That’s the text of a banner held by a group of Norwegians, gathered in Oslo, as President Barack Obama was making his acceptance speech, being the latest laureate of the Nobel Peace Prize.

Mr. Obama’s speech was twice as long as his inaugural address. He spoke at length about the circumstances that push nations to war and those that prompt them to seek peace.

He also admitted that the controversy surrounding the award is due in part to: “…this is because I am at the beginning, and not the end, of my labors on the world stage.”

The Nobel Committee, in announcing its choice for the 2009 Peace Prize, cited Barack Obama’s efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation.  It also said he has captured the imagination of the world with his message of hope.

Public opinion polls in the United States indicate that many Americans believe the honor has come far too soon.

Technorati Tags: Nobel Peace Prize, obama, Oslo, speech, war

While everybody is awaiting President Obama’s Tuesday evening speech on Afghanistan strategy to be broadcast out of the United Military Academy at West Point, we are still awaiting some definition of what it is that we are trying to achieve there. To the best of our knowledge nobody has defined either the Iraqi, nor the Afghan war’s mission objectives – not Bush and not Obama.

At least, the president is reportedly going to address his planned exit strategy. That’s better than nothing, but are we waiting for a few more ministers of the Karzai government to be indicted for corruption, before we withdraw the troops which – at a cost of $1 million per year, per soldier – are propping up his regime?

The mission objectives should of course be the absolute first thing to be addressed and that’s why we have decided to re-post this article, originally published here on November 3, 2009.

Since the original article was posted there have been some overtures by the Karzai government to engage “moderate elements” of the Taliban, so we stand corrected on that point.

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While the Obama administration ponders whether to send tens of thousands of additional U.S. troops to Afghanistan, as General Stanley McChrystal proposed and as everybody is trying to figure out what impact the Afghan run-off election, which has never taken place will have on the overall situation there, we still haven’t really figured out what it is that we are trying to achieve there.

“A foreign army alone cannot beat an insurgency; the insurgency in Afghanistan requires an Afghan solution,” wrote General McChrystal. In view of that probably sound assessment, why would we need an additional 40,000 U.S. troops?

Lets first of all decide what is it that we are trying to achieve in Afghanistan. Is it hunting down the remains of al-Qaida and maybe finally catching up with Osama bin-Laden? Or maybe something that sells in Washington, DC, but it doesn’t sell in Afghanistan – a stable Karzai government? Or maybe we are trying to defeat the resurgent Taliban? Or are we trying to transform the Afghan society? Are we including Pakistan in our grand plan?

Speaking of the Taliban, we haven’t heard any proposals to include this group in possible talks about forming a coalition government. No doubt that this omission is a really big mistake.

As things stand, eight years into an occupation of Afghanistan even the military are saying that we have not achieved anything, but that the situation on the ground has in fact deteriorated. What in fact appears to be the main problem is not the remains of al-Qaida, or the Taliban itself, or even the rampant corruption among the ruling clique, but rather the militarization of the Afghan conflict.

The military “solution” is obviously not working in an environment as complex as the one in Afghanistan and Pakistan for that matter.

One cannot expect the average U.S. serviceman to understand the very complicated tribal, ethnic, or language problems of the country he, or she has been shipped to.

The actual solution to the problem staring us in the eye appears to be getting the foreigners out of Afghanistan, rather than increasing their number.

When in 2001-2003 troops were truly needed in Afghanistan, they got diverted to the insane invasion and occupation of Iraq.

To make a long story short: we don’t even know what problem, or problems that we are trying to solve in Afghanistan are and we are still talking about changing our military strategy and increasing the number of troops. What are those troops supposed to do there? What do we expect from them? What is their mission? Nobody seems to have an answer to any of these questions.

Our advice to the White House team is to first come up with a mission statement, to nail down what it is that we are trying to achieve in Afghanistan and whether getting involved in that country is really in the U.S., or the world’s interest.

Throwing more troops into the Afghan quagmire, without even having a clear objective is clearly not the way to proceed.

Technorati Tags: Afghan, al-qaida, election, mission, obama, objectives, Pakistan, politics, Taliban, war

While perusing some other parts of the blogosphere, we have encountered some fresh postings challenging readers to come up with things that George W. Bush did wrong. Therefore it appears advisable to re-post this article, which originally has run here on October 1, 2008.

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Lets add up the very dubious “achievements” of the last eight years.

First: The stolen election of 2000, which started it all.

Second: The attacks of September 11, 2001.

Third: The approval of the Patriot Act and its effects on our democratic system, including the creation of the all-encompassing Department of Homeland Security, illegal wiretapping and domestic spying, the firing of U.S. Attorneys, Dick Cheney’s Energy Task Force, creation of a police state and an atmosphere of overall paranoia and so forth, and so on.

