The Marxist-Leninist Daily

On March 31, the Netherlands is hosting the "International Conference on Afghanistan: a Comprehensive Strategy in a Regional Context" at the World Forum in The Hague. A news release issued by the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs says both the Afghan President Hamid Karzai and UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon are attending. The ministerial discussion will be co-chaired by the Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General for Afghanistan, Kai Eide, Afghan Minister of Foreign Affairs Rangin Dadfar Spanta and the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands, Maxime Verhagen.

The news release says the conference will build "on the achievements of the Conferences held in Bonn, in London and, most recently, in Paris last year." The ministry says "[T]his Conference should reaffirm the solid and long-term commitment of the international community to supporting the Government of Afghanistan in shaping a better future for Afghanistan and its people."

Meanwhile, another conference on Afghanistan was held on March 27 in Moscow sponsored by the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO). "The conference was initiated by Russia in order to coordinate and intensify international cooperation in the field of anti-terrorist and anti-drug actions," Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov stated.

These conferences are being held on the eve of the NATO Summit to be held in Strasbourg on April 4-5 on the occasion of NATO's 60th anniversary, along with the meetings in London of the G-20, at a time of deepening financial and economic crisis and the constitutional crises in which all the big powers are mired. In this issue, TML is providing information about what the big powers say these conferences are supposed to achieve and related views on the mission of the U.S.-led NATO aggressive alliance in Afghanistan. TML reiterates the call of progressive humanity for an immediate end to the imperialist war and occupation of Afghanistan.

Canada Out of Afghanistan Now! Dismantle NATO!
All Out for Demonstrations Against the G-20 and NATO!

Conference in The Hague

The Dutch Foreign Ministry says, "The Conference will take a comprehensive look at the current political, security and development issues facing us in Afghanistan, also taking the regional context into account. The years 2009 and 2010 will be particularly important for Afghanistan. Presidential elections are scheduled to take place on 20 August this year, and parliamentary elections will follow next year. The international community now needs to look ahead and discuss upcoming policy choices.

"The Conference is an intergovernmental conference and attendance is by invitation only. The attendees will include foreign ministers from the countries that attended previous conferences on Afghanistan, including countries that border Afghanistan or are part of the wider region, countries that are part of the International Security Assistance Force and other countries and organisations that are contributing to reconstruction in Afghanistan.

"As with previous conferences, several organisations have been invited to the Conference as observers. The Afghan civil society will also be represented."

Lawrence Cannon, Minister of Foreign Affairs, is attending. "This conference gives members of the international community the opportunity to reflect on progress made, to prepare for important challenges ahead, and to reaffirm our commitment to a stable and peaceful Afghanistan," said Cannon. "We look forward to sharing some of the lessons learned from the last year in particular, during which we established priorities, benchmarked progress, doubled the number of deployed civilians, provided such helpful equipment as helicopters, and increased financial contributions to foster security, governance and development," he said.

"We will also engage with our allies and Afghanistan's neighbouring countries on how to work together to bring about regional cooperation, which everyone agrees is key to a long-term solution to the conflict in Afghanistan," Cannon added. "As one of our six priorities, Canada is helping to enhance border security by facilitating Afghanistan-Pakistan cooperation, since a secure and well-managed border will help promote much-needed economic opportunities for border-region residents."

Canada is echoing the preoccupation of the Americans and NATO as expressed by NATO spokesperson James Appathurai. Speaking to CTV's Canada AM Apparthurai said: "We want to avoid a situation and I think the whole international community wants to avoid a situation where this is seen as Obama's war, Obama's effort. It isn't. It's a UN effort that we're doing for the Afghan people. Our concern in NATO is that all the other allies step up their efforts so it's not just the U.S. doing it all and the rest of us looking on and telling them how they did."

Appathurai suggested NATO would like to see Canada and other member countries shift towards providing greater support for Afghan security forces. He said a strong Afghan police force is the "big piece of the puzzle that's missing" in the effort to stabilize and rebuild Afghanistan.

"I know Canada has devoted not only soldiers and everything they do, but millions of dollars to the overall development effort and the police training. This is one area we as NATO would certainly like to see a lot more of -- yes, forces on the ground but police are going to be the area where a lot needs to be invested," he said.

"We're able to clear territory with our soldiers. We have a lot of development money and development people on the ground but until we can hold, and 'we' meaning first and foremost the Afghans, can hold the territory our soldiers have cleared, the development people can't do their work."

Who Said What

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton: "We must ... support efforts by the government of Afghanistan to separate the extremists of al Qaeda and the Taliban from those who have joined their ranks not out of conviction, but out of desperation."

"They should be offered an honourable form of reconciliation and reintegration into a peaceful society, if they are willing to abandon violence, break with al Qaeda, and support the constitution."

Afghan President Hamid Karzai: "I welcome the growing recognition that without the true cooperation of Afghanistan's neighbours the victory over terrorism cannot be assured."

"We will spare no effort to bring back to Afghanistan and to normal life all those from the ranks of the Taliban, all those who have no association with al Qaeda and are willing to embrace peace and the constitution of the country. The policy of reconciliation, however, can succeed only if carried out under the aegis of the national institutions of Afghanistan."

