Originally published at http://www.commondreams.org/views/2021/04/18/us-did-not-bring-peace-democracy-or-freedom-afghanistan
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“We did not bring peace, democracy, or freedom. Afghanistan’s elections were flagrantly fraudulent. We did not improve the lives of the Afghan people. The necessities of life are in short supply—water, electricity, healthcare, education. And there are no jobs other than the opium trade, which supplies 90% of the world’s opium—a big contributor to the opioid epidemic.”
Hell, we didn’t even bring McDonald’s. Total failure.
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We did not bring peace, democracy, or freedom.
But that was not the purpose.
We brought profits to Raytheon, Haliburton, and all of the other political supporters.
THAT was the purpose.
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And we got to test their toys and such…
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The US Did Not Bring Peace, Democracy, or Freedom to Afghanistan
Or Vietnam, Yemen, Iraq, and most other places we’ve sent in our military since WWII
You’d have to conclude that Peace and Democracy are not the goals or our Imperial War Machine
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“Their toys” that eventually end up with our local Police departments
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We brought murder and destruction.
Peace is just another word for an existence without hate.
And guns.
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This the core of the issue. Too many still hide behind those words as justification for the war on Afghanistan. This gives them a sort of cover under the guise of “well we had good intentions and it just did not work out”
What the people have to understand and especially those who would join the US Military is that this is NEVER the purpose of the US Government. It is always about access to resources or the strategy of containing any rivals that may challenge the US for world power.
People that pay attention to history and understand why past wars fought have to know this. People that decide to join the US Military must deep down know this. Consequently these mea culpas after the fact accomplish nothing but creating the delusion there was a “good reason”. These ongoing wars go on and on for that very reason as Buffy Ste Marie articulated in “Universal Soldier”.
No one was drafted into the US Military. They all volunteered to do this. If they do not understand what they are volunteering for then that in and of itself a crime.
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Imagine how different world history would have been had that clever Zbigniew Brzezinski person not meddled in Afghanistan and not provoked the Soviets to invade back during the Carter administration.
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“peace, democracy, or freedom” are NOT the reasons they are there for
I certainly understand that folks think we wasted 20 years trying to install democracy in Afghanistan but the goal was to deny Al Quada a base for terror attacks which they will have again in September. There’s no good solution but there is also no question that it’s past time to leave.
I endured listening to Bill Maher this Friday talking about how the USA doesn’t always have to be the world’s policeman, and that leaving the Afghans to fend for themselves may be too bad for them, but it isn’t the job of the USA to spread its benevolence around the world.
This guy hasn’t changed his tune one bit since September, 2001. He’s either wilfully blind to events, or he’s so heavily propagandised that the can’t recognise an empire when he sees one.
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That was not the goal. That is the swill they sold you. This was reported on extensively albeit not in the US mainstream media.
Representatives of the Afghan Government prior to 9/11 had been invited to the USA to discuss a pipeline being built through their Country to ship natural gas from the various stans down through Pakistan. They indicated they would refuse to allow it.
A newspaper in India published an article PRIOR to 9/11 that the USA was going to invade Afghanistan and remove its government.
There were no “terrorist training bases” in Afghanistan. The Government of Afghanistan offered to turn Osama Bin Laden over if the US offered proof of his involvement in 9/11.
~https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2001/11/afgh-n20.html
Your Government lies and they lie all the time. It is why your nation has been at war for 92 percent of its history.
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As Kyle Kulinski often says on his show, foreign terrorists against the US don’t need Afghanistan, most of the 9/11 planning was in Hamburg (and even in the US itself - you must know some of the crazy flight school stories).
The fight them over there so we don’t have to fight them over here is a bullshit argument that I’m surprised you fell for given you think we should leave anyway. I encourage you to think a little further on your logic.
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If we remember the mission of those on the USS Enterprise in Star Trek, it was for the crew to never interfere in the society of any other lifeforms they encountered in their explorations.
This so-called Democratic government we have in this country could learn a thing or two by watching that series.
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Bill’s a good Democrat.
Well, Bill’s a Democrat.
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The American version of Peace, freedom and Democracy can only be understood if one reads George Orwell’s 1984.
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I agree with you for the most part.
But I disagree that no one was drafted except that it is technically true.
The US economy is structured so that there was and is a real ECONOMIC draft.
Many feel that their only hope out of poverty and the poor economic state of most rural areas is to join the military - an idea that is heavily sold by the US government. There are better ways, but with the poor state of education in this country many feel that the military is their only choice.
It was no accident that Betsy DeVos was chosen for education secretary so that she could further dismantle public education to provide more cannon fodder for her brother Erik Prince and his merry band of mercenaries.
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Right you are Phred. Economic expansion through Weapons Proliferation is the untold truth behind this 240 year old experiment in Empirical Rule.
Playing numerous sides in a conflict is just an added bonus for the scoundrels that we keep in Washington DC.
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Empirical?
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