Handy Guide to why the Afghanistan War is really about the TAPI Gas Pipeline

OK. So let's look at "why we went into Afghanistan" after 9/11.

You will be led to believe that the 19 hijackers got their training in Afghanistan with Osama bin Laden. They learned how to hijack planes and fly them into the various buildings and made other building nearby mysteriously crash into rubble.

Yes, we all know the story. There is nothing but the highest level of compassion for the victims of 9/11.



So let's assume that the 9/11 attacks are why we went into Afghanistan. Let's say there is no link to the fact that Hamid Karzai, originally a Taliban supporter and a contact with the CIA in the 80's, worked with the United States to overthrow the Taliban after 9/11 happened. Let's also imagine there is no link that Karzai was a consultant for the oil company Unocal (Union Oil Company of California), now owned by Chevron (who merged with Unocal in 2005).

Granted, Unocal has rejected the idea that Karzai worked with them (while being involved with the CIA helping install the Taliban in 1996), but could not speak for all companies involved in the group in that region. (Unocal was also responsible for the huge oil spill in Santa Barbara, CA in 1969 that led to public perception about the effects of the offshore oil drilling industry.)

Fast forward from 2001 where the Taliban were defeated, only to come back another day... namely now. The Taliban pretty much own Afghanistan and we are in a very different level of turmoil with the war there.

So why don't we just face facts? The real reason for the war in Afghanistan is to make the TAPI (Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India) gas pipeline be constructed. It's another war for energy resources, as Iraq was and has been proven to be about.

You can see where the pipeline needs to be constructed in order to get resources to be able to be distributed.





Another illustration of the pipeline and its route:



There have been recent talks on getting the gas pipeline project constructed:



More specifics on the gas pipeline project and the locations involved:



So what does this all mean?

I would suggest that we completely revamp the idea of the Afghanistan war. Our troops can leave and a more international force that will benefit from the gas pipeline project should be put into place. The Afghanistan government should be properly reimbursed for their contributions to making the gas pipeline happen.

We should reframe the intent of the war to containing Al Qaeda in the Pashtun region (bordering Pakistan) and simply calling for the pipeline to be constructed by the Afghan people and whoever else would benefit.

Let's call this tragic war for what it really is... an energy resource conflict that should not be America's responsibility. It's time to withdraw from Afghanistan NOW.


On edit: Included what TAPI means: Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India

Unrec this? Why? Don't be a coward. What's the reason...

Nah just kidding. But I will cancel out his/hers unrec.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/world/west_asia/37021.stm

Mother Jones article:
The Taliban, Unocal and a Pipeline
http://130.94.183.89/magazine/pipeline.html

... you can see how Enron, Halliburton and the other usual suspects are involved...

carpet of gold or carpet of bombs?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091005/ap_on_go_pr_wh/us_obama_afghanistan

Thread...
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=4091070&mesg_id=4091070

"WASHINGTON – The White House said Monday that President Barack Obama is not considering a strategy for Afghanistan that would withdraw U.S. troops from the eroding war there.

White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said that walking away isn't a viable option to deal with a war that is about to enter its ninth year.

"I don't think we have the option to leave. That's quite clear," Gibbs said.

The debate over whether to send as many as 40,000 more U.S. troops to Afghanistan is a major element of a strategy overhaul that senior administration policy advisers will consider this week as they gather for top-level meetings on the evolving direction of the war..."

Could Gibbs please explain. Will someone in the WH press corps please ask him.

:dem:

Soldiers coming back in body bags is horrible for a President's approval ratings and chances at re-election. Continuing the war in Afghanistan may be ill advised, it may even be downright idiotic, and it may even be for sinister reasons. But the argument that the President is putting this much on the line for a pipeline is absurd.

Natural gas that would be used for the Asian and East European markets by completing the pipeline would:

a) Allow Afghanistan to be part of a new "product" that could make the country have more alternatives than exporting heroin and terrorism
b) Have Pakistan and India work together on a pipeline project
c) Have Turkmenistan be able to be a energy player outside of the Russian umbrella
d) Have American troops get the fuck out of a place that even Alexander The Great and other conquerors avoided

If these points are "idiotic", then I wonder what "good" is...

India is very thirsty for energy products from Turkmenistan.

You are correct that "India is very thirsty for energy products from Turkmenistan."

