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Why is the United States doing the same thing and expecting different results? Afghan President Hamid Karzai is telling the world that he and all Afghan’s are enemy’s of the United States and that all Muslim’s are enemies of the United States.
Octuber 24 2011 3:15 am (AP) News of the World by AP and Panama Jack in exile in Costa Rica
After we took that cunt of a man out of France and made him President - Dictator of Afghanistan and put the Lucrative Heroin Drug Trade Business in his hands and in his pocket he in public bends the United States of America over and fucks us straight up our ass and then turns us around and makes us suck the shit off his dick. This is a result of a failed George W. Bush war policy. George W. Bush the sissy son of Tyrant who had the balls to shoot and kill President John F. Kennedy while climbing the latter to the Presidency then put his sissy son in the office of President. They both should be held responsible and not just in dollars, but also in blood. After me telling the United States Government for years that you put Bombs on the Ground not Troops on the Ground, they are finally taking my advice and using drones with bombs. Now the United States needs to listen again if you want to get out of Afghanistan and Iraq, without the loss of 10’s of thousands of American Military Service Men and Women you need not only put Bombs on the Ground you need to put Bombs on their Homes where they sleep with their families and children, then they will understand, You Do Not Fuck With America or Americans.
Octuber 23, 2011 7:15 am (AP) News of the World by AP and Panama Jack in exile in Costa Rica
KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Afghan President Hamid Karzai said that if the United States and Pakistan ever went to war, his country would back Islamabad — a statement that contrasts with his harsh criticism of his eastern neighbor during U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton's recent visit to Kabul.
Such a scenario is exceedingly unlikely, and Karzai's remarks appeared to be less a serious statement of policy than an overture to Pakistan, whose cooperation is sorely needed if Afghanistan is to have a chance at stability after years of conflict and civil war.
Nonetheless, Karzai's comments during an interview with the private GEO television station in Pakistan broadcast on Saturday contrasted sharply with his show of alliance with Washington during Clinton's visit last week, during which the American ramped up the pressure on Islamabad to crack down on militants using its territory for attacks into Afghanistan.
"If fighting starts between Pakistan and the U.S., we are beside Pakistan," Karzai said. "If Pakistan is attacked and the people of Pakistan need Afghanistan's help, Afghanistan will be there with you."
He said his country was indebted to Pakistan for taking in millions of Afghan refugees over the years and stressed that Kabul would not allow any nation — be it the U.S., India, Russia, China or anyone else — to dictate its policies.
"Anybody that attacks Pakistan, Afghanistan will stand with Pakistan," he said. "Afghanistan will never betray its brother."
Both Washington and Kabul have repeatedly said Pakistan is providing sanctuary to terrorist groups launching attacks in Afghanistan.
Clinton, joined by a bevy of top U.S. officials including CIA director David Petraeus, flew to Pakistan after her Kabul visit with the blunt message that if Islamabad is unwilling or unable to take the fight to the al-Qaida and Taliban-linked Haqqani network operating from its western border with Afghanistan, the U.S. "would show" Pakistan how to eliminate that militant group's safe havens.
Even so, she said the U.S. has no intention of deploying U.S. forces across the border in Pakistan. She suggested that the favored solution would be reconciliation and peace efforts and that Islamabad needs to cooperate.
U.S.-led coalition and Afghan forces on Saturday concluded two operations aimed at disrupting insurgent operations in Kabul, provinces south of the Afghan capital and along the eastern border with Pakistan — all places where the Haqqani network has launched attacks.
"A number of Haqqani affiliated insurgents plus additional fighters have been either detained or killed," Army Lt. Col. Jimmie Cummings, a spokesman for the coalition said Sunday. No further details were immediately available.
The focus on fighting those who refuse to embrace peace efforts while seeking reconciliation is pivotal in NATO's push to try to stabilize and secure Afghanistan as much as possible by the end of 2014, when foreign troops are scheduled to withdraw or move into support roles.
But the insurgents have remained intransigent and attacks and bombings plague Afghanistan, claiming the lives of civilians as well as those of Afghan and international forces.
NATO said that one of its service members was killed Sunday following an insurgent attack in the south of Afghanistan, a traditional Taliban stronghold.
Earlier, the alliance had reported the death of another of its troops in an attack in the eastern part of the country on Saturday.
NATO did not provide additional details, but the deaths raised to 473 the number of NATO service members killed so far this year in Afghanistan.
Separately, five villagers were killed while trying to remove a roadside mine planted by the Taliban in the Pashtun Zarghun district of the western province of Herat, the provincial governor's spokesman, Mohyaddin Noori, said Sunday.
