The U.S. Department of Defense has shelled out $150 million to Afghan companies “accused of helping to finance terrorist attacks on American soldiers and facilities,” according to an explosive new ABC News report.
“It’s like the United States government subsidizing the Taliban, al Qaeda, the Haqqani network, those groups that are trying to shoot and kill our soldiers,” U.S. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-New Hampshire) told ABC’s Dianne Sawyer.
Great …
The report – based on information compiled by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) – is the latest ridiculousness in America’s ongoing “War On Terror,” which just entered its twelfth year in Afghanistan.
What are we still doing there? Good question …
The SIGAR’s office – led by John Sopko – is the same agency which recently exposed the totally unnecessary construction of a 64,000-square foot U.S. military headquarters in the Helmund province of Afghanistan. The $34 million facility will … get this … never be used.
Astoundingly, the Department of Defense is refusing to stop issuing payments to these shady contractors.
“The reason they’ve given us is that it’s not fair to these contractors that the evidence that we’ve presented, and this is evidence collected by the United States government, is classified,” Sopko told ABC News. “That’s the absurdity of it. We can probably attack them via drone on Monday and we’ll issue them a contract on Tuesday.”
With taxpayers picking up the tab in both cases …
Oh well … we probably shouldn’t be surprised. After all it’s not like leading warmongers (most notably U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham) haven’t wanted to subsidize terror networks in the past.
For those of you keeping score at home, a recent Harvard University study determined the true cost of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq to be in the neighborhood of $4-6 trillion.
“The large sums borrowed to finance operations in Iraq and Afghanistan will also impose substantial long-term debt servicing costs,” the report found. “As a consequence of these wartime spending choices, the United States will face constraints in funding investments in personnel and diplomacy, research and development and new military initiatives. The legacy of decisions taken during the Iraq and Afghanistan wars will dominate future federal budgets for decades to come.”
And for what?
Last time we checked, American intervention has succeeded only in making bad situations worse.
23 comments
We should be 100% out of Iraq and Afghanistan. We should also close 95% of our overseas military bases. Such a waste.
And we’ll just dare them to come to our shores and attack us. They won’t dare do that, we’re too strong, we’re too smart and we’re better than them in every respect. They just wouldn’t even conceive to come here and attack us, none of them.
(Not the Germans, Not the Japanese, Not Al Qaeda, Not the Iranians, none of them)
Let’s keep it all in perspective. 3000 people were killed on 9/11.
That means the odds of anyone in the US being killed from THE ONE successful attack on US shores since Pearl Harbor was around 1 in 1 BILLION.
Our response has cost the nation TRILLIONS of dollars that we don’t have and borrow from China.
Not to mention the loss of around 5000 American soldiers and estimates of Iraq/Afghani CIVILIANS between 130,000 and 600,000(but brown people don’t matter, right?)
Jackie was BEING NICE when he called it a waste.
The nation’s emotional knee jerk response(much to the delight of the MIC) and been an unmitigated disaster.
Now you may proceed with the demagoguery of bringing up the 9/11 victims, etc.
I love the logic of “they want to attack us, so let’s move into their back yard and make it even easier for them to attack us.”
Furthermore, how does us having military bases in South Korea, the Philippines, Germany, and Japan stop terrorism?
I’m all for killing them in their on yard but we don’t necessarily have to be living in the neighborhood to accomplish that…
What do you mean “THE ONE successful attack on US shores since Pearl Harbor“, Kemosabe?
If you don’t count the War of Northern Aggression you’ve got to go back to 1812, or so.
And, EJB, 911 was blowback from our meddling in the middle east.
No, it was more than blowback for meddling. It was that, sure, but it was more of a culture clash. As much as I hate to admit it, we have to ‘meddle’ in the middle east, and everywhere else, really. It is a global world, in case you haven’t noticed. The only way to avoid ‘meddling’ is to not be involved with the region at all. That’s impossible EVEN IF WE USED NO OIL AT ALL.