It's been that way since 1980 or so...

Not... :eyes:

If you believe that we have/are spent/spending blood and treasure so that other countries can have gas and one corporation can make profits, you'll believe anything.

And think that "http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=9219858826421983682#">Why We Fight" is an excellent documentary, possibly one of the best ever made. I also think that America's war machine will jump at any opportunity to have a war. However, saying they went to war to provide other countries with gas and a corporation with profits when 911 gave them a good enough reason is ridiculous.

...like we did in Iraq.

... to supply India and Pakistan with gas, is it not?

Iraq and Afghanistan are two completely different wars, even though Busch, and his voice-box Faux news, managed to disinform 75% of Americans Saddam Hussein was linked to 911 as well.

Iraq was definitely a war for profit and to settle old scores for senior, but Afghanistan was a knee jerk reaction to 911, not to ensure India and Pakistan can get gas, which is what you are suggesting. If it was, that pipeline would have been built, or at least started, before we went into Iraq.

You are correct that "Afghanistan was a knee jerk reaction to 911", but if you look historically at the region and how the plans for the pipeline were being made by the visiting Taliban in Texas in 1996 (one of many examples), you see the truth that the TAPI pipeline is why we are really in Afghanistan.

Just as the Project For A New American Century wrote that a Pearl Harbor-like disaster would make people more willing to go into wars in the Middle East, the events of 911 were a perfect opportunity to make efforts to make the pipeline.

...we wouldn't be fighting them, alas. As it is, they are depressingly alike, and enrich many of the same people who initiated them.

is through Iran. Secure country, no Taliban or al Qaeda, could build it now, save a lot of lives. Wonder why they won't take the obvious route?

...Iran does their oil business with Russia and I'm guessing that the pipeline would favor Russian oil companies instead of Chevron, British Petroleum and the others...

but to say President Obama is presiding over young men and women dying for the sake of oil corporations is disgusting.

You might as well claim he's naive beyond anything anyone accused Bush of being or he is more ruthless and calculating than Cheney.

The war should be stopped because there are better ways than war to solve problems...especially when the wars are fought by people in entrenched 3rd world poverty...but to claim Obama is some blood-drunk corporate stooge is beyond the pale.

If you read the post, you'd see that Obama has a chance to get out of the Afghanistan war handed to him by the Bush Crime Family by fully admitting that the war is based on the TAPI gas pipeline. IT's pretty obvious if you take a clear view of the situation historically and see who the players are.

Surely, Obama can still continue going after Al Qaeda in the Pushtun region (as mentioned in the post) and work with an international force that would benefit Afghanistan by building the pipeline.

Nowhere did I claim that "Obama is some blood-drunk corporate stooge"... nowhere... that's your projecting based on some level of confusion. I don't want Obama to get dragged down by this war and he can pivot his way out of that by proclaiming that the TAPI gas line should be the first priority for Afghanistan to move forward.

Addressing the atrocious humans rights issues of the Taliban should also be factored in, but that's another matter.

on a tough stance to the Afghan war. He called it a war we had to win.

I seriously doubt he was referring to a war for pipelines.

..and to boil it down even more..it was started to protect and make vast bucketloads of money...

I agree with Obama on many things, but I never cared for his rhetoric on the Afghan war. Now that he's President and is seeing actionable intelligence about the region and the war efforts, it's his opportunity to just call the war what it really is.

Obama was not referring to pipelines... he was referring to Al Qaeda. I mentioned that his efforts can continue to rid the World of these assholes.

War is a waste of time and money and lives.

What I'm sayng is Obama is not a stooge. If he thought for an instant this war was on behalf of oil interests he would have pulled the troops not debating sending more. He isn't going to throw away the lives of young people for corporate fatcats.

I personally would like to think his current hesitancy is he is rethinking the nature of resolving the Afghan conflict. I would jump up and down and squeal with delight if he said he was pulling our troops and move into a nation building strategy. People need jobs and education and healthcare. People don't shoot at other people who bring them such things.

Still, I find it contradictory to claim Bush only fought for oil but AQ really does exist and Obama only fights AQ as if the oil war suddenly disappearred on Jan 20th. It's the same war, with the same generals and Secretary of Defense. As much ridicule (and indictments even?) as Bush deserves for killing untold hundreds of thousands and wasting our young people's lives if it were a war for oil Obama would have us out by now.

