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Time to come home?


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6 more squadies taken out in Afghanistan. The PM maintains the Bliar reasoning for the mission - "to stop Afghanistan being used as a safe haven for Al Queda" and to train and equip the Afghan Military to maintain security themselves. Seems no one has told Dave: 1) Yemen, Somalia, Indonesia and perhaps even Bradford, are currently training grounds for Al Queda affiliates; and 2)the Afghan Police and Miltitary are riddled with Taliban enterists, all ready to kick off as soon as we do leave. The only thing keeping us there now, is the shame the politicians have in having to explain all the deaths to relatives - they can't admit it was all for nothing. :angry:

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I guess that depends on what they died for?

 

They say that it is to stop terrorists coming over here and blowing up our country. The last terrorist attrocity carried out in Britain was by British Muslims..... before that it was British catholics....

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So Kije, present your case. The original reason we got locked into Afghanistan was cos Bush sent US special forces in, chasing Bin Laden into his mountain lair. He escaped, but they then got involved with the Taliban and it kicked off from there. The irony is of course, the Taliban's interest was limited to domestic affairs, and they were in fact rather embarrassed by Al Queda, although no doubt allowing them to train there. The CIA would probably have had the capacity to locate and vapourise these training camps and even individuals, as they are now doing with drones in Pakistan. Simply no need to have involved conventional forces, especially where the USSR had already tried and failed. Of course, Bliar allowed us to be dragged in on the US coat tails, as ever. The mission statement, which has changed over the period, is flawed, as the principle would equally now apply to Somalia - are you suggesting we send troops in there too Kije? It's ironic too, that peace loving, toga wearers, tend to finish up sleep walking into more bloodshed with naive notions - it's a wonder you don't want us to get tied up in Syria too. :roll:

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Come on Kije, we're only going back 10 years, so it's not exactly ancient history: the original intervention in Afghanistan was a pursuit of Bin Laden by US Special Forces - Bush's posse! The mission statement was ammended as time moved on and more troops were committed, to give the idea that there was a rational political reason behind it. The reality is somewhat different: IF the strategy to irradicate terrorist "safe havens" holds any water, then it follows logically, that we would have to be similarly involved in Somalia and indeed Pakistan (who have nukes btw). The threat to the UK: well, the only serious bombings todate, by Islamic terrorists, have come from home grown jihadists - so perhaps the Gov should be doing something preventative a lot further upstream? Meanwhile, as ever, our young soldiers are paying the price for past political posturing by super-egos like Bliar and Bush, given access to a military toy box. :angry:

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They went into Iraq because Saddam was changing the currency of the oil cartel from the dollar to the Euro.Thus cutting US oil companies profits.

They went into Afghanistan (which produces 80% of the world's heroin) because the taliban weren't continuing the US pharmaceutical companies lucrative deals.

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The posting is correct but you don't pull out of a marathon at 26 miles.

 

Happy days

Harry I normally respect your wisdom, however in this instance I personally think it's a bad analogy, you train and enter a marathon and do so voluntarily, we were dragged into Afghanistan by the Americans who as usual left us 'holding the baby', these last six lads were sacrificed for what, supposedly so that the so called ordinary Afghan people can have a better life with women treated as human beings, very admirable in theory, as soon as the last British and other foreign troops have been withdrawn from Afghanistan the Taliban will come back into the villages and towns and everything will be as it was before we went in.

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The degree of naivity or deceit on the part of politicians is becoming comical: the Defence Minister said, that the numbers of attacks by the Taliban had decreased over the recent period - well, naturally. They know that NATO are leaving anyway, they've penetrated membership of the "new" Afghan Army and Police, and Karsai is seeking a political compromise with them - so it's as good as won, from their point of view. Why would they waste their young followers when they can sit back and wait, with just the odd IED to sap the moral of the Western public. :roll:

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Algy, you make a good argument, but in my opinion to withdraw now would make the loss of four hundred lives really to have been in vain.

The perceived wisdom is that Afghanis will be able to look after themselves shortly. That may be wrong, but having come so far I feel we should carry it through to the apparently nearing finishing post.

 

Happy days

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Sha is right about Iraq and oil :wink:

 

Obs your capacity to change history to suit your aguement never fails :wink:

 

The primary goal was to disarm Al-Qaeda and stop them using it as a training base.A secondary aim was to topple the Taliban who were helping Al Qqaeda. We should finish training the Afgans before returning home.

 

Learn the lessons, the Americans had cleared Afganistan of the Taliban once before, they took their eye off the ball when they invaded Iraq, they came back and they had to start again. Finish the job this time or we only have to go back again.

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Which planet are you on Kije: the Taliban have never been "defeated"; yes, they were driven out of Kabul and power, but merely retreated to the mountains and have been fighting us for the past 10 years. And you still don't "get it"; the Afghan Police and Army have Taliban enterists within their ranks, some have already killed NATO personel, but the majority will no doubt be waiting for us to leave, before kicking off. Meanwhile, their Senior politicians are already trimming their sails to get on side with the Taliban when they do take over. Your turning naivity into an art form!. :roll: Harry, your arguement resembles that of our WW1 Generals, oh, we've lost a load of men, so we'll lose still more to justify the original loss - so it goes on and on! :roll:

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What message would it send out for the future if we pulled out?. Would be seen as a sign of weakness by anyone else we had nasty dealings with, of which no doubt there will be several if form is anything to go by. Would we really defend the Falklands for example? Then we have the Spanish and the rock.

 

Happy days

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Given the amount of money that's been wasted in Afghanistan; it could have gone towards maintaining a carrier capabilty to get air cover to the Falklands if/when the Argies do kick off - as it stands, we couldn't project power over there again. Afghanistan, can't be compared with the Falklans or Gib; they are UK protectorates, operating with the consent of the indigenous populations. As for the principle of "interfering" in other Countries on the pretext of them being "incubators of terrorism"; it would mean we would have to invade Pakistan, Somalia, Iran, Yemen etc etc; not sure we, or even the Yanks, have the men or the money to do that. As for "how" we deal with terrorism: it requires surgical responses (both at home and abroad) by intelligence services and their assets, and by special forces; to target the cancer rather than the rest of the body; conventional forces are a blunt instrument and offer a better target to the enemy. :wink:

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Algy, you make a good argument, but in my opinion to withdraw now would make the loss of four hundred lives really to have been in vain.

The perceived wisdom is that Afghanis will be able to look after themselves shortly. That may be wrong, but having come so far I feel we should carry it through to the apparently nearing finishing post.

 

Happy days

Harry there are times when you have to cut your losses, without seeming negative I believe those 400+ service people have lost there lives needlessly and enough is enough!.

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