"We're Not Ever Leaving"

[timely response]

Guess the surge didn't work...

Robert Gates: 'We're Not Ever Leaving' Afghanistan

In a shocking indication of a split between the White House and the Pentagon over the war in Afghanistan, Defense Secretary Robert Gates believes that the U.S. military will never leave the war-torn country.

During a dinner hosted by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for Afghan President Hamid Karzai in May, Gates reminded the group that he still feels guilty for his role in the first President Bush's decision to pull out of Afghanistan after the Soviet withdrawal in 1989, according to Bob Woodward's new book, "Obama's Wars." And to express his commitment to not letting down the country again, he emphasized:

"We're not leaving Afghanistan prematurely," Gates finally said. "In fact, we're not ever leaving at all."

Woodward notes that the group was shocked by the blunt comment: "At least one stunned participant put down his fork. Another wrote it down, verbatim, in his notes."...

And it seems to further indicate the Pentagon's commitment to staying in Afghanistan. The commander of US troops in Afghanistan, Gen. David Petraeus, is quoted saying about the country:

"You have to recognize that I don't think you win this war. I think you keep fighting. You have to stay after it. This is the kind of fight we're in for the rest of our lives and probably our kids' lives."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/0..._n_743409.html

[edin日本]

Would this have something to do with his decision?

Mineral resources

Extensive surveys have revealed the existence of a number of minerals of economic importance. The most important discovery has been that of natural gas, with large reserves near Sheberghan in Jowzjan province, near the Turkmen border, about 75 miles west of Mazar-e Sharif. The Khvajeh Gugerdak and Yatim Taq fields are major producers, with storage and refining facilities. Pipelines deliver natural gas to Uzbekistan and Tajikistan and to a thermal power plant and chemical fertilizer plant in Mazar-e Sharif. Petroleum resources have proved to be insignificant. Many coal deposits have been found in the northern slopes of the Hindu Kush. Major coal fields are at Karkar and Eshposhteh, in Baghlan province, and Fort Sarkari, in Balkh province.
High-grade iron ore, with an iron content of 62-63 percent, has been discovered at Hajigak, 60 miles northwest of Kabul. Copper is mined at 'Aynak, near Kabul, and uranium is extracted in the mountains near Khvajeh Rawash, east of Kabul. There are also deposits of copper, lead, and zinc near Konduz; beryllium in Khas Konar; chrome ore in the Lowgar valley near Herat; and the semiprecious stone lapis lazuli in Badakhshan. Afghanistan also has deposits of rock salt, beryl, barite, fluorspar, bauxite, lithium, tantalum, gold, silver, asbestos, mica, and sulfur.

[Yukkuri Kame]

No Bin Laden, but, oh, look what we found!



Besides natural resources, Afghanistan is a wedge into central asia, blocking Chinese access to the middle east, and projecting power into the oil & gas rich other former-soviet-stans.

We are at war with Eurasia, we will always be at war with Eurasia. Perpetual war is here to stay!

[Super Grover]

Would this have something to do with his decision?

Mineral resources

Extensive surveys have revealed the existence of a number of minerals of economic importance. The most important discovery has been that of natural gas, with large reserves near Sheberghan in Jowzjan province, near the Turkmen border, about 75 miles west of Mazar-e Sharif. The Khvajeh Gugerdak and Yatim Taq fields are major producers, with storage and refining facilities. Pipelines deliver natural gas to Uzbekistan and Tajikistan and to a thermal power plant and chemical fertilizer plant in Mazar-e Sharif. Petroleum resources have proved to be insignificant. Many coal deposits have been found in the northern slopes of the Hindu Kush. Major coal fields are at Karkar and Eshposhteh, in Baghlan province, and Fort Sarkari, in Balkh province.
High-grade iron ore, with an iron content of 62-63 percent, has been discovered at Hajigak, 60 miles northwest of Kabul. Copper is mined at 'Aynak, near Kabul, and uranium is extracted in the mountains near Khvajeh Rawash, east of Kabul. There are also deposits of copper, lead, and zinc near Konduz; beryllium in Khas Konar; chrome ore in the Lowgar valley near Herat; and the semiprecious stone lapis lazuli in Badakhshan. Afghanistan also has deposits of rock salt, beryl, barite, fluorspar, bauxite, lithium, tantalum, gold, silver, asbestos, mica, and sulfur.

If you (anyone) have been following the news...forget poppies. It is all about lithium now. Lithium, baby.

