Yet Another Afghanistan Killing by the Usual Suspects

Rogue Afghan police officer: A Taliban infiltrator’s road to fratricide
The Washington Post
By Kevin Sieff and Javed Hamdard, Published: April 1

KABUL — Before the Afghan police officer named Asadullah killed eight of his colleagues and one civilian Friday morning, he spent years as a Taliban fighter, targeting men he called infidels and crisscrossing the Pakistani border with teams of insurgents.

But his first collaboration with the insurgency was the one his neighbors still find the most egregious: He granted the Taliban permission to kill his father, Ehsanullah.


Afghan and Western officials said they uncovered those details in conversations with Asadullah’s family and friends after the new police recruit and Taliban sleeper agent apparently drugged his colleagues and shot them in the head while they slept.

The incident is one of the bloodiest cases of fratricide in the 10-year-old war and comes amid a surge in attacks by rogue Afghan army and police personnel on their Afghan and American colleagues. At least 16 NATO service members have been killed by men in Afghan army and police uniforms since January, an increase compared with the same period in previous years.

Copy of an e-mail I sent to Tom Palaima this Morning

Professor of Classics at UT Austin had yet another anti-American column in the American Statesman this morning. His twisted wording managed to imply that the United States is uniquely evil in the way it wages war. As a classical scholar Dr. Palaima know this is not true. Obviously he does this to further his agenda amongst less educated. He shows great contempt for his readers many who will not see though his false arguments.

Still, I suspect most American veterans themselves would dislike the article, no matter what they felt about our wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Here is the e-mail:

---------------------

Professor
Tom Palaima


I read you guest editorial in the American Statesman
this morning. I was bother by it because you seem
to indicate that the insane action of one American
soldier was indicative of the unique way we wage war.

You certainly did not mention that killing of otherwise
innocent civilians and captured soldiers has been a fact
of war since the beginning of history. The Romans
sacked cities that did not surrender, killing among others
Archimedes during the capture of Syracuse during the 2nd
Punic War.

I have on my shelves books with eye-witness accounts of
American killing captured German soldiers during WW2.

Of course we both know I could go on and on.

I and everyone I know is for leaving Afghanistan and
everywhere else in the Middle East today.

But you as a classical scholar should offer you readers
more information about long history of crimes committed
during wars since, well, since forever.

I am sure that most reading of you article do not have
the deep knowledge that you, and I, and even my wife share.

I am truly disappointed. Any thought of going to Thursday's
evening talk which I knew about before reading your column
just ended.

Steven Zoraster
3329 Perry Lane
Austin, Texas 7831

Karzai is at the End of Whose Rope?

From today's The New York Times

KABUL, Afghanistan — President Hamid Karzai chastised the United States on Friday, saying he was at “the end of the rope” over what he termed America’s lack of cooperation in investigating the American soldier who went on a rampage earlier this month and killed 16 civilians in southern Afghanistan.

Mr. Karzai had previously dispatched a delegation to investigate the killings in Panjwai district of Kandahar Province, and he said on Friday that American officials did not cooperate with the Afghan inquiry. He made the comments after meeting at the presidential palace in Kabul with relatives of those killed.

The Afghan leader also questioned whether only a single American soldier was involved in the massacre, which took place on March 11. He said the accounts of villagers — many of whom have claimed multiple soldiers took part in the shootings — did not match the American assertion that the killings were the work of a lone, rogue soldier.

Did We Just Win the War In Afghanistan?

One American soldier goes crazy, murdering many innocent civilians. Instead of rioting most Afghans keep a low profile. Heads down.

Another irrational rampage by an American and maybe the Afghan Army (such as it is) AND the Taliban will surrender? To us?

I have read a different take on this event and the fact that rioting has not occurred because of it. That is that killing civilians over some trivial feud is not a big deal in Afghanistan, but burning the Koran is RELIGION which these savages take seriously and are willing to riot and kill over.

