaq said..."

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/44593185/ns/world_news-south_and_central_asia/

[CJvR]

1. Nice to see...

...the Jihadists using their heads for a change.

[joshcryer]

12. Heh, morbid, pretty fucked up... but I laughed.

Dark humor. :P

[FarCenter]

2. The US completely screwed up by putting Karzai the Pashtun in charge

We should have continued to support the Tajiks and other ethnic groups in the Northern Alliance after they defeated the Taliban.

The sooner the Tajiks kill Karzai, the better off we'll be.

[happyslug]

9. So the largest group would have no say in the Government?

That is what you are saying about leaving the Tajiks and the other ethnic groups in charge as opposed to a Pashtun.

While no nation wide census has been done since 1972, it is believe the Pashtuns are about 42-50% of the total population.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demography_of_Afghanistan

If we do NOT consider the Pashtun, you are disfranchising up to half the population. That by itself would lead to Civil War, for the Pashtun will want to have a say in the Government.

A bigger problems is the Tribes in Afghanistan are more "like Jelly-fish" for trees in a forest. From US Army Intelligence report on the tribes of Afghanistan:
http://publicintelligence.net/u-s-army-human-terrain-system-afghanistan-pashtun-tribal-analysis/

Basically the Pashtuns are not a Tribe in the sense of Iraq or other Middle Eastern Countries, but more like Native American Tribes, people who spoke the same langauge, traded with each other, intermarried, but at the same time would break up and form a new living arrangement if that is what a group wants to do and the rest of the tribe was to weak to stop them (and that is most of the time).

While the concept of tribe is weak, it still has some value to the members of that tribe and as such we have to deal with it. One problem is the problems of marginalization of the Pashtuns:
"http://www.rferl.org/content/feature/2250550.html

In simple terms, a Pastuns had to be picked, but the problem is we picked a western educated one, that was hopelessly corrupt. Thus I agree with you that Karzai has to go, but the problem then is who to replace him with? It will have to be another Pashtun, but Karzai has made sure no fellow Pashtun has stood out (other then one of his corrupt relatives, who we have to avoid). Karzai did this to force us to keep him as out best hope. We have to make the decision to replace Karzai, even if that means setting up the Taliban as the rulers of Afghanistan.

[FarCenter]

14. Just because the Pashtuns are a plurality, is no reason to put a Pashtun in charge

The problem is that the Taliban is pretty much synonymous with a major part of the Pashtun community, and many of the characteristics that we find objectionable in the Taliban are really characteristics of Pashtunwali. This makes the whole Pashtun community highly resistant to modernization and the establishment of a modern pluralistic democratic state.

It would have been much better to start with a leader from one of the other ethnic groups, which doesn't have the baggage of Pashtunwali.

Karzai was installed and Pashtun dominance over Afghanistan was reinstituted in order to placate the Pakistanis, who were loathe to loose the allegiance of their client, the Taliban, and their allegiance with the Pashtun (half of whom are in Pakistan) in order to create "strategic depth" in their conflict with India.

While we bought an alliance with the Pakistanis, this has not worked out well in the long run, and reestablishing Pashtun rule in Afghanistan has dashed any hopes for a successful conclusion of our efforts.

[BeyondGeography]

3. Sounds like a job for The Turbanator

[Contrary1]

4. This one's for you...

:spank:

[BeyondGeography]

5. He won't be back

OK, I'll stop.

[Name removed]

6. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[jberryhill]

7. World Stereotype League Announces Annual Awards

[bullwinkle428]

13. EXACTLY - the Freepers must be splooging themselves over this,

sick fucks that they are.

[arbusto_baboso]

8. Turban bomb? Was it purchased from Acme?

And did it come with a free boxing glove at the end of an extending spring?

[TwilightGardener]

10. Or jet-powered roller skates?

[happyslug]

11. Actually an ideal place for a bomb, right height for maximum blast affect.

A blast goes equally in all directions, thus up to half of the blast is lost if the bomb in on the ground (the Ground absorb the blast that hits the ground). Worse, with most ground blast, the ground acts as a block so most of the blast goes upward as oppose to side-ward. This reduces the full affect of the blast.

On the other hand, with a aerial burst (Such as from the turban) the lack of anything blocking the blast permits the blast over the maximum amount of area, causing the maximum amount of damage. Thus a turban bomb would be an ideal height to give a bomb the maximum destructive capability.

Remember the suicide bomber had already decided to die, so how the blast kills him is unimportant to the suicide bomber. On the other hand, the people who prepared the bomb would want the maximum blast affect, as would the suicide bomber, so a turban bomb would be ideal location for such a bomb.