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


Sunday, April 15, 2012

News of the Day for Sunday, April 15, 2012

Gunmen launch coordinated attack on multiple sites in Kabul, Taliban claim responsibility, saying their main targets are British and German embassies and NATO headquarters. RPG hits British diplomatic housing, two rockets hit a British embassy guard tower, and three rockets hit a supermarket near the German embassy popular with foreigners. Smoke is seen billowing from the German embassy. Rockets are also fired at parliament and the Russian embassy.

AP has various additional details, including a mortar attack on NATO base Camp Warehouse on the edge of the city. Attackers are said to have occupied a tall building from which they are launching rockets at the British embassy.

U.S. embassy declares a lockdown, tells people to shelter in place.

KUNA,quoting Pajhwok Afghan News, reports gunmen stormed the Kabul Star hotel near the Iranian embassy, and that the hotel is on fire.

Suicide bombers attack Jalalabad airport, blow themselves up at the gate, causing an unspecified number of injuries.

Taliban attack a police training facility in Gardez. Four people are said to be injured as fighting continues.

Insurgents occupy a building near a police HQ in Paktia. A NATO helicopter is seen firing into the building.

Khaama is reporting explosions and gunfire in the Behsud district of Nangarhar, including an attack on the U.S Provincial Reconstruction Team and the airport.

Note: As of this writing, news is still emerging. TOLO is offline and Khaama is nearly inaccessible, perhaps due to excessive demand. I will do an update later in the day as the situation becomes clearer.-- C

Iraq Update

Attackers blow up a modest house in Taji, killing three members of the family including a five year old boy.

Head of Iraq's electoral commission, Faraj al-Haidari, and another member, are arrested on corruption charges and freed on bail. "Haidari’s arrest sparked condemnation from a number of leading politicians, who accused Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki of orchestrating a slide away from the electoral process and towards dictatorship."

AFP reports denunciation of the arrests by Muqtada al Sadr and the Iraqiya bloc. Al Sadr says "Maybe the arrest is to the benefit of the brother prime minister, because in my opinion, he is working on postponing or cancelling the elections." "Brother prime minister" is sarcastic - C

Iran and world powers will continue talks on Iran's nuclear program in Baghdad in May.

3 comments:

Dancewater said...

the unending and massive evil the US has done to Iraq:

Legacy of US weapons on Iraq

War's cruel legacy continues to unleash itself on the children of Iraq as weapons used by the U.S. have left Iraqi children with horrific birth defects, and the problem shows no signs of abating, Inter Press Service is reporting today.

"In 2004 the Americans tested all kinds of chemicals and explosive devices on us: thermobaric weapons, white phosphorous, depleted uranium...we have all been laboratory mice for them," hospital spokesman Nadim al-Hadidi told Inter Press Service (IPS).

IPS notes that the Iraqi Health Ministry, in close collaboration with the WHO, is set to embark on its first ever study on congenital malformations in the governorates of Baghdad, Anbar, Thi Qar, Suleimania, Diala and Basra this month.

Iraqi children being born with birth defects has been devasting families for years. A July 2010 study showed that increases in infant mortality, cancer and leukaemia in the heavily bombarded city of Fallujah surpass those reported by survivors of the atomic bombs that were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945.

And the Guardian reported back in 2009 that Falluja doctors were "dealing with up to 15 times as many chronic deformities in infants, compared to a year ago, and a spike in early life cancers that may be linked to toxic materials left over from the fighting."

Cervantes said...

Americans have no appreciation of the legacy of the intervention in Iraq and will not believe they have any responsibility for what happens there in the future.

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