The villagers had found six mines that were planted to target Afghan security forces in the area and, instead of notifying authorities, tried to move them themselves.
NATO and Afghan forces have been expanding their operations in the east, targeting the Haqqani network that operates out of Pakistan's North Waziristan region. Pakistan has been reluctant to move more forcefully against the Haqqani, arguing such an act could spark a broader tribal war in the region with which it is militarily ill-equipped militarily to handle.
Didn’t anyone tell the Taliban that George W. Bush won the war in Afghanistan, I saw it with my own eyes on Television on the news. George W. Bush standing on the deck of an aircraft carrier dressed up like a little soldier announcing to the world that the United States of America had defeated the Taliban.
September 13, 2011 9:05 am (AP) News of the World by Panama Jack in exile in Costa Rica
Well 10 year and 6 Trillion Dollars later it looks like George W. Bush’s lips where moving so I guess he was lying again to the American People and it looks like the Taliban are telling the American government that they want another Trillion Dollars in Gold if we want to see our young men in uniform in Afganishtan alive ever again. The going rate of $500,000.00 per soldier was set today in Iran by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad when he set the release fee for Shane Bauer and Josh Fattal who are not really soldiers but then again at least that’s what the United States Government are telling the American People. 500 thousand dollars is a cheap price to pay for each American Solider returned to the United States alive, considering that the Palestinian Government Hamas in the Gaza Strip is holding one Israeli Soldier Gilad Schalit and the price they want for him is for all the Jews in the world to give them all their money and them commit suicide.
BALI, Indonesia (AP) — In the final days of the U.S. war in Iraq, the outlook for America's military entanglements is markedly different from the confusing, convulsive first days.
Early on Iraq looked, to many, like one in a string of big conflicts in a "war on terror."
That was the view of John Abizaid when the now-retired Army general led U.S. forces in Iraq in 2003-04. At a U.S. base in northern Iraq one day in early 2004, Abizaid told soldiers preparing to return home that he hoped they would remain in uniform and keep building combat experience.
Asked by an Associated Press reporter why he had made that pitch, Abizaid said, "I think the country is going to face more of these (ground wars) in the years ahead."
That was a widely accepted, and often dreaded, view at the time.
Now, with the last American troops set to depart by year's end, Iraq seems more likely to signal an end to such long and enormously costly undertakings in the name of preventing another terrorist attack on U.S. soil — at least under the administration of President Barack Obama. He opposed the Iraq war and has declared that "the tides of war are receding."
With Obama also pledging to end the U.S. combat role in Afghanistan within three years, the military's focus is turning to places such as Yemen and Somalia.
There, the approach is different. Aerial drones, proxy forces and small teams of U.S. commandos are the preferred formula for containing the Islamic extremists who would plot terrorist attacks against the U.S.
Libya, too, has so far been a case for limited U.S. military intervention. The U.S. cleared the sky ahead of a NATO-led air campaign to protect civilians without putting any troops on the ground.
It took about eight months and cost the U.S. about $1.1 billion to achieve the Libyan rebels' goal of toppling Col. Moammar Gadhafi.
The potential for bigger conflicts persists in places such as Pakistan, whose growing arsenal of nuclear weapons sets it apart from other potential hot spots.
Iran is a major worry, too, in light of its suspected drive to build a nuclear bomb and its proclaimed goal of wiping out Israel. But a U.S. invasion of Iran, on a scale like Iraq, seems highly unlikely for now.
There are other troublesome security challenges facing the U.S., including in Asia where China is expanding its military and asserting its influence.
But the Obama approach — not unique, but distinctive in comparison to that of his predecessor, George W. Bush — is to try to prevent festering security problems from growing into full-blown crises.
The U.S. military can play a role in those cases without being called on to invade and depose a government.
Robert Gates captured this idea in a speech last winter to Army cadets at the U.S. Military Academy in which he said it would be unwise to ever fight another war like Iraq or Afghanistan.
"In my opinion, any future defense secretary who advises the president to again send a big American land army into Asia or into the Middle East or Africa should 'have his head examined,' as General MacArthur so delicately put it," Gates said.
Even with the Iraq exit in sight, the U.S. military is unlikely to wash its hands of the problems it will leave behind after nearly nine years of fighting. Wars don't end that neatly, and it is yet to be seen whether U.S. troops take on new missions in Iraq in 2012 to keep the country on track.
Obama is ending the U.S. role in the Iraq war, but that does not necessarily mean the war itself is ending.
Al-Qaida in Iraq remains. Ethnic and sectarian tensions persist. Chaos could again descend upon the country, testing the resilience of Iraqis who suffered enormously under Saddam Hussein and again during the U.S. war.