Richard Holbrooke, US Special Representative For Afghanistan And Pakistan: "How can you talk about Afghanistan and exclude one of the countries that's a bordering, neighbouring state? ... The presence of Iran here is obvious."

Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Mohammad Mehdi Akhoundzadeh: "The presence of foreign forces has not improved things in the country and it seems that an increase in the number of foreign forces will prove ineffective too."

"Iran is fully prepared to participate in the projects aimed at combating drug trafficking and the plans in line with developing and reconstructing Afghanistan."

EU Foreign Policy Chief Javier Solana: "I think it is good that Iran is coming. It is very good and I hope very much that Iran will take a responsible position."

"A foreign force is necessary to train, to help and to develop the national forces, the military and the police."

NATO spokesman James Appathurai: "What is unprecedented is that we have a much broader engagement on Afghanistan that includes Iran...the fact that Iran's here and is making positive noises about making a positive contribution to the international effort is very good...everybody is pulling in the same direction."

Kai Eide, UN Special Envoy to Afghanistan: "We must push aside the atmosphere of doom and gloom that sometimes overshadows the important progress we are making.

"The UN must do more, yes, and we are ready to do more, to deepen our role ... but countries around this table must also be prepared to do more."

"The time for strategic debate must come to an end. We know what to do. Now comes the time for implementation."

German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier: "President Obama has introduced a new focus, one that we welcome very much... We shall have to reinforce our civilian presence. The military presence will remain necessary and in an election year we can expect more tensions."

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov: "Today as never before such a comprehensive approach is necessary. We need to combine the anti-terrorist measures with the socio-economic measures to rebuild Afghanistan and in future Russia is quite ready to participate in that effort."

Dutch Foreign Minister Maxime Verhagen: "We have serious choices to make and the challenge is not just eliminating individual terrorists. It is far more complex -- as we found out. At the moment, we are at the crossroads."

"What we need is a new Afghan bond, a bond that unites those Afghan citizens and the government, which unites Afghans and their neighbours."

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon: "We cannot afford to fail in this endeavour. Failure would be a betrayal of the Afghan people. It would be a betrayal of the progress that has been achieved and it would betray our stated commitment to uphold the ideals of peace, human rights and development for all."

"The daily dose of news out of Afghanistan is not good -- another bombing, a renewed Taliban insurgency, crime, opium production, poverty and warnings from experts the war could drag on without clear results.

"The war has now gone on for more than seven years, with about 70,000 foreign troops in the country, most from the United States. And, President Barack Obama has announced he is sending 4,000 more troops to help train the Afghan armed forces. That's in addition to the 17,000 troops the president wants to deploy in the coming months.

"Included in the foreign military presence on the ground are nearly 60,000 troops that are part of a U.N.-mandated NATO contingent.

"NATO spokesman James Appathurai, has just returned from a visit to Afghanistan, where he accompanied senior NATO officials. 'Our assessment is basically this -- in the North and West of the country, things are basically stable or getting better; in the East in many ways they are getting better as well even though there's a lot more fighting; in the South it's not getting better, it's a stalemate,' he said.

"Appathurai says insurgent activity in Kabul itself is down. But, acknowledges concerns about lack of security are valid and often due to criminal activity, not the Taliban.

"Security analyst Dana Allin of London's International Institute for Strategic Studies, says NATO's achievements in Afghanistan are mixed at best. 'I don't think anybody really appreciated the dimensions of the Afghanistan mission, the inherent difficulty of trying to fight a counter-insurgency against an insurgency that has pretty much free sanctuary in neighboring Pakistan,' said Allin.

"The cross-border dimension of the conflict has led the new administration in Washington to push for a broader, regional approach.

"In announcing his new strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan Friday, President Obama said Taliban and Al-Qaida leadership are planning attacks on the U.S. and other nations from the mountainous border region. He said and they pose threats to both South Asian nations. 'For the American people, this border region has become the most dangerous place in the world. But, this is not simply an American problem, far from it. It is, instead, an international security challenge of the highest order,' he said.

"Analyst Allin says that approach is good, but not necessarily a magic formula. 'The most difficult problem is undoubtedly Pakistan. There is sanctuary in Pakistan that is believed to be where most of the high value al Qaida terrorist leaders are based. And, it is certainly a sanctuary for Taliban fighters to come back,' Allin said.

"And says Allin, a regional strategy might involve unpleasant trade-offs 'deciding that for example, you don't want to do anything that destabilizes Pakistan even though that seems necessary for winning in Afghanistan.'

"How to proceed in Afghanistan, how to adapt strategies, how to increase support? --those are among the issues on the table for the Afghan meeting in The Hague. And at the table will be the US, its allies and rival, Iran.

"Analysts say that while Washington and Tehran are mostly at odds -- Afghanistan is one area where they could more easily find common ground."

According to the Associated Press, "Washington ruled out what it called 'substantive' discussions with the Iranians ahead of the session, and Clinton told reporters aboard a flight to the conference that she had no plans to seek them out. Still, she added Monday that it was a good sign that Iran decided to come."

"The range of countries and institutions that are represented here shows the universal recognition that what happens in Afghanistan matters to us all," Clinton said.

"Sitting at the far end of a conference table from Clinton, Iran's Deputy Foreign Minister Medhi Akhundzadeh said that the 'buildup of Afghanistan's security capacity is the surest and least costly way' to overcome terrorism."