Fourth: The push towards the invasion of Iraq, along with totally untrue “justifications”, such as the presence of weapons of mass destruction, al-Qaida being centered in Iraq and the “urgent” need to depose Saddam, etc, etc.

Fifth: The inept and I mean INEPT attempts at nation building, which of course – besides the actual conquest of Iraq – have caused the longest-lasting war in U.S. history and have cost the lives of approximately one million men, women and children and over 4,000 American soldiers, with tens of thousands of young men and women being crippled for life.

Sixth: The total monetary cost of this artificially created conflict is estimated to be in the trillions of dollars and counting. Making certain specific, but often not even specified corporations very, very rich in the process – with U.S. taxpayer’s money, of course.

Seventh: Causing the United States to slide from a position of a beacon of freedom to most of the world, to a universally despised entity, which allows and in fact employs torture, extraordinary rendition, secret prisons and all kinds of nasty methods, formerly the domain of the most unsavory of regimes.

Eight: The deregulation of all kinds of industries, including the airlines and of course, the financial (read: debt repackaging mills) sector.

Ninth: The creation of the largest national debt and government deficit in the history of the known world. As a matter of fact, the debt clock on Wall Street – which has been switched off during the Clinton administration, because it wasn’t needed – was turned off again, this time, because they run out of digits….Yes, folks. Our national debt now totals some $56 trillion. That’s about $480,000 for every household in the U.S.  Isn’t it amazing that we had a surplus under the philanderer Clinton and a totally crippling debt under the teetotaler Bush?

Tenth: Becoming an economic cripple, with foreign creditors holding huge chunks of whatever real wealth remains in the U.S.

Eleventh: Not producing very much of anything any longer, allowing other countries to take the technological lead in many areas, allowing our infrastructure to crumble (besides the anti-terrorist barriers in front of government buildings), having an educational system that continues to produce illiterate adults, who often have no idea what lies beyond the borders of their counties and spend an incredible amount of time watching the moronic offerings of the television industry. And lets not forget the government’s peerless performance during and after Hurricane Katrina.

Twelfth: And this is the crowning, but not surprising touch of the last eight years: The seeming collapse of the debt repackaging mills, which George W. Bush had the gall to call “our financial system” and of course, another super urgent call to bail it out at a cost of another $700 billion, to a trillion dollars of taxpayer’s money. This, after bailing out Bear Stearns, Fannie May, Freddie Mack, AIG and others.

I will leave the 13^th point out of this discussion, as we all fervently hope that it won’t be needed and that point number 12 is the last serious point of damage that the present occupant of the White House and his corporate masters will cause to all of us.

In closing, allow me to congratulate all of those who have re-elected Bush in 2004!

Technorati Tags: 9/11, afghanistan, bush, damage, iraq, neocons, patriot act, torture, war

Matthew Hoh, a former Marine captain and lately a Foreign Service official in Afghanistan has decided to resign in protest over the Afghan war, which he believes simply fuels the insurgency.

“I have lost understanding of and confidence in the strategic purposes of the United States’ presence in Afghanistan,” wrote Hoh. “I have doubts and reservations about our current strategy and planned future strategy, but my resignation is based not upon how we are pursuing this war, but why and to what end.”

Hoh also wrote that many Afghans are fighting the United States largely because its troops are there – a growing military presence in villages and valleys where outsiders, including other Afghans, are not welcome and where the corrupt, U.S.-backed national government is rejected.

In 2006 Matthew Hoh was called up to active duty from the reserves to serve in Iraq. He commanded a Marine company in Anbar province. In 2008 he rejoined the Foreign Service and went to Afghanistan’s Zabul Province, on the border with Pakistan.

Soon after the August 20, 2009 presidential elections Hoh became so seriously disenchanted that he wrote: “multiple, seemingly infinite, local groups, “[the insurgency] is fed by what is perceived by the Pashtun people as a continued and sustained assault, going back centuries, on Pashtun land, culture, traditions and religion by internal and external enemies. The U.S. and NATO presence in Pashtun valleys and villages, as well as Afghan army and police units that are led and composed of non-Pashtun soldiers and police, provide an occupation force against which the insurgency is justified.”

Although we generally agree with Matthew Hoh’s assessment of the situation and his decision, there probably isn’t much that we can add to this.

Technorati Tags: Afghan, Diplomat, Matthew Hoh, Over, Resigns, US, war

We were curious which video was the most popular on YouTube on World Food Day, when at least a billion people in the world are permanently hungry, when the swine flu epidemic is spreading, when several wars are raging around the globe.

As it turns out, the most watched was a surveillance camera video of a really drunk dipshit, trying to buy still more beer, entitled Drunkest Guy Ever Goes for More Beer Video. Good to know where our preferences truly lie…

Technorati Tags: drunk, hunger, stupid, video, war, world problems, youtube