Our experience there shows that according to civilized standards these people cannot be tamed.

Certainly the particular American who committed the crime in question deserves to be punished by our military. I have read he is already out of Afghanistan. The rest of our people there can not leave soon enough. Tomorrow would be a good day to start.

Heck, a Direct Quote from the LA Times on Afghanistan

REPORTING FROM KABUL, AFGHANISTAN -- Reflecting continuing tensions over the burning of Korans at Bagram air base, a suicide bomber tried Monday to breach an outer gate of the giant U.S.-run installation north of Afghanistan's capital.

The attack killed two Afghan laborers who were leaving the base, the provincial governor said.

The Taliban claimed responsibility in a text message sent to journalists, but the claim could not be immediately verified. The Taliban have claimed responsibility for a number of violent incidents that took place as riots rocked the country last month over what U.S. officials have called the inadvertent burning of copies of the Muslim holy book at Bagram.

Monday's bombing took place about 6 p.m. as many workers were leaving the base. Abdul Basir Salangi, the governor of Parwan province, where the base is located, said the bomber ran toward a gate manned by Afghan security forces and detonated his explosives there. Four Afghan workers were wounded, he said.

They Hate Us

Just read yet another article in the Austin newspaper about the killing of 2 more Americans in Afghanistan. One was "a civilian literacy instructor hired to teach Afghan soldiers how to read".

Who cares if they can read? They hate us. They hate all foreigners. They always have and always will.

Let's think about the reading part. If they can read they can understand the instructions on the weapons they capture from us? This is a good thing? Or just unimportant because you do not have to read to use an AK-47?

We must leave. Now. I hold Obama responsible for failing to respond to these and previous outrages by pulling out of Afghanistan

Articles on Afghan Riots in LA Times and The New York Times

Today, both The LA Times and The New York Times have online articles about the political fallout of the ongoing riots in Afghanistan. And especially the dead Americans killed by our "friends" over there. Could this be the being of the end of our commitment to that country? God, I hope so. But, Obama is not going to admit we are defeated there and the Republicans probably will be just as bad if they win in November 2012.

More Afghan Violence Against Americans

These are are friends?

From The New York Times:

Blast Injures U.S. Soldiers as Riots Rage in Afghanistan

By GRAHAM BOWLEY and ALISSA J. RUBIN

Published: February 26, 2012



KABUL, Afghanistan — A grenade thrown by Afghan protesters wounded at least six American service members in northern Afghanistan on Sunday, officials said, as new details emerged in the investigation of the shooting death of two American officers within the Interior Ministry building the day before.

Rioting continued across the country on Sunday as anger over the burning of Korans by the American military continued unabated, putting the relationship between Afghanistan and the United States on shaky new ground. At least one Afghan was killed in clashes with the Afghan police.

A few details of the killing within the Interior Ministry were emerging, although many reports offered conflicting views of what had happened. According to three Afghan security officials familiar with the case, the main suspect was Abdul Saboor, who was said to have worked in the ministry for more than a year as a driver. The two American officers who were killed were shot in the head and the pistol used to kill them was equipped with a silencer, the officials said.

Afghan officials said that Mr. Saboor was at large, apparently able to leave the ministry without complication after the shooting. That suggested to some observers that he may have had help in the attack.

Now Afgans Security People are Killing Americans

Americans are dying to protect these people from whom? From themselves? Yet another outrage with an Afghan on the US payroll turning his weapon on Americans!

Again from The New York Times:

KABUL, Afghanistan — Two American officers were shot dead inside the Interior Ministry building here on Saturday, as outrage continued to erupt violently across the country at the American military’s burning of Korans at a NATO army base.

A U.S. military vehicle drives on the road leading to the Afghan Interior Ministry in Kabul on Saturday. Two American soldiers were shot dead inside the Interior Ministry.