I’m sorry I can not accept blaming ourselves for 9/11. They were continuously trying hurt us long before that happened. I believe it is only because we chose to mind our own business instead of stopping (preemptively killing OSB, when we had the chance) that threat before it could happen that we suffered those losses. Why not blame the gang violence in five points on ourselves because we dare to go into that part of town instead of leave it alone? The gangs will just spread out until we do have to deal with them.
If I pour kerosene on a yellow jacket nest on my on land (Five Points) and set fire to it, no problem.
If I show up on your land, uninvited, with a can of kerosene and a lighter….Hell…YOU might shoot me. Some of *your* yellow jackets might even follow me home and bite me. Even if you invite me, *your* yellow jackets ain’t going to like me and, besides, I have enough enough to deal with on my own property.
These enemies are not yellow jackets and they hide in our “neighbor’s back yard” to avoid the consequences of their actions. They will do their dirty work even if we pile treasure and virgins at their feet. We can’t avoid them, we can only delay the inevitable, I would just prefer to fight them at a time, manner and place of my choosing rather than of their choosing.
No they are not like regular yellow jackets, they are intelligent and know where we live.
But, neither are they in our neighbor’s yard. If the US was Israel, Greece, Russia, India, or even China–your argument may be valid.
What we have been doing for the last half century or so is the equivalent of travelling several counties over to poke sticks in yellow jackets nests. Problem is, these yellow jackets have memory, planning capability and know where we live.
TGB’s point is that you are less likely to get stung eradicating yellow jackets on your own land (and even your neighbor’s if he needs help),than traipsing willy-nilly all over the state in your attempt to make your property safer. Your gasoline and kerosene bills will be much lower also.
“America does not go abroad in search of monsters to destroy. She is the well-wisher to freedom and independence of all. She is the champion and vindicator only of her own.”
—-John Quincy Adams
Iran has threatened to “wipe Israel off the face of the earth” (a statement which has not yet been repudiated by the so called moderate Half-ass-a-man-ginny), Israel has not made any such threat towards Iran. At most Israel has stated she would not tolerate Iran having nuclear weapons because of the overt threats by Iran. As for Israel threatening the capitals of Europe, she has never even whispered any such thing; however, if Israel did threaten the capitals of Europe or actually bomb them without provocation, no, I would not support Israel in such an endeavor.
I pose a serious question; pertaining to the quote you provide above, do you believe JQ Adams would have felt the same had we common borders with a number of the European countries? Back then it was a month or more of sailing to reach our shores with very primitive weapons. Now we have intercontinental missiles, warheads that can completely obliterate many square miles of territory with a single blast and transit of the oceans in mere hours (even if by sea it is only days). Today we effectively have common borders, as far as being able to wage war and suffer the consequences thereof, and I believe he would have revised his opinion over time.
I pose a serious question; pertaining to the quote you provide above, do you believe JQ Adams would have felt the same had we common borders with a number of the European countries?
Certainly he would not have felt the same way.
While I understand your point about missiles and such…wars are still won by invasion and occupation. We still do not have “common borders ” with overseas countries, and never will.
I will grant you that the US apparently has “effectively common borders” with every other country on the planet…but the other countries do not have them with us.
Sure, if Iran choose to nuke an American city, they might have the capability in a few years…but we have had the capability to do it to them since 1945. While the US and her allies attacking and invading Iran is within the realm of possibilities, Iran and her allies attacking and invading the US is a laughable proposition and remains so for as far as TBG can envision.
The US losses in Iraq and Afghanistan are right at 6,700.
For perspective less than 3,000 lives were lost in the Japanese attack on Peal Harbor
http://history1900s.about.com/od/Pearl-Harbor/a/Pearl-Harbor-Facts.htm
But more importantly where would you draw the line, waiting until an invading army was actually landing on our shores. Some talk of how it would be suicidal for someone to attack us but in case you missed it the guys that hijacked the planes that slammed into the Twin Towers died in the crashes. These people that want us dead are strapping explosives to their women and children and sending them to us to detonate. They think they are going to be rewarded for this.