"The international community has declared that by being present in Afghanistan it intends to help the people of the country in establishing security," Akhundzadeh said. "It has to safeguard this objective and refrain from any kind of deviation from this motto or from giving priority to political or military matters," he said.

(Sources: Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Associated Press, CTV, Reuters)

Conference in Moscow

On March 27 in Moscow, a conference on Afghanistan was held, sponsored by the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO). Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov noted the following participants: "Taking part in it will be delegates from the SCO nations and from observer states, from Afghanistan, of course, and also from Turkmenistan, from the G-8 countries and from several international organisations, including the United Nations, the European Union, the Collective Security Treaty Organisation, the Commonwealth of Independent States and NATO."

"The principal summing up documents will include a statement by members of the SCO-Afghanistan Contact Group and attached to it will be a Plan of Actions, listing the concrete joint steps that are to be taken," the minister stated. "Moreover, plans are afoot to release a Declaration of the Conference," he added.

The Itar-Tass news agency reported that the agenda of the conference would consider problems linked with the latest developments in Afghanistan and their impact on the neighbouring nations. Participants planned to discuss the problem of boosting the joint efforts of the international community in counter-terrorism, illegal circulation of narcotics and trans-border organised crime emanating from the territory of Afghanistan.

"In spite of the efforts, exerted by the Afghan authorities and the international military force in that country, the security situation there is growing worse," Russia's Permanent Ambassador to the United Nations Vitaly Churkin said. "Particularly disturbing is the fact that terrorists are now actually in control of several districts of Afghanistan and are forming parallel governing structures there," he added.

Churkin stressed that "drug trafficking is still the main source of terrorism's financial backing in Afghanistan" and expressed the hope that "implementation of the Russo-Afghan intergovernmental agreement on cooperation in the effort to combat the illicit circulation of narcotic substances will help promote joint efforts to counter the drug crime."

Deputy Head of the Department on New Challenges and Menaces of the Russian Foreign Ministry Sergei Tarasenko stated: "Russia will strive to enlist a maximum number of co-authors to draft a Resolution of the U.N. General Assembly on steps to counter the drug menace, emanating from Afghanistan, which is now being drawn up on Moscow's initiative. We shall hold a special meeting on Afghanistan within the framework of the Russian mission to the U.N. Security Council, possibly this May, with accent put on narcotics and on the UN and the coalition forces' more active participation in the fight against this menace."

Bolat Nurgaliyev, the Secretary-General of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, gave the view that "the current situation in Afghanistan is very troubling and is endangering the entire region's security and stability. It is necessary to realize why, in spite of the considerable international aid amounting to approximately twenty billion U.S. dollars, Afghanistan still sees no light at the end of the tunnel. There are certain achievements, of course, but lasting stabilisation in Afghanistan is unthinkable without the suppression of the extremist and terrorist forces, without the elimination of organised crime, sustained by drug trade."

"Russia is able to exert notable political influence on the stabilisation of the situation in Afghanistan," NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer assured. "Cooperation on Afghanistan will be among the most promising areas of the Russia-NATO Council's work after its official meetings are resumed in April," he added, also noting the special importance for the Alliance of the agreement on railway transit carriages across Russian territory of non-military freight for the ISAF force in Afghanistan, which began early in March.

Role of Shanghai Cooperation Organisation Highlighted at Conference on Afghanistan

The Moscow conference on Afghanistan was held Friday under the auspices of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), a regional security organization comprising Kazakhstan, China, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.

The meeting, primarily aimed at finding a new way out for war-ravaged Afghanistan, was also attended by representatives of Group of Eight members, Turkmenistan, Turkey, Iran, the United Nations, the Collective Security Treaty Organization, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, the European Union and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

In a welcome message to the participants, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said he was confident that the meeting would provide results of weighty contributions to the efforts by the SCO members, its observers, other states and international organizations to assist Afghanistan.

Grave Syndrome

It would not be overdramatic to describe the current situation in Afghanistan as a unique syndrome, analysts said, because the series of challenges facing the country, such as the lingering menace of terrorism, rampant drug trafficking, severe organized crime and overdue reconstruction, have threatened the security and stability of not only the country, but also the entire region.

All these highly intertwined and correlated "symptoms" have complicated the "syndrome" and thus made it hard to cure.

Analysts pointed out that a sort of power balance has formed in Afghanistan. On the one hand, dragged down by the ongoing financial crisis and the economic downturn, the United States and its NATO allies have fallen weak to annihilate the Taliban military forces and other terrorists in Afghanistan. On the other hand, Taliban forces cannot launch effective counterattacks as well. That's why sporadic terrorist attacks frequently hit the country.

Furthermore, the incumbent Afghan government was not able to lay out clear goals and sound plans for the country's future development, and the international aid fund has not been fully used.

Under such circumstances, the current Afghanistan economy has become a great concern. The highly profitable drug chain, which is the major monetary resource of terrorism, becomes increasingly rampant and has reached some other Central Asian countries.

Tough Anti-Terrorism Situation for Washington

After overthrowing the Taliban regime and helping form a new government, the United States has fallen short of subsequent counter-terror operations and assistance for rebuilding the country.