Either AQ attacked us or they didn't.

One of Bush's many crimes is lack of imagination. He's a conservative, that means by definition, that they seek old ways of dealing with new problems. The old ways are killing people into submission.

Build schools and hospitals and AQ won't be able to find enough recruits to knockover a lemonade stand.

I never thought or wrote that Obama is a "stooge"... like you, I disagree on the wars. And Bush used Al Qaeda's antics as well as appeased his masters who were angling for the pipeline.

The TAPI gas pipeline would be good for Afghanistan and its people to get money for schools and hospitals.

"I would jump up and down and squeal with delight if he said he was pulling our troops and move into a nation building strategy. People need jobs and education and healthcare. People don't shoot at other people who bring them such things."

But that is exactly why the Taliban are shooting us.

Have a look in http://journals.democraticunderground.com/?az=archives&j=4893&page=2">my archive to see http://journals.democraticunderground.com/Turborama/56">several posts about the good things we have been doing in Afghanistan that for some strange reason the MSM aren't covering.

If we pulled out tomorrow, how can we continue to build schools when http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NS_T_wdajOo">the Taliban's agenda is to destroy them?

There are some videos on YouTube about dam and irrigation projects, too.

Obama's betrayed the Constitution and the country on the FISA bill and stood with big business.

Obama never involved the real stakeholders in health care reform, he never invited single payer to the table, big health insurance companies were involved from the outset. Now we have a plan where every American would be forced to buy mandatory coverage from insurance companies.

Had argued that conservatives and Bill Clinton were right to destroy social welfare,

Supported making it harder to file class action suits in state courts

Voted for a business-friendly "tort reform" bill

Voted against a 30% interest rate cap on credit cards

Had the most number of foreign lobbyist contributors in the primaries

Was even more popular with Pentagon contractors than McCain

Was the most popular of the candidates with K Street lobbyists

Supported the PATRIOT Act

Went to Connecticut to support Joe Lieberman in the primary against Ned Lamont

Lent his support, as Paul Street of Z Mag noted, " to the aptly named Hamilton Project, formed by corporate-neoliberal Citigroup chair Robert Rubin and other Wall Street Democrats to counter populist rebellion against corporatist tendencies within the Democratic Party. . . Obama was recently hailed as a Hamiltonian believer in limited government and free trade by Republican New York Times columnist David Brooks."

Voted for a nuclear energy bill that included money for bunker buster bombs and full funding for Yucca Mountain.

Supported federally funded ethanol and was unusually close to the ethanol industry.

Promised to double funding for private charter schools, part of a national effort to undermine public education.

Supported Israeli aggression and apartheid.

Favored turning over Jerusalem to Israel

Wouldn't rule out first strike nuclear attack on Iran

Called Pakistan "the right battlefield ... in the war on terrorism." Threatened to invade Pakistan

Supported restricting damage awards in medical malpractice suits

Favored healthcare individual mandates that would help insurance companies and banks but not citizens

Mine followed the terrain.

get away in Tora Bora. A captured Bin Laden would have meant to a lot of Americans that we'd done our job and we could get out of Afghanistan. People would have questioned why we were staying.

Or scrapped or something?

He puts forth some conspiracy theory about a pipeline as the real reason for the Iraq or Afghan. war (or both). But it was proved, after the movie was released, that the pipeline had been scrapped years before, or something like that. His info was old.

Or was that a different pipeline?

Officials from Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India were recently meeting to discuss the project. This is the whole point of why our troops are really there, aside from Al Qaeda in the Pushtun region (bordering Pakistan).

Read this from April 2008:
http://www.downstreamtoday.com/news/article.aspx?a_id=10294

The pipeline hasn't been scrapped. It's run into a lot of hurdles getting it produced.

in, what, 2002, killing lots of people and having our people killed, on the offchance we can forge a deal for some other countries 8 to 10 years down teh road? I would think there was a better way to forge the deal than to go about it this way, which surely is the hard way (if it's a way at all, which apparently it isn't yet?).

Sounds to me like maybe there's a perk there somewhere, if it happens, but not a reason we'd go in in the first place. I'm not even sure the neocons are that smart to think that far ahead, or how exactly that would benefit our country.

