Sen. John Kerry: Tora Bora: An opportunity missed

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-kerry8-2009dec08,0,4394347.story

Tora Bora: An opportunity missed

Analysts say it would've taken only 2,000 or so U.S. troops to get Osama bin Laden in 2001, but military leaders failed to use all the firepower available. Our troops have been paying the price since.

By John Kerry

December 8, 2009


Eight years ago this month, Osama bin Laden walked out of the Tora Bora mountains in Afghanistan and disappeared into Pakistan. U.S. intelligence agencies have no real idea where he is today, but it is clear that the world's most wanted man and the terrorist organization he leads have reemerged as a powerful force behind the increasingly deadly insurgencies in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Three senior Obama administration officials warned last week that Al Qaeda is more dangerous than at any time in the last 18 months. They gave the Senate Foreign Relations Committee a frightening bill of particulars: Al Qaeda is providing training and resources for militants attacking U.S. troops in Afghanistan, assisting suicide bombers in Pakistan and helping extremists plot new attacks on India. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton described Bin Laden's Al Qaeda as a "syndicate of terrorism." Underscoring the danger, she said the terrorists are seeking nuclear weapons.

If we had captured or killed Bin Laden, the world would look very different today. His death or imprisonment would not have eliminated the worldwide extremist threat, but our failure to finish the job represents a lost opportunity that altered the course of the conflict in Afghanistan and the future of international terrorism. It left the American people more vulnerable, and it inflamed the strife that now threatens to engulf Pakistan and Afghanistan.

snip//

More than 1,000 members of two Marine expeditionary units were not far away in Kandahar, but their commander's request to move to Tora Bora to encircle Bin Laden was rejected. Roughly the same number of troops from the Army's 10th Mountain Division was split between southern Uzbekistan and Bagram air base, a short helicopter ride from Tora Bora. Instead, Gen. Tommy Franks left the job to a motley collection of Afghan militiamen and Pakistani Frontier Corps paramilitary fighters who never showed up.

Franks and his boss, Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld, were determined to succeed in Afghanistan with a light footprint. They justified limiting the number of U.S. troops by saying they wanted to avoid stirring up anti-American sentiment and creating a protracted insurgency. Unfortunately, in failing to get Bin Laden, we wound up with exactly what we had hoped to avoid in Afghanistan -- and a virulent insurgency across the border in Pakistan, a nuclear-armed ally.

Getting Bin Laden at Tora Bora would have been dangerous, and success was not guaranteed. Failing to try meant that we had no chance for success. Our men and women in uniform have been paying the price for eight years and, as 30,000 more of them are preparing to finish the job, we must all remember that we can't ensure our national security by turning our backs on enemies who have sworn to destroy us.

John Kerry (D-Mass.) chairs the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

as they pushed BushInc's pack of lies for their LiarsInc masters.

and accusing him of being a right-wing toady, warmonger, corporate-whore sellout like some have accused President Obama.

Thanks for the post Babylonsister.

And AlQ isn't really the problem. The problem is the US drive for global dominance....which Kerry is a part of???

The "war on terror" is just a good excuse to do even more of the same thing that was already going on.

read or don't care to believe. Me, I believe Sen. Kerry.


Three senior Obama administration officials warned last week that Al Qaeda is more dangerous than at any time in the last 18 months. They gave the Senate Foreign Relations Committee a frightening bill of particulars: Al Qaeda is providing training and resources for militants attacking U.S. troops in Afghanistan, assisting suicide bombers in Pakistan and helping extremists plot new attacks on India. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton described Bin Laden's Al Qaeda as a "syndicate of terrorism." Underscoring the danger, she said the terrorists are seeking nuclear weapons.

...and so it goes. The US just can't smell it's own shit? Same thing going on in SouthAm? Elsewhere?

When a country spends as much on it's military as the rest of the world combined...and has a habit of invading other countries....it WILL tend to attract enemies?

But please...enjoy these wars. :crazy:

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article24145.htm

There is an amazing story in Ha'aretz today on the "pro-Israel" litmus test that determines who is permitted to serve in the United States government. Here's the sort of lede you're not likely to read in the New York Times or Washington Post:

Every appointee to the American government must endure a thorough background check by the American Jewish community.

In the case of Obama's government in particular, every criticism against Israel made by a potential government appointee has become a catalyst for debate about whether appointing "another leftist" offers proof that Obama does not truly support Israel."

The story goes on to rehearse what happened to Chas Freeman (whose appointment was derailed by the Israel lobby because he voiced a few mild criticisms of Israel's behavior) and reports that similar complaints are now being raised against the appointment of former Senator Chuck Hagel. Even more bizarrely, the Zionist Organization of America and other rightwing Jewish groups are complaining about the appointment of Hannah Rosenthal to direct the Office to Combat and Monitor Anti-Semitism. Why? Apparently she's been involved with J Street and other "leftwing" organizations that ZOA et al deem insufficiently ardent in their support for the Jewish state, and has suggested that progressive forces need to be more vocal in advancing the peace process.

One has to feel a certain sympathy for Ms. Rosenthal, who is forced to defend her own appointment by telling an interviewer:

I love Israel. I have lived in Israel. I go back and visit every chance I can. I consider it part of my heart. And because I love it so much, I want to see it safe and secure and free and democratic and living safely."

These are fine sentiments, but isn't it odd that she has to defend her qualifications for a position in the U.S. government by saying how much she "loves" a foreign country? For an American official in her position, what matters is that she loves America, and that she believes anti-semitism is a hateful philosophy that should be opposed vigorously. Whether she loves Israel or France or Thailand or Namibia, etc., is irrelevant. (And yes, it's entirely possible to loathe anti-Semitism and not love Israel).

But the real lesson of all these episodes is the effect of this litmus test on the foreign policy community more broadly. Groups in the lobby target public servants like Freeman, Hagel, and Rosenthal because they want to make sure that no one with even a mildly independent view on Middle East affairs gets appointed. By making an example of them, they seek to discourage independent-minded people from expressing their views openly, lest doing so derail their own career prospects later on. And it works.

was manufactured in the early 1990s to enable a target for prosecution in US courts. After 9/11 it was resurrected in order to justify the GLOBAL war on terror. Compared to the US its powers are limited - yet US politicians to continue to elevate these rogue elements to nation state status in order to justify expensive wars and funding the MIC.

If Kerry chooses to do this, he is a tool of the MIC.