It’s not all about terrorists either. Russia and China are making moves on our periphery. Look at the activity between China and Japan and several of the other countries over there. China is moving naval vessels to force their will on their neighbors and Japan and the others are having to move their naval forces to the area in defense of their territory. China builds her navy as we shrink ours. Look what Russia is doing to Ukraine and Georgia. We are slowly loosing our allies around the world. Each will be picked off individually; China and Russia are already making moves in the Middle East that are undercutting our influence in that region (coupled with 0bama’s poor foreign policy). They won’t have to attack us directly they can achieve the same goal by slowly starving us of resources from our allies until we are truly isolated. China is already squeezing the world supply of rare earth materials and forcing price spikes (shortages) in those materials.
1. What do I care if China and Japan want to fight over a stupid uninhabited island? Are you willing to risk your children’s lives to fight in China to defend Japan’s claim to an island?
2. We don’t need massive navies anymore. One missile can bring down an entire billion dollar air craft carrier. Furthermore, to think China is going to risk an all out military confrontation, naval or otherwise, with it’s main trading partner is ludicrous China is not suicidal. Even if every other country on planet earth tried to invade the U.S. it would not work. The logistics of transporting an invasion fleet is just too difficult.
3. Why do we care what Russia does to its neighbors? Where’s our strategic interest in Ukraine or Georgia? Does China or Russia interfere with our relations with Canada or Mexico? Would you be ok if they did?
4. Why would China or Russia slowly want to starve the U.S.? What is there to gain? They dislike us because we interfere with them and their neighbors. If we did not do that, they’d have no reason to starve us. What, you think China is going to invade its neighbors so it can raise the price of an LCD t.v.? Come on.
I think the problem people have is they want the U.S. to be a SUPERPOWER forever- even if we can no longer afford it. The U.S. did just fine from 1776-1945 before it reached superpower status. There’s nothing wrong with the U.S. being a country that looks after its own citizens and does not serve as the world’s police.
Why do you think Germany, UK, France, and all the other NATO socialist countries can afford universal health care? We’re their military. We spend more on our military than the next 10 countries COMBINED. That’s unsustainable. You’re scare of China’s military or Russia’s military? Last year China spent $166 Billion on its military. Russia spent 90 Billion on its military. The U.S. spent $682 billion. We’re outspending the big, bad, dangerous Russian and Chinese by over 2 to 1, and you act like they are actual threats that we need to continue to spend money on. We could cut our military spending by 50% and still be spending more than both combined.
So keep living in your fantasy land where enemies are on the verge of toppling American supremacy. These imaginary super powerful enemies don’t exist. We shouldn’t be spending hundreds of billions of dollars to fight imaginary enemies.
Whether by design or effect we are getting the military you appear to want, smaller and less effective. It’s only a matter of time before we do start closing certain bases. As our influence is shrinking Russia and China are working feverishly to increase their influence (that should be the first sign we are making a mistake). We will come to regret this strategy and course of action and the cost will be far worse.
The military I want is the small military our Founders intended. I’ve yet to see a proposal to cut 50% of the military.
Why do we need so much influence anyways? What has it gained us? Endless wars? Billions wasted on defending other countries?
Think of the logistics and treasure, not to mention repercussions, of attacking the US.
It is a plan only the mad and suicidal would undertake.
You talk of it being suicidal to attack the US but answer me this; if Iran did explode a nuclear device in Israel would you allow US retaliation? If after Iran detonated that nuclear device she stated she had others mounted on missiles aimed at the US or on cargo ships within US ports that they would detonate should we retaliate would you still allow US retaliation (assuming you said yes to the first question)? Why would you possibly want to wait until that point to do something?
What if Israel bombed Iran? Would you support retaliation. What if Israel threatened to blow up the capitals of Europe if they went down?
Same with India/Pakistan or even China/Russia.
I guess since “The War to End All Wars” didn’t…we must now start wars to prevent wars.
Gotta run, George Orwell is calling…..
Families want their loved ones home. The economy needs the resources. Stop the wars and focus on building the country. We have our best days ahead of us if we can do the right thing, no matter how hard it may be to swallow our pride.
scrubbing bubbas – we bleed so Israel doesn’t have to.