The CIA-Afghanistan bombshell
What the CIA’s alleged payments to President Karzai’s drug-lord brother mean for the Afghanistan war
Ahmed Wali Karzai, brother of Afghan President Hamid Karzai, during an interview
(EPA/Corbis/S. Sabawoon)
In a bombshell revelation based on an anonymous leak, The New York Times reports that the CIA has been funding alleged drug-lord Ahmed Wali Karzai, the Afghan President’s brother, for the past eight years. Wali Karzai is thought to be a player in the country’s lucrative opium trade, a source of revenue for the Taliban. Coming just two weeks before the Afghan elections, how will this leak affect Obama’s war strategy? (Watch the New York Times reporter make the link between the CIA and the Taliban)
This makes it even harder to win the Afghans’ trust: The CIA’s payoffs to Wali Karzai are “at best appalling and at worst a harbinger of doom,” says Fred Kaplan in Slate. The counterinsurgency strategy being hashed out by the White House and Pentagon rests on winning the country’s trust and “propping up” its government, but if the CIA is “abetting high-level corruption,” we can kiss Afghan “hearts and minds” goodbye.
“Friend or Foe?”
Obama must decide between the CIA and Army approaches: The Army may be planning for a counterinsurgency, says David Frum in The Week’s Bullpen, but the CIA is focused on counter-terrorism. “Either we make a big investment aimed at securing peace or we pay a local bad guy to kill even worse guys. It’s the Army approach or the CIA approach….it’s generally expected that [Obama] will split the difference between the two paths.” And that’s a mistake.
“It’s Army vs. CIA in Afghanistan”
A big mess just got messier: Whoever engineered this “extraordinary leak” knew it would compromise President Hamid Karzai's ability to govern the country, says Charles Cooper in CBS News. “Tensions have grown with the U.S., which pressured Hamid Karzai to allow a re-do after the rigged election results. Now, the Afghan leader also has to fight allegations that his corrupt brother is in cahoots with the CIA, the bête noir of every 3rd World conspiracy nut out there.” Afghanistan is looking more like Vietnam all the time.
“Who Outed Our Afghan CIA Agent And Why?”
This is just the cost of doing business in Afghanistan: The Vietnam analogies are worrisome, says Robert Baer in Time. “But before anyone calls for a congressional investigation, let’s remind ourselves” that in Afghanistan, all foreigners—the CIA, NATO, the Carter and Reagan administrations, the Soviets—“survive by renting clans, tribes, and narcotics dealers.”
“Why the CIA Can’t Be Picky About Afghan Partners”
Show: Oldest | Newest
151 Comments
Posted by Aaron, Thursday, October 29, 2009, 12:26 pm So here's a plan: let's leave Afghanistan to itself. I personally don't think the residents there are worth one drop of American blood. If Iran takes it over, then so be it. If they get out of hand again, turn their sand to glass.
Posted by Joe, Thursday, October 29, 2009, 12:47 pm Good plan Aaron, except for one thing. We leave, Taliban returns and takes over. Osama is free to come back and terrorize the free world. After another 9/11, we will be back there again, starting from scratch, making all our efforts and lost blood a waste.
Posted by Jack, Thursday, October 29, 2009, 12:50 pm In Vietnam and now in Afghanistan, our country is not only dealing with drug producers, but the drugs come in to our country as well. We then spend billions of dollars fighting a so called drug war. We worry about who is sleeping with whom in Washington but seemingly do not care about the extrodinary level of corruptiong our government is invlolved in. Here in the US, people go to prison for many years for being involved in such dealings. My goodness, what a hypocritic government we seem to have. And what an apothetic we the people.
Posted by Ol Rick, Thursday, October 29, 2009, 1:03 pm How about we outbid the Taliban for the opium and dump it at sea. That would cripple the Talibans finances as well as the drug lords, and it's far cheaper than trying to interdict the opium trade.
Posted by Larry, Thursday, October 29, 2009, 1:07 pm I keep hearing the same justifications for continuing the war. It does'nt seem to matter that the whole world is going down the drainover this thing. Lots of innocent people are dying. Perhaps this may have been a terrible mistake. With a trillion billion dollars and eightyears invested, they have no strategy. They are trying to install a goverment thats rotten to the core under the guise of democracy. We're kicking a dead horse. It's time to roll up the cord on this thingand move on. A policy of containment is the best approch.
Posted by Alla, Thursday, October 29, 2009, 1:17 pm The Army soilder with boots on the ground knew this!! We have even protected the fields from others at the direction of the CIA, have pictures to prove it, what a joke we Americans are. This Afg government is the best the CIA can buy, same old same old. That is the reason the people of the country hate us, their own government is corrupt, they know it, everyone is aware of these facts, and now the information shows up in the US news papers? Starting to look like a real democracy to me, where are the lobbiest? That is all we need, time to
Posted by Bree, Thursday, October 29, 2009, 1:38 pm Doesn't anybody remember when Bush administration supported Taliban before 9/11? The CIA is behind the opiumgrowing warlords. American government created these problems, Afghan people would have been better off under Soviet control. We tell Karzai to redo his elections, but what about when Bush beat Gore. Our own democracy is looking more oligarchical all the time. We need to clean up our own backyard, before we go knocking on a neighbor's door. Take the beam out of your own eye to see clearly to remove the splinter from your brothers.
Posted by Jb Saxman, Thursday, October 29, 2009, 1:50 pm I say leave those countries alone, bring our kids home and let guard our borders, and protect our freedom here, and let us live in peace here, cause what ever we do they hate us anyway, if an earth quake happens somewhere in the world, they blame us for it, bring our heroes home and thank you very much. God Bless America.
Post a Comment