This 'peace deal' with the Taliban is not really a peace deal

[Mosby]

Taliban and U.S. representatives signed on Saturday what has been described as a peace deal. Beware the treachery of labels. Just as Magritte’s painted pipe was not really a pipe, so this vaunted “peace deal” is not really a peace deal.

It has been heartening to see a steep reduction in violence over the past week — a U.S. precondition for signing the deal — but there is no agreement on a permanent cease-fire, much less a resolution of all the issues that divide the democratically elected Afghan government from the Taliban. What was signed on Saturday is an agreement to try to reach an agreement. To get even this far, the United States had to drop its long-standing demand for intra-Afghan negotiations to precede a U.S. troop drawdown. Now the Taliban will enter the talks, scheduled to take place in Oslo, in a stronger position after having already achieved their chief demand — a timetable for U.S. withdrawal within 14 months.

I envision three potential scenarios for what happens next: good, bad and ugly.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/02/29/if-trump-pulls-all-us-troops-out-afghanistan-deal-with-taliban-will-fail/

[Sherman A1]

1. Of course it isn't

There is no way that these clowns can tell the truth.

[PatrickforO]

2. Afghanistan is the graveyard of empires.

The country has actually BEEN conquered many times, with US forces being the latest. The difficulty comes in holding it and also in pacifying it.

Basically, by 2017, this country has poured an estimated $2.3 trillion down this rat hole, and what the HELL do we have to show for it? Nothing, that's what. Just an agreement to withdraw that saves face for us.

So we came, we saw, we conquered and we left after 19 years with nothing to show for our efforts there. Nothing.

Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rice and the rest of the Neocons SHOULD HAVE BEEN TRIED FOR WAR CRIMES in 2009 and 2010. The only thing that saved that from happening is they fucked up the economy so bad we needed all hands on deck just to take care of that, and Obama spent all his political capital on ARRA and ACA. Two good things, but it left the war criminals free and uncharged.

And make no mistake - Trump doesn't give a hoot about Afghanistan. He's doing this now to distract us from his inept handling of COVID-19, and his impeachment, and his general stupidity and narcissism.

This is why I'm a firm progressive. We HAVE to stop doing this shit. And if we recapture our republic at the polls in November, IF, then those we elect MUST make some serious reforms to re-impose a democratic republic on this empire. We need to kill the empire and nurse the republic back to life, in other words.

[William769]

3. Kick & recommended.