Confronting al Qaeda

In a 9/14/09 audiotape, Osama bin Laden addressed the American people, saying once again that "the cause of the quarrel with you is your support of your Israeli allies who have occupied our land, Palestine." He declared that not only Muslims but also Americans suffer because of the US Israel Lobby. He described the Palestinians under siege in Gaza who were pounded with US-made incendiary phosphorus bombs, and he called on the American people to achieve peace and security by freeing ourselves from the Israel Lobby neocons who dictate our foreign policy.

Certainly no one deserves to live under foreign occupation. President Obama has said that we are in Afghanistan to disrupt, dismantle, and defeat al Qaeda. However, al Qaeda has now spread around the world, and we manage to successfully kill al Qaeda leaders in various countries without US military occupation. For instance, just this week US Special Operations and attack helicopters killed a most-wanted al Qaeda ringleader in Somalia, (The New York Times 9/15/09), and a US missile-armed drone killed an al Qaeda commander in Pakistan (The New York Times 9/18/09).

Although it is said that we are in Afghanistan to prevent the establishment of an al Qaeda haven, former CIA counterterrorism chief Paul Pillar wrote in a Washington Post op-ed (9/16/09) that the notion that terrorists require such a haven is unproven: "The preparations most important to the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks took place not in training camps in Afghanistan but, rather, in apartments in Germany, hotel rooms in Spain and flight schools in the United States."

Clearly preventing al Qaeda recruitment is very important, and there is no question that, just as in Palestine, our occupation of Afghanistan, with our civilian bombings, etc, fuels anti-Americanism. Even massive aid hand-outs does not necessarily win hearts and minds, as pointed out by Andrew Wilder, a Tufts University research director in a Boston Globe op-ed 9/16/09. Our aid often fuels massive corruption, and the Taliban's promises of better security, justice, and less corruption are more important to the people than new roads.

This is no doubt one reason Afghanistan president Karzai wants to negotiate a peace with Taliban leader Mullah Omar. The US government opposes this and in fact appears to oppose Karzai who has called for an end to our civilian bombings, a timeline for our withdrawal, etc. In fact, American UN official Peter Galbraith was recently criticized by his UN boss, Norwegian Kai Eide, who correctly said that it isn't the UN's role to appear to be taking sides in the election. (See The Wall Street Journal 9/16/09) (Peter Galbraith incidentally has been a longtime outspoken proponent of Kurdish autonomy/independence.)

Dragging out the political election turmoil makes peace talks less likely and prolongs our occuption indefinitely. As noted in The Christian Science Monitor 9/13/09, it costs 50% more to keep a soldier in Afghanistan, with its rugged mountainous terrain, than in Iraq. However, Israel Lobby neocons are pushing for more US troops in Afghanistan, just as they pushed for war with Iraq. For instance, Israel Lobby neocon William Kristol, son of the late neocon godfather Irving Kristol, founded the Project for a New American Century (PNAC) which sent the notorious 1998 letter to President Clinton calling for a "willingness to undertake military action" to remove Saddam Hussein. PNAC faded away after the Iraq debacle but appears to have resurfaced. William Kristol has now helped found a new organization, The Foreign Policy Initiative, which has just sent a letter to President Obama calling for a bigger military footprint in Afghanistan. It was signed by many of the same people who signed the 1998 PNAC letter. (See The Wall Street Journal 9/16/09).

The Israel Lobby neocons want an indefinite US military presence in Afghanistan to serve as a base from which to attack Iran, Pakistan, and all of Israel's many enemies who object to Israel's illegal occupation of Palestine. And thus the Jewish settlements increase along with al Qaeda recruitment.