U.S. Military Installs Brutal Dictatorship in Afghanistan

actually the negotiations going on in bonn include more then just the NA.

furthermore, the NA isn't exactly one unitary body, but rather a collection of various tribes and ethnicities.

thus to say the entire NA is brutal and despotic based on the actions of one particular group is rather dishonest

Look at the news coming out of Bonn --- few women invited, Northern Alliance will remain the interim ruler until something can be decided, at least 2 months before "constitution" neogotiations begin, official statements from RAWA on the brutal rule of the northern alliance when they were in power before, cant you read the writing on the walls, jon?

Your assertion that "nothing can be blamed on the northern alliance" because they are a diverse coalition. Actually, they are now solidified so they can represent in Bonn but that's not the point. The Northern Alliance is not some ethereal entity --- they were in power in Afghanistan before, remember?

And from that experience, the whole world knows what murderous rapist thugs they are. Everybody, that is, except Americans, kept ignorant by corporate media.

For every photo like this one, there are ten that show Taliban attrocities....so this is a worthless posting. War is ugly, no doubt about it.

Afgans hate the Taliban more than the N.A. And only dopes spread propaganda about the US putting the NA in charge of the country.

for the record i haven't seen any taliban brutality photos. Do you have some to show? can you show them?
quit lying to prove a worthless argument

the NA is scum, the taliban were scum
and you're scum

It'd be lovely to have the source (URL if possible) of pictures!

3 women is better than none? even after all of laura bush's bleating about "liberating women"? even after RAWA is removed from the invitation?

only a man would say that.

yes yes, america is "ignorant b/c of media corporate rule" whereas you are all so enlightened.

please.
a quick look on cnn will unveal more hten enough reports supporting the claim that the NA aren't exactly the friendliest of people.

yet, idealists like you all don't understand that life is unfortunately full of compromises. we would all like to live in gum-drop houses on lollipop lane but unfortunately that just is not possible.

the NA will run an interim gov't b/c quite frankly nothing can be put together to address the short-term need of stability in the country right now.

and RAWA wasn't invited. ooooo
pray tell just how large is RAWA's membership based in afghanistan? the fact that they claim to speak for afghani women does not mean that they in fact do, or that they have a mandate from every afghani female. RAWA then could very well just be another elitist lefty organization that pretends it speaks for everyone.

Thank you for the needed dose of realpolitik and your own brand of enlightenment. Are you not a businessman? How now? You are so worldly and well spoken. And your lack of scruples! Surely you are a businessman--a successful businessman.

Like you, I think the practical is God. The practical is what MUST BE DONE; thus it is THE morality. And might I say (just between the two of us) that the practical is thus THE ideal? But let that not trouble us--we men of the world.

But those women--oh how they are upsetting! Now even these afghani females want a piece of the pie. As always, the practical must guide our deliberations; it can be no different with these radical feminine demands. If the girls should constantly find themselves of the back burner, they should chasten themselves. Chasten themselves; foe we men of the world have no time to deal with such trivialities as "the woman problem."

These godless girls of Afghanistan should hide under their vails--I mean veils--in shame for their untimely and uncheched desires.

P.S. I like CNN too.

Ok, Jon, I'll explain it for you.

"a quick look on cnn"

You are aware of CNN's cozy relationship with the US military, right? That being said ... Searching for "northern alliance" at CNN, I don't really see the "Northern Alliance as murderous warlord rapist" stories that you are talking about. Here's some interesting ones you do get, which seem to fluffy up the NA angle:
- Christiane Amanpour: Afghanistan's moment for peace
- Northern Alliance looking for broad-based government
- Alliance invites Afghan factions to Kabul for talks
- Satinder Bindra: Afghan rebels report Taliban defections (here they are referred to as rebels!!)
etc etc etc ... i was not able to find, paging through 12 pages of search results ... really one article that was in any way critical of the northern alliance. Even if there is one in there, CNN's broadcast coverage and front story coverage doesnt address these historical facts at all. And why? Because the northern alliance are the puppet army we're using and probably the puppet government for some time. And they are just as much terrorists as the Taliban are. But that truth might confused the American people, huh?

"life is unfortunately full of compromises"

That's nice. That must have been a really hard thing to say from the comfort of your gum-drop house.