Always money for war?? Go figure. Yet resources for education are unavailable. Today a teacher from Georgia pleaded for some of my resources for free because the school district has "no more money for educational materials." At the end of September! Maybe they could go foraging for lithium.

[Yukkuri Kame]

If you (anyone) have been following the news...forget poppies. It is all about lithium now. Lithium, baby.

Yeah, they are saying more lithium than Bolivia - which was believed to be the richest source of lithium on the planet. Funny how dirt-poor mountain peoples keep ending up on top of our minerals.

[Yukkuri Kame]

Today a teacher from Georgia pleaded for some of my resources for free because the school district has "no more money for educational materials." At the end of September! Maybe they could go foraging for lithium.

The entire state of Georgia should be medicated with lithium.

[Seattlegirl]

Funny how dirt-poor mountain peoples keep ending up on top of our minerals.

[edin日本]

No Bin Laden, but, oh, look what we found!



Besides natural resources, Afghanistan is a wedge into central asia, blocking Chinese access to the middle east, and projecting power into the oil & gas rich other former-soviet-stans.

We are at war with Eurasia, we will always be at war with Eurasia. Perpetual war is here to stay!

Does this mean the US will start a series of Flower Wars?

[mechatron]

And the U.S. is never getting out of I.R.A.Q. either, despite what it thinks, as that place is going to be a festering swamp of terrorism from now until Armageddon.

[timely response]

Would this have something to do with his decision?

Mineral resources...

They may need to use up some of those mineral resources to pay for the ongoing war.

Study: Wars could cost $4 trillion to $6 trillion

The authors of the book "The $3 Trillion War" noted in a conference call on Wednesday that when they first released their findings two years ago, the estimates were widely criticized as being too high. Now, the researchers believe they may have been too low.

Joseph Stiglitz, who received the 2000 Nobel Prize for Economics, and Linda Bilmes, a public policy professor at Harvard University, said the number of veterans seeking post-combat medical care and the cost of treating those individuals is about 30 percent higher than they initially estimated. That, combined with increases in the cost of military medical care and the lagging economy, will likely push the true long-term cost of the war over the $4 trillion mark.

"This may be more of a crisis than the Medicare and Social Security problems we have looming," said House Veterans Affairs Chairman Bob Filner, D-Calif. "It rivals both in the potential impact. This is another entitlement we've committed ourselves to, and it could break the bank."

In a conference call with reporters, Bilmes said about 600,000 Iraq and Afghanistan veterans have already sought medical treatment from the Department of Veterans Affairs, and 500,000 have applied for disability benefits. That's about 30 percent higher than initial estimates for care, and could cost the department nearly $1 trillion in costs for the current wars alone.

The House Veterans Affairs Committee will hold a hearing on the costs Thursday morning. Filner said he'll use the new research to push for a "veterans trust fund" to pay for the long-term costs of war, a proposal he's already pitched to Democratic leaders in the House.

Under his plan, lawmakers would add a 10 to 15 percent surcharge on all appropriations bills, banking billions of dollars for future veterans medical costs. Reaction to the idea so far has been negative, Fliner said, because lawmakers are concerned that such a move would make the costs of war look astronomical.

Of course, Filner said, that's exactly the point. Stiglitz said history has shown the costs of treating illnesses such as post-traumatic stress disorder only increase with time, and with the country still expecting a significant presence in Afghanistan for years to come, the bills will keep piling up.

http://www.stripes.com/blogs/stripes...llion-1.120054

[timely response]

And then there's Gates whining about how fewer Americans are seeing serving in the armed forces as their patriotic duty...Gee, I wonder if he mentioned Pat Tillman in his speech.

War's burdens borne by too few, Gates says

Most Americans have grown too detached from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and see military service as 'something for other people to do," Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Wednesday.

In a speech to about 1,200 faculty and students at Duke University, Gates said this imposes a heavy burden on a small segment of society and has wildly driven up the costs of maintaining an all-volunteer force.

Because fewer Americans see military service as their duty, troops today face repeated combat tours and long separations from family. The 2.4 million people in the armed forces represent less than 1 percent of the country's total population.

To attract and retain recruits, the Defense Department finds itself spending more money, including large bonuses and education benefits. That spending has nearly doubled since the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan, from $90 billion to $170 billion.

http://www.stltoday.com/news/nationa...e6492fc1b.html

[mechatron]

Right. Join the Israeli Foreign Legion and see the Middle East.

