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


Saturday, April 19, 2014

War News for Saturday, April 19, 2014


Army Pulling Helos from National Guard

Government to hold fresh talks with Taliban negotiators


Reported security incidents
#1: Six Taliban insurgents were killed Saturday in a blast in Afghanistan's eastern province of Ghazni, police said. "A local Taliban leader named Mullah Saddiq, along with five militants, was killed after improvised explosive devices (IEDs) they were building went off prematurely in Khoshak locality of the provincial capital Ghazni city in the morning," Xinhua Saturday quoted Asadullah Insafi, deputy provincial police chief, as saying.

#2: Meanwhile, two militants were killed and six wounded in the country's northern Sari Pul province during a military operation conducted by the army earlier Saturday.

Posted by whisker at 5:19 AM

2 comments:

Dancewater said...

An Afghan provincial government spokesman has alleged that a NATO airstrike killed at least three civilians and injured another in Afghanistan's Khost province Tuesday.

A spokesman for NATO's International Security Assistance Force, Lt. Col. Will Griffin, said ISAF is looking into the allegation.

Helicopters fired at houses in Khost's Nadershahkot district early Tuesday, killing a woman and two children and injuring a man, said Mubarez Zadran, spokesman for Khost's governor.

Afghan officials are investigating the incident, Zadran said.

Link here

April 19, 2014 at 7:52 PM
Dancewater said...

So very disgusting:

A US drone attacked a highway in Yemen’s southeastern Bayda Province, killing at least 21 people, including a number of civilian bystanders, and wounding many more.

Link here

Obama is a murderer, that is for sure.

April 19, 2014 at 7:58 PM

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