"the NA will run an interim gov't b/c quite frankly nothing can be put together to address the short-term need of stability in the country right now"

Don't act like it was some accidental act of God or something. Here is how you can rephrase what you wrote so it is accurate: "the NA will run an interim govt b/c quite frankly the US decided that they wanted to topple the Taliban government and replace it with one of the warlord groups in the country right now"

"pray tell just how large is RAWA's membership based in afghanistan? the fact that they claim to speak for afghani women does not mean that they in fact do, or that they have a mandate from every afghani female."

Ahhh, yes. And *now* RAWA is non-representative, etc. FYI, RAWA is the oldest womens rights organization in Afghanistan. They were active when the Russians were there, they were active when the Taliban were there, and they will be active while the US is there. When all this happened, RAWA was the first to make statements, start getting information out, etc. As a result, Rep Cynthia McKinney point-blank asked members of the White House (during congressional testimony) if RAWA would be involved in any kind of coalition building government. On C-Span, you can watch the White House person promise up and down that RAWA is "definitely wanted" at the talks. In fact, out of dozens of representatives at the meetings, only 3 were women, and they said last night that they didnt feel as though they were part of the process. Big surprise.

What should be obvious is that Laura Bush has no interest in womens rights, let alone womens rights in Afghanistan. Donald Rumsfeld could give a fuck. Colin Powell doesnt care. George Bush doesnt even understand. What they understand is blowing women and children up, not promoting human rights.

Of course you haven't seen any photos of taliban attrocities...



the taliban made anything that can recreate a human image (TV, film) illegal, arrests photographers and confiscates the cameras!

DUH!

As atrocious as it is, the fact that the NA allowed the photographer to TAKE this picture says quite a bit...

The only question I have is: who's the "victim"?

For all we know, this guy might be one of the foreigners brought in by Al Qaeda and was identified by his liberated victims as a rapist (of which the taliban has plenty)...

-Mutilation of the genitals IS a traditional punishment for rapists in the region...

The Taliban atrocity fotos you seek are at http://www.rawa.org/ ... these photos suppressed not only by the taliban but also the u.s. government, as the u.s. was supporting the taliban for a long time.

as stated, the NA are scum. the taliban are scum. the us govt is scum. and you are scum.

a quick search at CNN.com
first thing to come up is amnesty int'l being let in to probe the killings at mazer-el-shariff.

geez, some vast corporate conspiracy to cover up NA atrocities, someone musta really slipped up here!

and geez "afgan women looking for a voice" begins to comment on how some are worried that afghani women might not have enough say in the new interim gov't.

gee whiz, someone musta really messed up at CNN huh?

as for RAWA, who cares how old it is and who cares who they say they speak for.

i want to see membership numbers and civic participation. at the moment its just another exiled group living in pakistan. to say that RAWA is the voice of afghan women is completely pretentious and elitist.

it may be fun to cry conspiracy and to believe that someone is intentionally trying to keep your voices from being heard. after all, this is completely understadnable. if you believe that you are in the possession of some ultimate truth and then see that the rest of hte world doesn't agree with you you're of course going to think that someone, something must be keeping you down or that the rest of the world are nothing more then "sheep", as one indymedia article rather ridiculously claimed.

however, if you open your eyes and actually peruse those publications which you despise, like the NY Times, the economist, etc. you'll find that the issues you raise are given voice time and time again.

thus the only "conspiracy" here is the mass-delusion that many on this board continue to hold unto.

cheers
:)

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2001/11/29/MN139289.DTL



Yeah those Northern Alliance forces really care about the starving refugees. Anarchist is right. Taliban are scum, the Northern Alliance is scum and so is the US government!

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2001/11/29/MN139289.DTL



Yeah those Northern Alliance forces really care about the starving refugees. Anarchist is right. Taliban are scum, the Northern Alliance is scum and so is the US government!

when have i ever denied that the NA aren't exactly the best of people?

however, the fact remains, if not the NA then what?

exactly.

"geez, some vast corporate conspiracy to cover up NA atrocities, someone musta really slipped up here!"

No, how could the press not report that? They have to. But here's what they don't do: 1) make it part of their analysis on tv, CNN etc, 2) ever give it frontpage coverage, etc

I mean, come on, when the northern alliance came in it was all sunshine and happiness, beards coming off and riots outside movie theaters. you dont think that this is a little different than a more complex perspective would take? i.e. what are the *concerns* of people now that the NA is in charge. and will remain in charge. thanks to the the USA.

"i want to see membership numbers and civic participation. at the moment its just another exiled group living in pakistan. to say that RAWA is the voice of afghan women is completely pretentious and elitist."