Looks like the cannon fodder in America have wised up to the fact that religious wars are stupid, endless enterprises and the people who are fomenting them are too smart to fight and die in their own wars.

[edin日本]

Right. Join the Israeli Foreign Legion and see the Middle East.

Shouldn't that be join the Israeli Cyber Warriors, get trained by Chinese hackers and see the interior of Moshe Dayan's mother's basement? You've heard about Stuxnet? It's a virus designed to hack into and disable nuclear reactors. The coding appears to be Chinese but with some rather elegant refinements. If it is the Chinese then it's just business and they're sending out a message to their competitors and if it's the Israelis or some other country then it's a test for something much nastier.

[mechatron]

Shouldn't that be join the Israeli Cyber Warriors, get trained by Chinese hackers and see the interior of Moshe Dayan's mother's basement? You've heard about Stuxnet? It's a virus designed to hack into and disable nuclear reactors. The coding appears to be Chinese but with some rather elegant refinements. If it is the Chinese then it's just business and they're sending out a message to their competitors and if it's the Israelis or some other country then it's a test for something much nastier.

Why would the cannon fodder in Afghanistan downwind of the soon to be operational nuclear power plant at Bushehr infect its control systems with a computer virus which might turn it into another Chernobyl? Are Americans really that stupid? It's entirely possible but I don't think so.

[edin日本]

Why would the cannon fodder in Afghanistan downwind of the soon to be operational nuclear power plant at Bushehr infect its control systems with a computer virus which might turn it into another Chernobyl? Are Americans really that stupid? It's entirely possible but I don't think so.

Reading the various articles, experts believe it's either the Chinese or the Israelis. As neither group is in Afghanistan they wouldn't care if some American or allied troops start to glow in the dark from radiation poisoning.

If it is the Chinese behind this then they can offer to clean up the mess in return for a large quantity of oil and if it's the Israelis then it's another step closer to security for their country.

[mechatron]

. . .As neither group is in Afghanistan they wouldn't care if some American or allied troops start to glow in the dark from radiation poisoning. . . . and if it's the Israelis then it's another step closer to security for their country.

At America's expense, as usual.

[edin日本]

At America's expense, as usual.

Yup! Everyone's favourite fall guy. That's what comes of trying to be policeman to the planet.

[SteadyRollingMan]

Seeing as how how favorite "liberal basher "has not made an appearance maybe he's staying away(?). I will do it for him " See where Liberalism gets you" " I blame all you liberals"
Finished _now bash away

[timely response]

Reading the various articles, experts believe it's either the Chinese or the Israelis.

Looks more and more like it was the Israelis.

Computer experts have discovered a biblical reference embedded in the code of the computer worm that has pointed to Israel as the origin of the cyber attack.

The code contains the word "myrtus", which is the Latin biological term for the myrtle tree. The Hebrew word for myrtle, Hadassah, was the birth name of Esther, the Jewish queen of Persia.

In the Bible, The Book of Esther tells how the queen pre-empted an attack on the country's Jewish population and then persuaded her husband to launch an attack before being attacked themselves.


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worl...orm-claim.html

[edin日本]

Seeing as how how favorite "liberal basher "has not made an appearance maybe he's staying away(?). I will do it for him " See where Liberalism gets you" " I blame all you liberals"
Finished _now bash away

Too short, where's the 12 pages of inane babble, verbal diarrhea and innuendo?

[edin日本]

Looks more and more like it was the Israelis.

Computer experts have discovered a biblical reference embedded in the code of the computer worm that has pointed to Israel as the origin of the cyber attack.

The code contains the word "myrtus", which is the Latin biological term for the myrtle tree. The Hebrew word for myrtle, Hadassah, was the birth name of Esther, the Jewish queen of Persia.

In the Bible, The Book of Esther tells how the queen pre-empted an attack on the country's Jewish population and then persuaded her husband to launch an attack before being attacked themselves.


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worl...orm-claim.html

Ok, if true this mens the Israelis can keep the plant off line for as long as they can engineer nastier and more robust viruses and get them into the system. They won't have to send in an aerial strike or a commando raid.

And if they are really creative they can mock up a CG of iran's supreme mullah issuing a fatwah against the Iranian President and his advisors.

[timely response]

And if they are really creative they can mock up a CG of iran's supreme mullah issuing a fatwah against the Iranian President and his advisors.

Only if they have do a rap version.