We'll beat you again, Afghans warn British

[cal04]

Anti-foreigner sentiment has risen sharply in southern Afghanistan as bloodshed intensifies. Over the weekend 45 Taliban militants and two soldiers from the US-led coalition were killed in Panjwayi district, near Maiwand, the coalition said. More than 250 people have died in Operation Mountain Thrust, a major anti- Taliban offensive launched 11 days ago.

Western commanders claim they are bringing the insurgency to heel, but there is growing resentment among Afghans at the high death toll. President Hamid Karzai acknowledged this last week, saying: "It is not acceptable for us that in all this fighting, Afghans are dying."

(snip)
"The Taliban want to clear our territory of infidels, and why not?" said shopkeeper Abdul Ali Maiwandi. "At least when the Taliban are in power your property is safe, your family is safe, and you are safe."

(snip)
One quarter of the town's 60 police had been killed in the past three months, he complained, yet Canadian soldiers based in Kandahar, 40 miles east, had done little to help. "They show up maybe once a week, promising vehicles and ammunition but bringing nothing," he said. "Now we take their words like a joke."



http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,,1806029,00.html

[marmar]

1. The Iraq-Afghanistan nexus....

will go down as one of the most spectacular screwups in human history. Bush and Blair are names that will live in infamy.

[msongs]

2. afhanis been killing each other for millenia

they have a tribal culture, the tribe is the biggest unit, and the warloard heads the tribe. they merge and shift and kill each other
whenever they feel like it, and have done so for thousands of years.

Msongs

listen to our song demos!
www.msongs.com/msongsdemos.htm

[Copperred]

4. WRONG

Msong,
The tribal elders/heads, usually very old peacefull men, lead the tribes.

In modern times, since the USSR and US started using Afghanistan as a playing field, have the warlords come to prominence in many of the tribes at the expense of the traditional tribal elders.

The tribal elders would love to get the Warlords out of Afghanistan...but the US decided to use them once again to take Afghanistan and re empower them after the Taliban had finally run them out of town and put in place their strict albeit peacefull drug free vision of the future.

Get your facts straight bro...

[NYC]

3. I keep thinking of Rudyard Kipling.

Paraphrased: Save a bullet for yourself.

[madrchsod]

6. ah... thinking the same thing.....

[struggle4progress]

7. Thought you were gonna say "The Man Who Would Be King"

The Man Who Would Be King
By Rudyard Kipling
http://www.litrix.com/mbking/mbkin001.htm

[madrchsod]

5. kipling had a comment about Afghanistan

http://www.poetryloverspage.com/poets/kipling/young_british_soldier.html


he also had some thoughts on Mesopotamia


http://www.poetryloverspage.com/poets/kipling/mesopotamia.html

[NYC]

8. That's exactly what I had in mind:

When you're wounded and left on Afghanistan's plains,
And the women come out to cut up what remains,
Jest roll to your rifle and blow out your brains
An' go to your Gawd like a soldier.
Go, go, go like a soldier,
Go, go, go like a soldier,
Go, go, go like a soldier,
So-oldier of the Queen!