Due to the ongoing crisis, the variant stances the neighboring countries take on the U.S. operations, and apprehension over the rising death toll, it may only seem reasonable for U.S. President Barack Obama to readjust his policy toward Afghanistan, analysts say.

To shift from Iraq to Afghanistan was one of Obama's major foreign policy adjustments. The U.S. president announced in February that his country would send an additional 17,000 troops to Afghanistan, increasing the number of deployed servicemen there to about 60,000 in one and a half years.

Media observers believed that the shift would not only help the Obama administration pull out of the apparently unjustified mire of the Iraq war and retain its reputation, but also help it focus on the real threat of terrorism and gain more support back home.

The United States initially desired to hold its own conference on Afghanistan on March 31 in the Hague, but authorities changed their minds and expanded the conference to fall under the auspices of the UN, according to Alexander Lukin, director of the Center for East Asia and Shanghai Cooperation Organization Studies at Moscow State University for International Relations.

Obama will probably use the gathering to invite as many countries as possible to participate by contributing financially and militarily, the Moscow Times quoted Lukin as saying.

Meanwhile, there is urgency to the task "because even some of Washington's closest allies are currently planning to withdraw their forces from Afghanistan," he added.

Detailed Prescription from the SCO

To unravel the imbroglio and cure the Afghan syndrome, the Moscow conference on Afghanistan under the auspices of the SCO has given out a specific prescription with comprehensive cooperation from all parties concerned against terrorism, drug trafficking and organized crime.

For drug trafficking, the SCO members and Afghanistan will exchange intelligence, conduct joint operations, extinguish money laundering involved with drug deals, train anti-drug personnel, and amend the legal basis for the prohibition of drug trafficking and precursor chemicals.

As for terrorism, the major direction will be on strengthening frontier defense, checking suspected terrorists, conducting joint operations against terrorism, gradually assimilating Afghanistan into the regional counter-terror cooperation within the framework of the SCO, and obtain intelligence from security-threatening terrorist organizations through coordination and collaboration.

As for organized crime, the SCO members will cooperate with Afghan authorities on cracking down on arms dealing and other trans-border organized crimes; exchange of information; assistance in criminal arrests, evidence collection and transfer; studying the feasibility of joint operations and mutual personnel exchange; and improve vocational training programs of Afghan law enforcement authorities.

Moreover, the SCO members have agreed to continue bilateral economic and trade cooperation with Afghanistan and play a role in the international efforts to reconstruct the Afghan economy.

Deputy Russian Foreign Minister Alexei Borodavkin described the Moscow gathering as an important stage for joint efforts to stabilize the situation in Afghanistan.

The active participation by various parties in the conference demonstrated that the SCO has become an efficient international platform to discuss measures of assistance for Afghanistan.

Obama Team Outlines 'New Realism' for Afghanistan

The Obama administration today today outlined a new campaign strategy for the war in Afghanistan, scaling back the ambitions of George Bush in a shift which senior officials and diplomats described as a "new realism."

Richard Holbrooke, Barack Obama's new envoy for Afghanistan, General James Jones, the new White House national security adviser, and General David Petraeus, the new commander of the Afghan campaign, all stressed that the U.S. president's policy on the Taliban and al-Qaida would be governed by "attainable goals" matched by "adequate resources."

In the first major foreign policy speech from the new administration, the vice-president, Joe Biden, told a security conference in Munich that the strategic review on Afghanistan under way in Washington would "make sure that our goals are clear and achievable."

Notable by its absence in any of the speeches from the American team was any mention of building democracy in Afghanistan. Instead, the emphasis was on creating sustainable security to try to prevent the Taliban from extending their grip on the country.

"Obama's objectives will be much more moderate," said a senior European policy-maker involved in discussions with the Obama team. A senior Nato official said Washington's emphasis on Afghanistan was shifting to "being much more realistic," adding: "It doesn't need to be a democracy, just secure."

"The new policy will be not just winning hearts and minds, but winning hearts, minds, and stomachs," said another senior diplomat working in Kabul. "It's realistic. Realism is good."

The Obama team and Nato leaders are due to finalise a "comprehensive" review of the Afghan strategy by April when the U.S. president arrives in Europe for a Nato summit in France and Germany.

"Barack Obama is a pragmatist. He knows we must deal with the world as it is," said Jones. He added that there had been a "failure to harmonise" the various strands of the campaign in Afghanistan. The new policy would place greater emphasis on "going beyond military capacity" to dealing with good governance, judicial reform, a focus on the police, and the "war on drugs."

General John Craddock, the Nato commander, said alliance forces in Afghanistan would launch attacks on opium and heroin cartels "within a few days," a decision that has triggered some dispute among some European Nato allies.

Petraeus made it plain that the Americans expected the Europeans to contribute more troops to the campaign in Afghanistan, although there were no troop pledges made over the weekend.

John Hutton, the British defence secretary, was the sole European voice today calling for more troops to be dispatched. "It is better to volunteer than to be asked," he said, denouncing the European habit in Nato of "looking to the Americans to do all the heavy lifting."

Hutton delivered an unusually robust attack on Nato's bureaucracy, arguing that the operations to counter the Taliban represented the alliance's future.

"This is not an aberration. This is the pattern of future conflicts. I do not believe we are properly preparing for it," he said.