Even after the U.S. declares an end to its presence in Iraq in December, about 157 U.S. service personnel are expected to remain, working out of the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad under Army Lt. Gen. Robert Caslen.
Their job will be to oversee security assistance to the Iraqi government, as similar embassy contingents do in many other Persian Gulf countries and beyond.
About 760 private contractors working for the State Department will help the Iraqis field new military equipment purchased from the U.S. and give them initial training on that equipment. But that is not the depth and scale of training that many U.S. military officers believe the Iraqis need.
On his flight to Indonesia on Friday, U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta told reporters that negotiations with Iraq on future training possibilities will begin later.
If such talks are held, they likely would start either when Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki visits Washington in December or after the end of the year, according to a senior U.S. defense official familiar with the discussions.
The officer spoke Sunday on condition that he not be identified because the issue of possible future U.S. training is highly sensitive.
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Robert Burns can be reached on Twitter at http://twitter.com/robertburnsAP
Recent attacks in Afghanistan's capital:
2011
—Sept. 13: Taliban insurgents fire rocket-propelled grenades and assault rifles at the U.S. Embassy, NATO headquarters and other buildings.
—Aug. 19: Taliban suicide bombers storm the British Council, an international charity, killing eight people during an eight-hour firefight as two English language teachers and their bodyguard hid in a locked panic room.
—July 17: Gunmen strapped with explosives kill a close adviser to President Hamid Karzai and a member of parliament. Jan Mohammed Khan was an adviser to Karzai on tribal issues and was close to the president, a fellow Pashtun.
—June 29 — Nine insurgents armed with bomb vests, rifles and rocket launchers storm the Inter-Continental Hotel, killing at least 12 people and holding off NATO and Afghan forces for five hours.
—June 18: Insurgents wearing Afghan army uniforms storm a police station near the presidential palace and open fire on officers, killing nine.
—May 21: A suicide bomber wearing an Afghan soldier uniform slips inside the main military hospital in Kabul and kills six Afghan medical students.
—April 27: A veteran Afghan military pilot opens fire at the Kabul airport, killing eight U.S. troops and an American civilian contractor.
—April 18:Cat the Afghan Defense Ministry, killing two Afghan soldiers and fatally wounding an Afghan army officer.
—Feb. 14: A suicide bomber attacks Kabul's first Western-style shopping mall, killing two security guards at the entrance.
—Jan. 28: A suicide bomber attacks inside a Western-style supermarket, killing eight.
—Jan. 12: A suicide bomber on a motorbike targets a minibus carrying Afghan intelligence employees, killing at least two and wounding more than 30.
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2010
—Dec. 19: Two insurgents strapped with explosives ambush a bus carrying Afghan army officers to work, killing five and wounding nine.
—Nov. 12: A C strikes an American convoy, killing one civilian.
—Aug. 10: Two suicide bombers attack a private security company building, killing two company drivers.
—June 2: Insurgents fire rockets at the site of a national peace conference, where Taliban fighters wearing suicide vests battle security forces. Two militants are killed.
—May 18: A Taliban suicide bomber attacks a NATO convoy, killing 18 people including five American troops and a Canadian soldier.
—April 19: An explosion at an Afghan National Army facility just outside the capital kills an American soldier.
—Feb. 26: Suicide attackers strike two residential hotels, killing 20 people, including seven Indians.
—Jan. 26: A suicide car bomber strikes a barrier outside a U.S. base in Kabul, wounding six Afghans and eight American troops.
—Jan. 18: A team of suicide bombers and gunmen target government buildings, leaving 12 dead, including seven attackers.
TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — An Iranian court Tuesday set bail of $500,000 each for two American men arrested more than two years ago and convicted on spy-related charges, clearing the way for their release a year after a similar bail-for-freedom arrangement for the third member of the group, their defense attorney said.
Lawyer Masoud Shafiei said the court would begin the process to free Shane Bauer and Josh Fattal after payment of the bail, which must be arranged through third parties because of U.S. economic sanctions on Iran. But the timing of the court's decision is similar to last year's bail deal mediated by the Gulf state of Oman that freed a third American, Sarah Shourd.
"They accepted to set bail to release," Shafiei told The Associated Press after leaving the court. "The amount is the same for Sarah."
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, in an interview aired on NBC's "Today" show, predicted the Americans could be freed "in a couple of days." He described the bail offer as a "humanitarian gesture" and repeated complaints about attention for Iranians held in U.S. prisons.
The Americans were arrested in July 2009 along the Iran-Iraq border and accused by Iran of espionage. The trio have denied the charges and say they may have mistakenly crossed into Iran when they stepped off a dirt road while hiking near a waterfall in the Kurdish region of Iraq.
