Archive for the ‘war’ Category
November 11, 2009
By Jordan Fabian, The Hill, Nov. 10, 2009
Former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev on Tuesday advised President Barack Obama to prepare to withdraw forces from Afghanistan, rather than adding more troops.
The USSR leader, who in 1986 began the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Afghanistan after a lengthy conflict there, said that adding more troops will be counterproductive.
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Tags:Afghanistan, Mikhail Gorbachev, more troops, President Barack Obama, withdrawal of US forces
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November 10, 2009
The Independent/UK, Nov. 8, 2009
One by one over the past eight years, the arguments for the continued presence of Nato troops in Afghanistan have fallen away. The last one, which held us back until now from calling for withdrawal, was the need to police the Afghan election in August. That election process is now over: last week the president’s main opponent pulled out, and Hamid Karzai was formally re-elected. That is not a happy outcome. For British soldiers to be deployed in support of a president whose position is bolstered by ballot-rigging tips the balance of our view from reluctant backing for the mission in Afghanistan to regretful opposition.
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Tags:Afghanistan war, British soldiers, Karzai and vote-rigging, NATO soldiers in Afghanistan, Tony Blair and Afghanistan war
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November 8, 2009
By Pilger, John | ZNet, Nov. 7, 2009
John Pilger’s ZSpace Page
Thank you all for coming tonight, and my thanks to the City of Sydney and especially to the Sydney Peace Foundation for awarding me the Peace Prize. It’s an honour I cherish, because it comes from where I come from.
I am a seventh generation Australian. My great-great grandfather landed not far from here, on November 8th, 1821. He wore leg irons, each weighing four pounds. His name was Francis McCarty. He was an Irishman, convicted of the crime of insurrection and “uttering unlawful oaths”. In October of the same year, an 18 year old girl called Mary Palmer stood in the dock at Middlesex Gaol and was sentenced to be transported to New South Wales for the term of her natural life. Her crime was stealing in order to live. Only the fact that she was pregnant saved her from the gallows. She was my great-great grandmother. She was sent from the ship to the Female Factory at Parramatta, a notorious prison where every third Monday, male convicts were brought for a “courting day” – a rather desperate measure of social engineering. Mary and Francis met that way and were married on October 21st, 1823.
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Tags:Aboriginal Australia, Afghanistan war, Australia, Australia and Vietnam war, escating war in Afghanistan and Pakistan, Harold Pinter, Israel, John Pilger, occupied Palestine, Rudd government, United States
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November 7, 2009
Judge Richard Goldstone and the United Nations fact-finding mission on the Gaza conflict have issued a report about Gaza that is strongly critical of both Israel and Hamas for their violations of human rights. On Wednesday, a special meeting of the U.N. General Assembly began a debate on whether to refer the report to the Security Council.
In January 2009 rudimentary rockets had been launched from Gaza toward nearby Jewish communities, and Israel had wreaked havoc with bombs, missiles, and ground invading forces. Judge Goldstone’s claim is that they are both guilty of “crimes against humanity.” Predictably, both the accused parties have denounced the report as biased and inaccurate.
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Tags:crimes against humanity, deaths and damage in Gaza, destruction of Gaza, Gaza, Goldstone report, Israeli attack, plight of Gazans, President Jimmy Carter, rockerts from Gaza
Posted in Commentary, Gaza, Human rights, Uncategorized, war, war crimes, Zionist Israel | 1 Comment »
November 7, 2009
According to the Republicans, the United States is once again at the crossroads of losing another critical war because of feckless Democrats. Only this time it’s Afghanistan.
John Mearsheimer, FP, November 2, 2009
The conventional wisdom among most Republicans is that while the United States had serious difficulty in Vietnam during the early years, by the early 1970s things were turning around, and victory was on the verge. Unfortunately, the craven Democrats in Congress bowed to widespread anti-war sentiment and forced the Ford administration to end almost all support to South Vietnam, allowing the North Vietnamese to win the war in 1975. In the GOP version of the story, this decision was a disastrous mistake.
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Tags:Afghan war, Afghanistan, corrupt Karzai regime, Democrats, John Mearsheimer, Republicans, Taliban, United States, Vietnam War and Afghanistan, war escalation in Afghanistan
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November 7, 2009
Noam Chomsky is the west’s most prominent critic of US imperialism, yet he is rarely interviewed in the mainstream media. Seumas Milne meets him
Seumas Milne, The Guardian/UK, November 7, 2009
Noam Chomsky: ‘Obama’s campaign rhetoric was completely vacuous’ Photograph: Rex Features
Noam Chomsky is the closest thing in the English-speaking world to an intellectual superstar. A philosopher of language and political campaigner of towering academic reputation, who as good as invented modern linguistics, he is entertained by presidents, addresses the UN general assembly and commands a mass international audience. When he spoke in London last week, thousands of young people battled for tickets to attend his lectures, followed live on the internet across the globe, as the 80-year-old American linguist fielded questions from as far away as besieged Gaza.