The NATO commander, Gen. John R. Allen, immediately ordered all military advisers withdrawn from Afghan ministries in Kabul, in a startling admission of how deep the crisis had become, with anti-American fury reaching deeply into even the Afghan security forces and ministries working most closely with the coalition.

Although there was no official statement that the gunman was an Afghan, in an e-mail sent to Western officials here from NATO headquarters the episode was described as “green on blue,” which is the military term used here when Afghan security forces turn their weapons on their Western military allies.

The killings, which happened within one of the most tightly secured areas of the ministry, add to the drumbeat of concern about a deepening animosity between civilians and militaries on both sides that had led to American and coalition forces being killed in increasing numbers even before the Koran burning ignited nationwide rioting. Now, the withdrawal from Afghan ministries suddenly calls into question the coalitions’ entire strategy of joint operations with Afghan forces across the country, although General Allen said NATO was still committed to fighting the war in Afghanistan.

Yet More Rioting in Afghanistan

From The New York Times:

KABUL, Afghanistan — Angry and violent protests broke out in Kabul after the midday prayer on Friday and gunfire could be heard near the large Eid Gah Mosque where a crowd of more than 1,000 people gathered in the center of the capital.
Related

The protests were in response to the burning of several Korans at the largest NATO air base in the country on Monday night, which the military afterward said was a inadvertent mistake and apologized for profusely.

A second angry protest by an estimated 4,000 people armed with rocks and sticks was surging along the Kabul-Jalalabad road in the east of the city and moving toward central Kabul. At least seven police vehicles were seen retreating as the crowd hurled a barrage of stones. A few of the protesters were waving the white flag of the Taliban and some were wearing head wrappings with a jihad slogan written on them: “I sacrifice myself.”

Protesters throughout the city were also shouting “Death to America.”

And Another Day of Anti-American Riots in Afghanistan

A direct quote from today's The New York Times


KABUL, Afghanistan — Protests against the burning by NATO personnel of an undisclosed number of Korans spilled into a second day on Wednesday and seemed poised to widen as the United States Embassy in Kabul suspended all travel by its staff and NATO soldiers in the capital appeared to be restricting their movements, keeping military vehicles off the streets.


Demonstrations turned violent on Wednesday morning in the capital and in Jalalabad in eastern Afghanistan where one person was killed and at least six injured, according to government officials. Protesters attempting to break into the NATO base at the Jalalabad airfield set fire to six fuel tankers in a nearby parking lot.

In Kabul, protesters threw rocks at Afghan Army vehicles and shouted anti-American slogans as they blocked the main road to eastern Afghanistan.

The stench of burning rubber still lingered after the worst of the protest was over. Ten demonstrators and 12 police officers were injured, officials said. The Kabul police chief, Mohammed Ayoub Salangi, was also pelted with rocks but was not hurt.

The Associated Press said security forces fired into the air as hundreds of protesters gathered outside a housing complex for foreigners on the outskirts of Kabul, the capital, and set a fuel truck ablaze.

The protesters chanted slogans including: “Death to America,” witnesses said.

Afghans Riot Over Rumors of Burned Korans

Rioting outside Bargram Air Base near Kabul

Now are "friends" in Afghanistan are rioting because they think NATO forces burned Korans. A three paragraph quote from The New York Times:

"The crowd at Bagram, estimated at more than 2,000, shouted 'Death to America' and 'We don’t want them anymore,' according to witnesses who were reached by telephone. Witnesses said gunfire could be heard and security forces were firing rubber bullets.

"Some in the crowd were singing Taliban songs and several Urdu speakers, described as Pakistanis, were making speeches to the crowd.

"The protesters closed the district government building and stopped people trying to come to the center of the city before dispersing in the afternoon as the demonstration ended."

Once again my opinion is that we should leave the Afghans to do their own insane killing of each other. Bring our soldiers home tomorrow. And, naturally, The New York Times seems to blame NATO as much as the Afghans for their irrational anger