USS Clueless              Voyages of a restless mind

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Stardate 20011206.1646 (On Screen): Sometimes I just know what someone else is going to say. Take the current situation in Kabul: because of American bombing and Pashtun ground assault, the Taliban are falling apart and ready to give up. They've been negotiating a surrender with the Pashtun, with the proviso that Mullah Omar be guaranteed safety. The US won't accept that. Here's what I know at least someone will say in the next 24 hours: "The United States is an obstacle to peace." The war in Afghanistan could be over, they'll say, if only the United States was less martial, less aggressive. Look, they'll say, the Taliban are ready to negotiate.

We didn't go into this war for the hell of it. We went into this war to destroy al Qaeda, which was a danger to the United States, and to make a clear example of the Taliban for the benefit of other nations we may need to fight. The one thing we cannot do here is to end the war with the Taliban's leadership getting off scot free, because then our threat to other nations will be blunted. We need to be able to say to Saddam and other similar leaders: Knuckle under or we're going to get you personally. If Omar gets away, even to internal exile, then that threat won't be as credible. Omar tolerated a force inimical to the US within the area he controlled; he refused several years worth of demands that he stop, and it became clear later that he'd sold himself to al Qaeda and acted as a puppet for bin Laden. Omar himself must suffer as a result of this war; either imprisonment or as a casualty of war, but he must suffer; because the heads of other states must be given graphic proof that they themselves will also suffer if they don't change their ways.

If the United States prevents the immediate end of the conflict in Afghanistan because of this it will be because the United States is trying to maximize the chance of not having to fight in any other country. (discuss)

Update: Whew! that's a relief. Hamid Karzai, newly designated leader of the Afghan transition government, says that Omar and the other top Taliban leaders must face trial.