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Tags:American Empire, critic of the US imperialism, Noam Chomsky, power of Israel lobby in the US, Seumas Milne, US foreign policy, US invasion of Afghanistan
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November 6, 2009
Stephen Zunes, Foreign Policy In Focus, November 4, 2009
In a stunning blow against international law and human rights, the U.S. House of Representatives overwhelmingly approved a resolution on Tuesday attacking the report of the United Nations Human Rights Council’s fact-finding mission on the Gaza conflict. The report was authored by the well-respected South African jurist Richard Goldstone and three other noted authorities on international humanitarian law, who had been widely praised for taking leadership in previous investigations of war crimes in Rwanda, Darfur, the former Yugoslavia, and elsewhere. Since this report documented apparent war crimes by a key U.S. ally, however, Congress has taken the unprecedented action of passing a resolution condemning it. Perhaps most ominously, the resolution also endorses Israel’s right to attack Syria and Iran on the grounds that they are “state sponsors of terrorism.”
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Tags:attack on Goldstone report, Christine Chinkin attacked, Gaza, Goldstone mission report, Israel, misleading accusations, Stephen Zunes, U.S. House of Representatives resolution
Posted in Commentary, Gaza, Human rights, Uncategorized, US policy, USA, war, war crimes, Zionist Israel | 2 Comments »
November 4, 2009
George Barnsby, The Barnsby Blog No. 966, Nov 4, 2009
Once again I have turned to the Website of the only man who can save the world, Barack Obama who forty days ago amazed and delighted the world with his statement that he would abolish all nuclear weapons, but who since has reneged on that promise and today keeps the most warlike company of those who want to conquer Iraq and Afghanistan and other places for their oil, and precious metals while puppet governments in Asia and elsewhere are quite willing to give their assets to the Western Neo-Coms, but find it necessary to deceive their own people and the rest of the world by fulsome false promises that they are not serving their own material interests but are patriots serving the interests of their countries.
In the meantime Obama has his own problems with his ‘allies’ notably NATO and the European Union and the basic trio of Nuclear Maniacs – Bush, Blair and Brown are now desperately trying to defy the Human Rights authorities who are chasing them for Crimes against Humanity and they will eventually suffer the same fate as did the Nazi genocidists at Nuremburg in 1946.
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Tags:Barack Obama, blockade of Cuba, Cuba, George Barnsby, Iraq and Afghanistan, NATO, nuclear weapons, Obama and Europe, wars
Posted in Commentary, imperialism, President Barack Obama, US policy, war | Leave a Comment »
November 4, 2009
| Al Jazeera, Nov 4, 2009 |
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| The Goldstone report alleges that Israel used disproportionate force in its war on Gaza [Reuters] |
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The US House of Representatives has rejected as “irredeemably biased” the findings of a UN-sponsored report which says Israel committed war crimes during its military assault on the Gaza Strip.
The house on Tuesday voted 344 to 36 in favour of a non-binding resolution calling on Barack Obama, the US president, to maintain his opposition to the report, which was written by a panel led by Richard Goldstone, a South African judge.
The report accused Israel and the Palestinian Hamas group, which has de facto control of Gaza, of war crimes during the 22-day conflict in December and January.
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Tags:Gaza war, General Assembly, Goldstone report rejected, Israel, Palestinians killed, US House of Representatives, war crimes allegations
Posted in Commentary, Gaza, Uncategorized, USA, war, war crimes, Zionist Israel | Leave a Comment »
November 3, 2009
By Bill Van Auken, wsws.org, November 3, 2009
The two-and-a-half-month election drama in Afghanistan was brought to a close Monday with the incumbent president of the US-backed regime in Kabul, Hamid Karzai, being decreed the winner.
The Independent Election Commission, a body stacked with Karzai supporters, issued a decision giving him another five-year term and cancelling a runoff election set for November 7.
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Tags:Afghanistan, Ahmed Wali Karzai and corruption, Dr Abdullah, election, election fraud, Hamid Karzai winner, more troops, narcotics trafficking, United States, war in Afghanistan
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Peace and Justice Post 
Leading article: Why we must leave Afghanistan
November 10, 2009The Independent/UK, Nov. 8, 2009
One by one over the past eight years, the arguments for the continued presence of Nato troops in Afghanistan have fallen away. The last one, which held us back until now from calling for withdrawal, was the need to police the Afghan election in August. That election process is now over: last week the president’s main opponent pulled out, and Hamid Karzai was formally re-elected. That is not a happy outcome. For British soldiers to be deployed in support of a president whose position is bolstered by ballot-rigging tips the balance of our view from reluctant backing for the mission in Afghanistan to regretful opposition.
Continues >>
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Tags:Afghanistan war, British soldiers, Karzai and vote-rigging, NATO soldiers in Afghanistan, Tony Blair and Afghanistan war
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