Nato should show a "wartime mentality" over the campaign in Afghanistan, but instead it possessed a "peacetime culture obsessed with process," he added.

Hutton's attack on Nato's indecision was welcomed by Petraeus, who described the remarks as "a terrific message." The U.S. is expected to almost double its contingent in Afghanistan to about 60,000 troops.

Holbrooke signalled a sharp change of tack on Afghanistan, saying: "We've inherited a situation of grand rhetoric and inadequate resources, both military and civilian. We need to understand what our goal is in Afghanistan."

A New Afghanistan Nightmare

When U.S. envoy to Afghanistan, Richard Holbrooke met with Afghanistan's 'democratically' installed President Hamid Karzai in Kabul on February 14, he may have just learned of the historic significance of the following day. February 15 commemorates the end of the bloody Russian campaign against Afghanistan (August 1978-February 1989).

But it is unlikely that Holbrooke will absorb the magnitude of that historic lesson. Both he and the new U.S. President Barack Obama are convinced that the missing component for winning the war in Afghanistan is a greater commitment, as in doubling the troops, increasing military spending, and, by way of winning hearts and minds, investing more in developing the country. That combination, the U.S. administration believes, will eventually sway Afghans from supporting the Taliban, tribal militias, Pashtun nationalists and other groups. The latter is waging a guerilla struggle in various parts of the country, mostly in the south, to oust Karzai's government and foreign occupation forces. While Kabul was considered an "oasis of calm" -- by Jonathan Steele's account -- during the Soviet rule, it's nowhere close to that depiction under the rule of the U.S. and its NATO allies, who had plenty of time, eight long years, to assert their control, but failed.

In fact, just as Holbrooke sat within Karzai's heavily guarded presidential palace, roadside bombs were detonating across the country, in Khost, in Kandahar and elsewhere. Several police officers were killed, the latest addition to the hundreds of soldiers and officers who die each year as they desperately defend the few symbols of the central government's authority. Aside from its shaky control over Kabul, and a few provincial capitals, the central government struggles to maintain the little relevance it still holds.

This deems most of the country a battleground between Afghani militias, seen by a growing number of Afghans as a legitimate resistance force against an illegitimate occupation; that being U.S. and NATO forces.

Unlike the unpopular war in Iraq, Afghanistan was widely viewed in the U.S. as a moral war, based on the logic that since al-Qaeda was responsible for the September 11 terrorist attacks, and since the group is hosted by an equally militant Taliban government, both groups must pay. So far, the people of Afghanistan have paid many times over the price expected. Thousands were killed, and an entire generation was scarred by a new civil war, and yet a new foreign military occupation.

While mainstream news consumers are inundated with official commentary and occasional news reports on the challenges awaiting the U.S. in Afghanistan, to secure democracy, freedom and 'national interests,' media reports continue to reduce the battle over Afghanistan as one that is concerned with fighting local corruption, instilling human rights and ensuring gender equality.

Little is said of the pertinent reasons behind the war, as such seemingly tedious rhetoric of great games to control the Eurasian landmass -- which dates back to the 19th century's rivalry between British and Russian empires -- is more suited for academic discussions that are by no means newsworthy.

But it is perhaps relevant to note that desperate attempts at controlling Afghanistan have failed miserably in the past. If Holbrooke wishes to dig deeper into history, he should learn that the British Empire, which controlled India at the time, was also defeated in Afghanistan in 1842, and again in 1878. Soviet leaders looked for a quick victory as they occupied Kabul in December 1979, only to find themselves engaged in a most bloody war that cost them 15,000 deaths (it goes without saying that the hundreds of thousands of Afghani deaths often go unreported) and an unmitigated defeat.

But, then again, Holbrooke must've known of the details of the latter period, for after all, it was his country that armed and financially sustained the mujahideen forces in Afghanistan fearing that the Soviets' ultimate objective, during the Cold War was challenging U.S. dominance in the region, and eventually the Middle East. Considering the strategically disastrous toppling of the Shah of Iran to the U.S., the world-leading superpower could take no chances.

But since then, Afghanistan has grown in significance from a politically strategic landmass, due to its proximity to warm-waters and regional powers, to an energy strategic landmass, inevitable to the exploitation of Caspian oil.

"I cannot think of a time when we have had a region emerge as suddenly to become as strategically significant as the Caspian," said former vice-president Dick Cheney in a speech to oil moguls in 1998. In the same year, John Maresca, vice president of international relations of Unocal Corporation commented before a House committee in February 2008 on ways to transfer Caspian basin oil (estimated between 110 to 243bn barrels of crude, worth up to $4 trillion): "(One) option is to build a pipeline south from Central Asia to the Indian Ocean. One obvious route south would cross Iran, but this is foreclosed for American companies because of U.S. sanctions legislation. The only other possible route is across Afghanistan."

Military success in Afghanistan is simply not possible, for numerous logistical, historical and practical reasons. But failure will also come at a price, at least for those who will directly benefit from subduing the rebellious nation.

Former president Bush and his entourage of allies failed to turn Afghanistan into a U.S.-styled democracy, easily exploitable for strategic and economic use. By pressing a military solution in Afghanistan, Obama is not only summoning another failed U.S. imperial experiment -- as that in Iraq -- but insists on adding his country's name to those of Britain and Russia, who had better chances of success, but were squarely defeated.

