Miliband Heaps Pressure On Hamid Karzai

Telegraph:

David Miliband, foreign secretary, said on a visit to Kabul that the UK was already paying a high financial and human cost for its role in fighting al Qaeda and Taliban insurgents.

Read the whole story: Telegraph

Comments

[rkimball]

karzai can't work miracles with usa forces controlling the cities & the insurgents controlling 80% of the country side. this is by no means a sucess story no matter how it's sugar coated.

[realitycheck7]

there is little Karzai can do

countries prosper and perish by their economic health

Afganistan has few options to pull itself from poverty

[SteadyOn]

One of the the ten pooreset countries in the world (other nine in Africa). Think how well they could do if they sold the opium LEGALLY for medical means????? As it is, the farmers get damn little, and the traffickers get the bulk - including Ahmed Wali Karzai, the president's brother.

[leonel]

Big support for Mr. Obama so far, except for Afghan. There is no strategy. Why is Congress not helping with hearings? Has the Obama Admin. already permitted the killing of innocent civilians with Predator launched Hell Fire missiles? The local commanding general was today giving a press conference, talking very McCain-like, about how American troops got to be there number of years. Said "no comment" on Predators. Who is running this war, and how about informing the American public if they are still into nation-building, Gates said not likely. The Brits just said, "count us out." I know Obama is going to resolve the problem with Iranian and Russian help, right? That, in my humble opinion, is not only unavoidable, but best solution.

[EgyptianMysterySchool]

Mlllibrand better watch out for the backhand - only people I've ever seen wear capes like that are pimps.

And don't think that just because Bush is gone, that Karzai isn't still saying, ' The U.S. betta have my money"

[TJCole]

"Heroin, it's my life, it's my wife..."

[Y2KCockroach]

"Mr Miliband said: 'This commitment is very costly to Britain in terms of money and more importantly in terms of human lives'..."

Big deal. The British lost 15000 soldiers (correction: one survived) in the mid-1800's in that country, and got zero, zilch, zip, nada, nothing for their trouble. You would think that they would have learned something from that, but apparently not. They were trying to "save" Afghanistan then, and they are trying to "save" Afghanistan now, and it would all be so very funny if it weren't all so very tragic. Pip pip boys, and keep your heads down.

[shystar]

And the British experience then and the recent Russian experience in the 1980s is a lesson I hope Obama pays attention to.

[UncleSquinky]

Don't forget Alexander the Great's "conquering" of the same mountainous region and people. He had the sense to cut and run, in short order, and declare victory. Alexander had a big ego, too, but he had the sense not to throw military capital down a rat hole. To ignore the history of various empires' attempts to subdue/control this area -- particularly the most recent one, by the Soviet Union -- and try to achieve an actual military and political victory in the current situation is pure folly and hubris. Then there is the US's own experience in Viet Nam: it's hard to beat a guerilla group supported by countries of means (military and/or economic).

Furthermore, to even seriously contemplate attempting this requires the Taliban's backers, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, be brought to heel. I don't see that happening. The US refuses to acknowledge that the Pakistan government, under Musharef and before, directly supported the Taliban, and that members of the Saudi Royal family have supported Al Queda and likely the Taliban. Given all this, Afghanistan is definitely a lost cause.

[BaileyWo]

"Commanders of Nato-led forces in Afghanistan have suggested supplies could enter Afghanistan via Iranian ports and bypass the volatile Khyber Pass supply route in Pakistan."

That's the most realistic statement I've read in months regarding the cooperation of OPEC nations in securing those pipelines but still, no one is talking about the elephant in the living room -- securing the pipelines through Afghanistan from the Caspian and Central Asia. We can certainly count on Israel's opposition to such cooperation as well as their letting those on the take in Washington knowing they oppose it.

[TheFriendlyAtheist]

Poor Hamid. He's been hamstrung by CIA, who favored and bankrolled the warlords at the expense of the central government, and by the Bush adm. who let Afg. be overrun again by the Taliban when they pulled out troops to go to Irag. And now the writting is on the wall, they're going to cut him loose for being inefective. With friends like us who needs enemies?

[nogimmicks]

It looks like Karzai is using some of the products produced by his country.

[LeftLeanWing]

I love Karzai's fashion sense. A great blend of Western and traditional style.