So lets see, all the warlords and murderers, what you have to say is, "oh, what are you going to do, have to invite the warlords" But when it is a women's rights group that has been there for 20 years, your immediate reaction is "oh, they are representative, they are elitist, etc"

It really doesnt matter. The rest of the world respects and listens to RAWA, even if some american brat doesnt think he has to. And they realize that the exclusion of RAWA in Bonn is a complete reversal from what the US *had* been saying all a long, what Laura Bush said, what was said at the hearing where Cynthia McKinney questioned members of the administration. ETC. you are obviously searching for excuses. face facts: RAWA didnt get invited because the US is not bringing true democracy to afghanistan, it is bringing a client puppet state. even though the US does this over and over and over and over again, patriotic idiots like yourself always deny it as it is happening. 5 years from now, when teh fallout from another one of these policy failures bites us in the ass, you'll be saying "oh, who cares about the mistakes in the past blah blah"

"however, if you open your eyes and actually peruse those publications which you despise, like the NY Times, the economist, etc. you'll find that the issues you raise are given voice time and time again. "

your continued reliance on the word "conspiracy" only exposes how weak your argument is. were jim crow laws a conspiracy? was south african apartheid a conspiracy? ETC ETC.

"however, the fact remains, if not the NA then what? exactly."

hellloooo earth to jon .... the "what else" is: the US begins to respect international law, it doesnt illegally overthrow foreign governments, and it doesnt create these kinds of genocidal warlord starvation crises anymore. got it, dumbass?

Those who say compromise were saying we should compromise to the Talban a year go.

Those of us who have principles say they both stink so why shpould our tax dollars suppport criminal brutality whether it be from Taliban or from The NA.

Stick your compromise up your ass..

Compromising with tyrants = slavery to the tyrant

SICK OF COMPROMISE


Freedom for al oppressed peoples of the world including americans enslaved to their credit cards and addictions to consumer goods.

hmmm: believe it or not everyone is not interested in the same thing you are. its rather arrogant to presume taht the things you think are important should be required front-page material.

the media will show what it thinks its clientel wants, simple as that. that is not censorship at all, especially seeing how the information you are interested in are readily accessible on the major news outlets, just not given the prominence you personally believe it should receive. on that note many bible-thumpers believe that the decline of morality should be constant front page news, but it isn't. is this censorship?

RAWA wasn't invited b/c it has no power base whatsoever. simple as that. if you want to forge a gov't and you don't include the main power-brokers, or if you belittle their role by also inviting a horde of powerless figures, how lasting do you think any sort of gov't will be?

face the realities of the situation on the ground. the warlords have ALL of the power. to hammer out any sort of new gov't that is even halfway stable you are going to by necessity have to deal with these warlords, unless you are so naive as to believe that they will just voluntarily surrender all power to powerless organizations like RAWA

Jon I'm beginning to think you are just naive. You slowly come around to see things but in the time it takes you to get there you make the most outlandish statements... heh.

"the media will show what it thinks its clientel wants"

Yes, and its clientele is large, multinational advertisers ... oh, you thought it was the audience? Haha, nope. IBM, Microsoft, Lockheed-Martin, the people who make the bombs and missiles are not only the people who own the media companies, but also the people who want to appeal to similar corporations for advertising. The "audience" is a potential couple hundred million people with widely diverse viewpoints ... the "advertising market" is a very very small group of people with a very narrow political viewpoint. And thus, corporate media represents this small group of people and their narrow political agenda.

"RAWA wasn't invited b/c it has no power base whatsoever. simple as that. if you want to forge a gov't and you don't include the main power-brokers, or if you belittle their role by also inviting a horde of powerless figures, how lasting do you think any sort of gov't will be?"