"It's like fighting sand. No force in the world can get the better of the Afghans," Oleg Kubanov, a former Russian officer in Afghanistan told Reuters. "It's their holy land; it doesn't matter to them if you're Russian, American. We're all soldiers to them."

It would be timely if Holbrooke takes a few hours from his hectic schedule in the region to brush up on Afghanistan's history, for he surely needs it.

* Ramzy Baroud (www.ramzybaroud.net) is an author and editor of PalestineChronicle.com. His work has been published in many newspapers, journals and anthologies around the world. His latest book is, "The Second Palestinian Intifada: A Chronicle of a People's Struggle" (Pluto Press, London).

Afghanistan: U.S., NATO Wage World's
Largest and Longest War

On October 7 it will enter its ninth calendar year and with the projected deployment of at least 30,000 more American and thousands of more fellow NATO nations' troops this year it promises to go on indefinitely.

It is the second longest war, both on the air and ground fronts, in United States' history, with only its protracted involvement in Indochina so far exceeding it in length.

The Afghan war is also the North Atlantic Treaty Organization's first armed conflict outside of Europe and its first ground war in the sixty years of its existence. It has been waged with the participation of armed units from all 26 NATO member states and twelve other European and Caucasus nations linked to NATO through the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council, the Partnership for Peace and the Adriatic Charter with the first-ever invocation of the Alliance's Article 5 mutual military assistance provision.

The twelve European NATO partners who have sent troops in varying numbers to assist Washington and the Alliance include the continent's five former neutral nations: Austria, Finland, Ireland, Sweden and Switzerland.

The European NATO and partnership deployments count among their number troops from six former Soviet Republics -- with Azerbaijan, Georgia and Ukraine tapped for recent reinforcements and the three Baltic states represented disproportionately to their populations -- although Western officials and media refrain from using words like invasion, empire and occupation that were tossed around so profligately in the 1980s.

The conflict marks the first time since the Vietnam War that U.S., Australian, New Zealand and South Korean troops have fought in the same campaign in the same theater. (Although all four also had troops in Iraq after March of 2003, only American forces were engaged in combat. In Afghanistan, however, over 1,000 Australian troops, including special forces, participate in counterinsurgency operations and ten of their soldiers have been killed.)

In all, 42 nations have military contingents ranging from a handful to thousands of troops serving under NATO in a war nearly as far removed from the North Atlantic as could have been imagined and embroiled in an endless engagement because of a 1949 commitment by the major Western powers to render each other military aid in the event of a conflict in Western Europe or North America.

Over a thousand U.S., NATO and NATO partner nations' soldiers have been killed in the war, including servicemen from all three Baltic States, Australia and South Korea.

From the beginning of the invasion of and war in Afghanistan in early October of 2001 under the aegis of so-called Operation Enduring Freedom, which commenced with U.S. and British air and missile attacks, the model used seventeen months later in Iraq, the conflict has not been limited to Afghanistan itself but rather has exploited the nation's alleged and highly tenuous connections to the September 11, 2001 attacks on the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon in Washington to situate U.S. and other NATO military forces in several neighboring and nearby nations, including airbases and troop and naval deployments in Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Pakistan and the Indian Ocean (where the Japanese navy has been assisting Operation Enduring Freedom).

The Russian press wire agency Itar-Tass reported last December that 120,000 U.S. and NATO soldiers passed through the Manas airbase in Kyrgyzstan in 2008.

2009 has brought the Pentagon and NATO the bad news that the government of Kyrgyzstan may close the base to warplanes used for the war in Afghanistan, a base that since 2001 has hosted military personnel from the United States, Australia, Denmark, Norway, New Zealand, Poland, Turkey, the Netherlands, Italy, Spain, France and South Korea.

The Pentagon officially defines Operation Enduring Freedom's area of responsibility as encompassing fifteen nations: Afghanistan, Pakistan, Cuba (Guantanamo Bay Naval Base), Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Jordan, Kenya, Kyrgyzstan, the Philippines, the Seychelles, Sudan, Tajikistan, Turkey, Uzbekistan and Yemen.

After the invasion of Afghanistan in October of 2001, the U.S. and its NATO allies obtained from the United Nations of ever-obliging Secretary-General Kofi Annan (who in 1995 held the posts of Special Representative of the Secretary General of the United Nations to the former Yugoslavia and special envoy to NATO and was installed as Secretary-General after the U.S. deposed his predecessor Boutros Boutros-Ghali and browbeat the other 14 Security Council members in 1997 to accept him) a resolution authorizing the establishment of an International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), initially to oversee Afghanistan's occupation, but later to wage a full-blown counterinsurgency campaign inside the country and across the border into Pakistan.

There was and is nothing international about ISAF. It is a NATO operation entirely.

From December of 2001 until August of 2003 command of ISAF was held in six month rotations by major NATO nations. At the end of that period it passed to NATO collectively. Initially its mission was limited to the capital of Kabul, but by 2003 its mandate was extended beyond the capital and by 2006 to all of Afghanistan's provinces.

To deploy combat forces to a nation that was bombed and invaded and to conduct aerial and ground assaults throughout its territory is as good a working definition of the words war and occupation as could be devised.

