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.

Andrew Bacevich


Wednesday, January 1, 2014

War News for Wednesday, January 01, 2014

The military is reporting the death of an ISAF soldier from a non-combat related injury in an undisclosed location in southern Afghanistan on Wednesday, January 1st.


Afghans’ Plan to Release Prisoners Angers U.S.


Reported security incidents
#1: An explosion ripped through a rickshaw on Tuesday, killing at least three people and wounding four others in Peshawar, officials said. The blast occurred at Chamkani, a suburb of Peshawar, the capital of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province, which borders Afghanistan and has been a target of Taliban suicide attacks and bombings. “At least three people were killed in an explosion in a rickshaw near a police check point,” said local police official Shaukat Ali.

#2: An Afghan police officer was killed and two others were injured following an improvised explosive device (IED) explosion in southern Zabul province of Afghanistan. According to local government officials, the incident took place on Wednesday in Qalat city.

Posted by whisker at 5:29 AM

1 comments:

Dancewater said...

and Happy New Year's to all!


My New Year’s resolution: Learn to play ‘World of Warcraft’ so I can get a job with the NSA.

January 1, 2014 at 9:33 PM

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