Last month, Bauer and Fattal, both 29, were sentenced to three years each for illegal entry into Iran and five years each for spying for the United States. They appealed the verdicts. Shourd's case remains open.
Shafiei said he has passed along details of the court's decision to the Swiss Embassy, which represent U.S. interests in Iran since there are no diplomatic relations between Tehran and Washington.
In Washington, State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said officials were in touch with Swiss envoys "to get more details from the Iranian authorities."
Iran may have timed the court decision to coincide with Ahmadinejad's visit later this month to New York for the general assembly of the United Nations. Last year, Shourd was released on bail just as Ahmadinejad was heading for the annual gathering of world leaders.
But Ahmadinejad was not likely involved in any decisions on the case. Iran's judiciary is controlled by the country's ruling clerics, who have been waging relentless pressure on Ahmadinejad and his allies as part of an internal power struggle.
Click to see images of jailed U.S. hikers
The diplomatic pathways for possible bail payments was not immediately clear. Officials in Oman — which has close ties with the U.S. and Iran — did not immediately respond for comment on whether they could again offer assistance.
The prime minister of Pakistan, which handles Iran's diplomatic interests in the U.S., has been in Iran since Sunday. But there has been no indication that Yousef Raza Gilani is playing any role in the case.
There was no immediate comment from the families of Bauer and Fattal.
In August, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said the U.S. is "deeply disappointed" by the conviction and eight-year sentence for the two men and pledged "unflagging support."
Shourd is living in Oakland, California; Bauer grew up in Onamia, Minnesota; and Fattal is from suburban Philadelphia. The last direct contact family members had with Bauer and Fattal was in May 2010 when their mothers were permitted a short visit in Tehran.
Their case most closely parallels that of freelance journalist Roxana Saberi, an Iranian-American who convicted of spying before being released in May 2009. Saberi was sentenced to eight years in prison, but an appeals court reduced that to a two-year suspended sentence and let her return to the U.S.
At the time, a spokesman for the Iranian judiciary said the court ordered the reduction as a gesture of "Islamic mercy" because Saberi had cooperated with authorities and expressed regret.
In May 2009, a French academic, Clotilde Reiss, also was freed after her 10-year sentence on espionage-related charges was commuted.
Last year, Iran freed an Iranian-American businessman, Reza Taghavi, was held for 29 months for alleged links to a bombing in the southern city of Shiraz, which killed 14 people. Taghavi denied any role in the attack.
UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The father of an Israeli soldier captured by Hamas-allied militants more than five years ago called on the international community Thursday to demand the release of his son as a precondition for recognition of Palestine as a U.N. member state.
Gilad Schalit was captured inside Israel in June 2006 and has been held by Hamas in Gaza. Hamas has demanded the release of hundreds of prisoners, including many who carried out deadly attacks on Israeli civilians, in exchange for Schalit.
The father, Noam Schalit, told a news conference that he came to New York to meet with diplomats from many countries and U.N. officials to press for his son's release ahead of expected Palestinian moves seeking U.N. recognition later this month.
He said the Palestinian U.N. observer mission turned down a request to meet with him, but he said he met with senior officials from the U.N., United States, Britain, France, Russia and Italy.
He thanked U.S. Ambassador Susan Rice for demanding his son's immediate release and U.N. humanitarian chief Valerie Amos, who promised to "use all her channels to tell the Palestinians ... to comply with international humanitarian law" and allow Red Cross visits to him.
In a letter from Schalit's parents to governments released at the press conference, Noam and Aviva Schalit said: "We demand that the recognition of Palestine as a U.N. member state be preconditioned on a genuine, explicit and United Nations-monitored undertaking by the Palestinian Authority to comply with international law and to immediately release our son."
Noam Schalit said the last word from his son was in September 2009 and "we do not even know if he is alive."
At all his meetings in New York, Schalit said he has stressed that the leadership of the Palestinian Authority, which controls the West Bank, signed a coalition agreement with Hamas last April.
"The Palestinian Authority cannot be allowed to ignore the commission of a grave breach of international humanitarian law by its coalition partner at the same time that it seeks the legitimacy and recognition of the international community," he said.
The Schalit family favors a Palestinian state existing side-by-side in peace with Israel but is not taking a position on the Palestinian request for U.N. recognition.
Egypt took charge of negotiations between Israel and Hamas from 2006-2009, and Schalit said there are attempts by Egypt's new government to take charge again. "So far, we haven't got any news about any breakthrough or any developments," he said
Associated Press writers Amir Shah and Deb Riechmann in Kabul contributed to this report.
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