Afghanistan has become a permanent training ground and firing range for providing the U.S. and its NATO allies and candidate members opportunities to test out new weapons systems, wage 21st Century counterinsurgency operations and integrate so-called niche deployment military units from over 42 nations to achieve weapons and warfighting interoperability.

Polish military officials among others have openly stated that in Afghanistan NATO has provided them with the conditions to modernize their armed forces, which had not been employed in war zone and combat operations since the beginning of World War II. Coupled with recent statements by Polish and Baltic officials that NATO should renew its focus on "defending" Europe, the Greater Afghan war theater is a laboratory for preparing Eastern European and South Caucasus nations for actions on Russia's eastern and southern borders.

Last month the U.S. signed an agreement with Poland to train their special forces (comparable to what the Pentagon has already done with Georgia), citing Afghanistan as the immediate locale for its joint implementation.

The comparative size of each NATO nation's contribution is less important than the fact that several tens, perhaps hundreds, of thousands of NATO troops have been rotated through Afghanistan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan over the past seven and a half years and in the process gained experience in serving under the command of major NATO powers.

Earlier this year the U.S.'s Central Command chief David Petraeus began focusing on the Caucasus nations of Georgia and Azerbaijan as military transit routes for the expanding war in Afghanistan and visited the former Soviet Central Asian republics of Kazakhstan and Tajikistan to also incorporate them into the ever-widening South Asian war vortex.

Late last year General Nikolai Makarov, chief of the General Staff of Russia's Armed Forces, warned that "American military bases are dotted throughout the world. The U.S. has opened bases in Romania and Bulgaria, and according to our information plans to establish them in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan." ....

Much is made in Western official circles and in the obedient media about the pretexts under which the U.S. and NATO attacked and invaded Afghanistan, took over all its strategic Soviet era airbases (as was done most recently with the Shindand airbase in 2005 in Herat Province, near the Iranian border) and installed a compliant puppet government to rule over the nation and its people.

At first as the memory of the attacks of September 11, 2001 were still freshly burned into America's and the world's imaginations, the rationale for Operation Enduring Freedom was to hunt down and "bring to justice"--- or kill--- Osama bin Laden, Mullah Omar and several of their top associates in a lex talionis punishment for the deadly attacks on New York's financial center and the headquarters of the U.S. Defense Department.

As the years proceeded and not only weren't bin Laden and Mullah Omar apprehended but their whereabouts couldn't even be determined, emphasis was shifted to the fight against Taliban for having hosted the above two.

That fallback position was belied by the fact that Washington in the person of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld right after 9/11 asserted that as many as sixty nations, almost a third of the world's, were harboring terrorists and as such were fair game for missile and other attacks, but conspicuously left off the hit list the only three nations that had recognized, funded and no doubt armed the Taliban: Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

Nor was the Taliban argument helped by U.S.-installed President Hamid Karzai being quoted regularly on the U.S.'s Voice of Afghanistan (an offshoot of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty) applauding "our Taliban" who "fought shoulder-to-shoulder with us in the jihad against the Soviets."

The U.S. and NATO tact was then to adopt an ex post facto humanitarian guise to justify their fanning out into Afghanistan's provinces in 2003 (in addition to the original in Kabul, NATO launched North, South, East and West commands): Establishing so-called Provincial Reconstruction Teams (PRTs).

Invading armies with their bombers, cruise missiles, 15,000 pound Daisy Cutter bombs and long-range artillery are designed to destroy and not construct buildings and the PRTs would be better termed provincial pacification teams, with the model being the Strategic Hamlet Program in South Vietnam in the early 1960s.

More reasons would be devised to explain the West's continuing and growing presence and intensifying military operations in Afghanistan and its environs.

Four years of Taliban power had at least accomplished one objective; it had curbed opium cultivation.

However, after a few years of NATO occupation Afghanistan became the world's largest producer and exporter of opium and so last autumn the Alliance announced that it was planning to conduct armed raids against opium and "drug traffickers," however the West decided to define the second.

The ongoing and endless war in Afghanistan -- and now Pakistan -- has metamorphosed from a hunt for bin Laden, to a fight against Taliban to a drug war modeled after the U.S.'s murderous Plan Colombia initiated in 1999. There are reports that 300 Colombian troops are slated for deployment to Afghanistan to replicate that model.

Notwithstanding recent talk by U.S. President Barrack Obama about an Afghan exit strategy, it's not apparent that Washington and its allies ever intend to leave the country and the broader South-Asia/Central Asia/Caspian Sea Basin/South Caucasus circumference whose center Afghanistan is.

Two weeks ago the Russia Novosti website featured this observation: "Central Asian states think the U.S. started the Afghan war to change the regional regimes into local analogues of Georgia's Saakashvili and Ukraine's Yushchenko, and that it began with Afghan President Hamid Karzai. Iran, China and Russia think the war could be Washington's attempt to reduce their influence in Central Asia to zero."

Less than four months before the invasion of Afghanistan, China, Russia and four of the five former Soviet Central Asia republics -- Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan -- founded the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), a mutual security grouping that would later include India, Iran, Mongolia and Pakistan as observers.

It's purpose is to provide regional security and to address the issues of trans-border crime, including narcotics smuggling, armed extremism and separatism.

