EXCLUSIVE: U.S. ignored warnings before deadly Afghan attack…Three intelligence reports dismissed days before eight U.S. soldiers killed
Bill Gertz, October 16, 2009
Army Maj. T.G. Taylor, a spokesman for the Army's Task Force Mountain Warrior, told The Times that the three reports did not stand out among hundreds of others and that the intelligence was deemed to be not specific and uncorroborated.
The Economist October 17, 2009 Cover Story
Obama's War: Why the Afghanistan war deserves more resources, commitment and political will
The coalition, however, lacks three essential components of a successful strategy. It needs a credible, legitimate government to work with, the resources to do the job and the belief that America’s president is behind this war.
Many Afghans find it bizarre that the West should devote so much money to Mr Karzai, yet be unable to hold him to account over something so basic as stuffing ballot boxes on an industrial scale. For most, however, the local and provincial leaders matter more than the distant central government.
Phi Beta Iota: Afghanistan may well be this generation's Viet-Nam, and the poster child for lessons not learned. We still cannot do warning, we still cannot connect the dots, we still have no moral grounding (love dictators, hate freedom fighters if they are not ours), and we still have no strategy. It is all connected. Our blind support for Israel on its continuing genocidal actions in Palestine; our blind support for Karzai a world-class thief with a drug lord brother; and our relatively blind support for an ungodly combination of Pakistani military profitting from heroin production and Indian military hell-bent on attracting Al Qaeda deep into India, in combination make no sense at all.
