Successor to Today in Iraq
The present-day U.S. military qualifies by any measure as highly professional, much more so than its Cold War predecessor. Yet the purpose of today’s professionals is not to preserve peace but to fight unending wars in distant places. Intoxicated by a post-Cold War belief in its own omnipotence, the United States allowed itself to be drawn into a long series of armed conflicts, almost all of them yielding unintended consequences and imposing greater than anticipated costs. Since the end of the Cold War, U.S. forces have destroyed many targets and killed many people. Only rarely, however, have they succeeded in accomplishing their assigned political purposes. . . . [F]rom our present vantage point, it becomes apparent that the “Revolution of ‘89” did not initiate a new era of history. At most, the events of that year fostered various unhelpful illusions that impeded our capacity to recognize and respond to the forces of change that actually matter.
Reported security incidents
#1: The chief financier of the Taliban-linked Haqqani network militant group has been shot dead in the Pakistani capital of Islamabad, Reuters quoted militant sources as saying.
#2: One militant was killed and 14 were detained in operations in separate Afghan provinces since early Sunday, the country's Interior Ministry said Monday.
Posted by
whisker
at
4:20 AM
2 comments:
Regarding the killing of Nasiruddin Haqqani, best not to jump to any conclusions about who did this and why. Most likely suspect is actually the Pakistani Taliban; Hakimullah Mehsud is said to have viewed the Haqqani as tools of Pakistan's ISI. Alliances and rivalries in that area are baroque, to say the least, and much is not as it appears. I don't normally endorse CBS news, but this story appears well informed.
Another possibility I've seen bruited about is a family dispute over money.
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