Since its inception it has also increasingly focused on joint development projects in the spheres of energy, transportation, trade and infrastructure.

With the breakup of the Soviet Union, Central Asia was seen by the SCO's founding members and since by its observers as a mechanism for fostering mutually beneficial relations among the nations of Central Asia and Russia, China, Iran, India and even Turkey eventually.

Afghanistan has been hurled into interminable turmoil, with hundreds of thousands of its citizens displaced; almost daily bombing runs, drone missile attacks, middle-of-the-night commando raids, indiscriminate shooting of civilians at checkpoints; mass-scale drought and famine; an explosion of opium cultivation and trafficking; expansion of that destabilization by setting Pakistan aflame with the potential for its fragmentation and dismemberment and heightened tensions with its -- fellow nuclear -- neighbor India.

This is the current, grave situation seven and a half years after the invasion of Afghanistan.

With the deployment of another 30,000 U.S. troops and thousands more from NATO's ranks (recently Italy, Poland, Georgia, Azerbaijan and other nations have announced increases) Western troop strength will soon approach 100,000.

This is pouring fuel on fire. Taliban has become as amorphous a term as al-Qaeda has been; anyone in Afghanistan, even in the non-Pushtun North and West of the nation, who takes issue with Western warplanes and combat troops dealing out death and destruction in their nation and their villages is now a Talib. An enemy.

The more U.S. and NATO troops that arrive in Afghanistan, the more resentment, resistance and violence will ensue. Inevitably.

The U.S. and NATO have arrogantly spurned offers by the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and the post-Soviet Collective Security Treaty Organization to assist in bringing a regional -- and non-military -- resolution of the myriad crises afflicting Afghanistan, its long-suffering people and the region.

NATO is not a nation-building, peacekeeping or humanitarian outfit -- it is an aggressive military bloc. When it and its individual member states' military forces leave South and Central Asia then healing, reconstruction and lasting peace can begin.

Calendar of Events

(All events Saturday, April 4 unless otherwise noted)

PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND
Charlottetown
Friday, April 3 -- 4:30 pm
The Island Peace Committee calls Islanders to a Peace Rally and Walk on Friday, April 3, 2009 beginning at 4:30 pm in front of the PEI Legislature, Richmond Street, Charlottetown. The Rally and Walk will demand an end to the NATO-led occupation that has already killed thousands of Afghan civilians and threatens to bring war to the entire region. The Rally will also call on the Canadian government to support our troops by bringing them home NOW.

QUEBEC
Montreal
Gathering -- 1:00 pm
Departure -- 1:30 pm
Dorchester Square (corner of Peel and René-Lévesque west, metro Peel)
Organized by: Collectif Échec à la guerre

ONTARIO
Ottawa
Rally -- 1:00 pm
Spider statue, National Art Gallery
Organized by: Ottawa Peace Assembly

Toronto
Rally and March -- 1:00 pm
Dundas Square (Dundas subway station)
Organized by: Toronto Coalition to Stop the War

Windsor
Rally and March -- 12:00 noon
Gather in the parkette at Wyandotte and Goyeau. Rally with speakers,
followed by a march through downtown.
Organized by: Windsor Peace Coalition

MANITOBA
Winnipeg
Public Debate -- 1:00 pm
St. Matthew's Anglican Church, 641 St. Matthew's Avenue
(corner of St. Matthew and Maryland)
Free Admission
Peace Alliance Winnipeg believes it is essential for Canadians to examine the issue of NATO. The question to be resolved is a simple one: "Should Canada remain in NATO?" The Debaters: Dr. James Fergusson, Director of the Centre for Defence and Security Studies, University of Manitoba; Professor Henry Heller, Department of History, University of Manitoba
Organized by: Winnipeg Peace Alliance

ALBERTA
Calgary
Rally -- 2:00 pm
Corner of 8th St and 17th Ave SW (Tompkins Park)
We'll be holding banners, handing out leaflets, getting a petition signed and speaking out!
For information: candil-at-shaw.ca

Edmonton
Rally -- 1:00 pm
Churchill Square
Sponsored by: Edmonton Coalition Against War And Racism
Slogans for the anti-birthday party for NATO's 60th anniversary are: Canada and NATO out of Afghanistan! Canada Out of NATO! Bring the Troops Home Now! Occupation is a crime!
Free Palestine -- Let Gaza Live!
For information: www.ecawar.org

BRITISH COLUMBIA
Grand Forks
Walk and Rally -- 1:00 pm
Walk from Lois Hagan Park (beside City Hall). Followed by Rally @ The Source.
Donations gratefully accepted.
Sponsors: Boundary Peace Initiative; Canadian Peace Alliance; USCC Working Groups: KRUNA
For information: Laura, 442-0434

Vancouver
'Housing Not War' Contingent at Grand March for Housing
12:00 noon
Seaforth Peace Flame Park
"Money for housing, not for war"; "From Canada to Afghanistan, stop the war on the poor." The StopWar.ca Coalition is joining with other peace and community organizations to connect the issues of housing and social spending and the war in Afghanistan. We'll be marching as part of this major spring action to raise awareness of the urgent need to end homelessness and provide homes for all.
Organized by: Stopwar.ca Coalition

Canada Out of Afghanistan Now! Dismantle NATO!