I'd be more inclined to believe a theory like this regarding Iraq. But there was a valid reason to go into Afghanistan to begin with. So .... this just doesn't have a plausible sound to it, to me.

But there are lots of conspiracy theories around and always will be.

to ensure its completion?

I'd boil it down this way:

• We invaded Afghanistan to get Al Qaeda, so we need to focus on that as the war objective and use Special Forces in the Pushtun region only
  
• The TAPI gas pipeline project has been something the region states have wanted for decades
  
• Building the pipeline helps Afghan/Pakistan/India relations
  
• The TAPI pipeline gives Afghanistan more alternatives to its economic survival and help fund rebuilding (or building) its infrastructure
  
• Focusing on making the pipeline the focus of the conflict allows our troops to leave

I see how it would help Afghanistan, Pakistan, and India, of course.

But HOW would it help America, esp. to the point where we'd lay our lives on the line to get it done? How would OUR country make tons and tons of money on it?

Therefore bringing down the cost, possibly quite dramatically. It's also a possible exit strategy, which isn't on the table at the moment.

...less dead American soldiers... less troops in that region fighting for something that's only benefiting multinational energy companies...

Frankly, even chasing down Al Qaeda is like cutting the limbs of a 10-headed hydra. We need to allow Afghanistan a chance to get their people healthy, educated and safe. We can't do that by chasing them around one of the most (if not the most) treacherous terrains on this planet.

Also, by making even just Pakistan and India working with each other instead of being at each others throats with nukes, that would not only benefit the US... but the rest of the World as well.

We have enough problems here. Let's let the TAPI gas line be made and get the hell out of there. We'll always be in the Persian Gulf able to change plans if need be.

I see how it would help one or two companies in America. Mainly it would help Pakistan, India, etc. I guess it would help with peace in that region, and therefore, indirectly help us in that regard.

But to go to war on the offchance that a decade down the road we could get a pipeline done .... why? In what way would there be such a huge benefit to America?

Maybe it would make a little more sense if there weren't really a good reason to go into Afghanistan in the first place...like in Iraq. But there was. It seems more likely that any pipeline was hoped to be a perk, if it happened at all, than the main reason we went into Afghanistan. Unless I'm misunderstanding something. But the conspiracy theory doesn't make sense to me.

Granted the money would probably go down a rathole, but the main reason why it would help to admit that the war is for the pipeline to be built would be that the American troops would be able to focus on jump-starting the construction and then get the hell out of there.

Otherwise, it's an occupation that will never hold anything more than a propaganda tool for Al Qaeda and whatever other new anti-American movements that would arise. Strategically, it was always about getting the pipeline going and the rest is simply window-dressing.

If we want to nation build like a fool wants to make a sand castle in a hurricane, then that's what is going on.

I still don't buy the original motive thing, though.

I like discussing this with you because you're polite and don't get all aggressive and hostile when someone with a different opinion chips in for a debate. That's quite refreshing on here.

The New U.S.-British Oil Imperialism
"The real motives for the Bush administration's war in Afghanistan are clear for all to see. The U.S. Ambassador to Pakistan, Wendy Chamberlain, met with Pakistan's oil minister, Usman Aminuddin, in January, 2002 to continue plans for the north-south pipeline, encouraging the construction of Pakistan's Arabian Sea oil terminus for the pipeline.

President Bush says our military will continue its presence in Afghanistan, which means that while the U.N. forces serve as a paramilitary police force, U.S. soldiers will be guarding the construction of the north-south pipeline.

To assure that the pipeline project will proceed apace, the Afghani-American Zalmay Khalilzad, a previous member of the CentGas project, became President Bush's Special National Security Assistant. Khalilzad has recently been named presidential Special Envoy for Afghanistan. Khalilzad is a Pashtun and the son of a former government official under King Mohammed Zahir Shah. Along with being a consultant to the RAND Corporation, he was a special liaison between UNOCAL and the Taliban government. Khalilzad also worked on various risk analyses for the project under the direction of National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice, a former member of the board of Chevron."
http://www.oilcompanies.net/oil1.htm

It pretty much lays out what I was inferring...

...that this is the strategic reason why we are there.

We need to get the countries/nation-states involved in the construction and development of the gas pipeline and get the HELL out of there.