What RAWA wants is not power in the government --- what they want is a democratic election which they have a key role in organizing. What you are saying is *absurd* --- so the US creates warlord groups, uses them to fight one another, and then in the pomp and fanfare of "creating democracy" in Afghanistan, they don't create democracy, they install a puppet regime. And when people criticize the fact that they are calling it democracy but are acting like feudal military dictatorship, people like you are "ohhh well what are you gonna do, we got ourselves in this mess, now we'll just install a dictatorship, thats what we have to do"

Jon, you and every other patriot-minded jackass are apologists for statist murder, state dictatorships, etc. As I have said before you obviously have never suffered. I wonder how your political views would change if anyone you love would be murdered by a US-sponsored death squad. Then I wonder how quick you would whine about how "things are" instead of how they should be.

the media ultimately exists to sell advertising space, and these advertisers ultimately exist to sell their products to consumers

so, you're saying that lock-heed martin is a big advertiser?

haha.
yes, i'm sure hte civilian market for military aircraft is quite large.

actually, try firms that depend upon civilian consumer sales in order to survive, and these firms are then dependant upon the sovereign consumer

as for RAWA, yes they say they want democracy.

however, none of you have even addressed the realities on the ground. where will this democracy come from? what do you think will happen with the warlords if they are excluded from power?

don't call me naive when you think people can just wave a magic wand and everything will be all right. the road to reconstruction in afghanistan will be long and treacherous, and such simplistic thinking as "let's just have a vote and everything will be all right" isn't going to solve anything. we either have to give the warlords control commensurate with their relative power, or we have to somehow disarm all of them.

the latter isn't too likely.

is this the ideal situation? of course not. but, until another alternative presents itself it is the ONLY way forward.

vague statements on int'l law and democracy, w/o any actual policies being put forward, are simply worthless

"the media ultimately exists to sell advertising space, and these advertisers ultimately exist to sell their products to consumers"

Exactly. As for your flippant comment about Lockheed-Martin advertising dollars, you are aware that Lockheed-Martin is a major aerospace firm, right? You realize that travel industry, tourism industry, etc are all tied into Lockheed-Martin? If you think that the Defense Big Three companies don't impact advertising decisions, you are more naive than I thought.

"is this the ideal situation? of course not. but, until another alternative presents itself it is the ONLY way forward"

The rest of your comments basically sum up as "well here we are what can we do?"

For one, we can hold the illegal rogue nation actions of the US Government accountable. You will not even do this. You admit that they have seriously fucked things up (again) in Afghanistan, but you do not want to assign blame.

Second, what we can do is stop repeating the mistakes of the past. Push true democracy. Push RAWA. What's the worst that can happen if the US actually fulfills its propaganda and pushes for a democratic coalition government?

Of course this will not happen. What will happen is a dictatorial oil government. History shows us this over and over again.

Sorry, Jon, keep backpedaling and providing justifications and rationalizations for the nightmare of death and destruction caused by the US government here and elsewhere.

on Lockheed: so, how many consumers really make consumption decisions based upon the aircraft brand.

when you book a flight on united do you check to see if they're flying either airbuses or boeing? of course not.

ultimately media ad space is sold so that it can reach and effect consumer preference. so, to say that the military-industrial complex runs the media is a bit ridiculous seeing how citizen-consumers can't exactly purchase gunships on their own


as for anarchist's "solutions". again, how do they even address the reality on the ground?

if the US did a total mea culpa and signed unto every ridiculous int'l treaty under the sun, it would still NOT address the fact that the afghan warlords have all of the power, not RAWA. trying to ignore that is not naive, it is murderous.

nessie: IMC still fulfills a consumption purpose, ultimately to facilitate with activism, to recruit more people, etc. even this has a positive impact on the revenue of various NGO's, albeit less directly then mainstream advertising on the networks

Jon, you always accuse people of letting their preconceived conspiratorial minds take over. You are guilty of the same thing. How can you think that places like Boeing or Lockheed-Martin don't advertise because they don't have a large or diverse consumer market. That's idiocy ... what they do is *brand*, which is another word for propaganda, do get what they want from society.

Jon I am amazed at your naivete sometimes. Are you here to talk or just to win some arguments against perceived political enemies?

Just for the hell of it I posted an example of the advertising that I am talking about. I just saw an article that Lockheed-Martin just granted a $15 million advertising contract to one agency in NYC.

See here:
http://www.indybay.org/2001/11/111008.php

and that's a very indirect advertising meant to increase air sales, and therefore aircraft sales.

again, answer my question: when you fly do you make your consumption decision based upon the brand of the aircraft?

are you in the market for B-2 stealth bombers?

"again, answer my question: when you fly do you make your consumption decision based upon the brand of the aircraft?"

who gives a shit? incredibly, the issue here is whether or not the military-industrial complex and aerospace industry pull weight with the media because of advertising revenue. incredibly, you dont think they do.

of course, the military and aerospace industries spend millions and millions on advertising, whether or not you think consumers are influenced by industry advertising (they are, as the boeing ad demonstrates)