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2006-03-30 Afghanistan

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Posted by john 2006-03-30 16:10|| || Front Page|| [3 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 Doom ! Despair!! Agony!!! That poor man really needs to take a Seratonin re-uptake inhibitor or he'll become seriously depressed. For the first time in two generations the Afghan people have the chance to build a peaceful society, and they are slowly and inconsistently inching in that direction. It would be absurd and unfair to expect them to reach the standards of Western civilization in less than half a decade, even if they didn't live in that particular neighborhood.

Posted by trailing wife 2006-03-30 17:17|| 2006-03-30 17:17|| Front Page Top

#2 If you want to make an American intelligence officer blanch, ask him whether the Pakistani military is supporting the Taliban. Officers like McGary seem willing to talk about it all day longit's their men who are dying, after allbut intelligence officers inhabit that awkward world where politics and war intersect, and the wrong question can literally set them to stammering.

Posted by john 2006-03-30 17:28|| 2006-03-30 17:28|| Front Page Top

#3 I hope with left the Indian Government a copy of

"Lithium 6 for Dummys"

Posted by 6 2006-03-30 17:45|| 2006-03-30 17:45|| Front Page Top

#4 Junger's most well-know piece of writing is "Perfect Storm", in which the entire fishing boat crew drowns at the end, so we're not talking about a guy who necessarily looks on the bright side of things. (Good movie, though- you get to watch George Clooney drown.)

Posted by Matt 2006-03-30 17:58|| 2006-03-30 17:58|| Front Page Top

#5 I hope with left the Indian Government a copy of
"Lithium 6 for Dummys"

Being stockpiled right now...

http://www.thebulletin.org/article.php?art_ofn=ja98albright

"India also did not reveal whether the fusion material used in the thermonuclear device was lithium deuteride, tritium, or both. Bhabha started producing lithium 6 almost a decade ago and began producing tritium even earlier. Bhabha also recently opened a tritium production plant, which can extract significant quantities of tritium from the heavy water irradiated in its CANDU power reactors."

Posted by john 2006-03-30 18:09|| 2006-03-30 18:09|| Front Page Top

#6 waah, waah, waah

interesting stuff about Pakistan...

waah, waah, waah

Posted by Iblis">Iblis 2006-03-30 18:10|| 2006-03-30 18:10|| Front Page Top

#7 How long are the Paks going to get away with this?

Posted by john 2006-03-30 18:14|| 2006-03-30 18:14|| Front Page Top

#8 I find it hard to fathom why we have not made a major operation (Airstrikes followed by napalm, followed by ground troops) to destroy the bulk of the poppy fields and deny our enemies that economic resource.

At the very least it might convince the poppy growers to stop paying for Taliban soldiers. At very most it might bankrupt then and help us win.

Posted by rjschwarz 2006-03-30 18:33|| 2006-03-30 18:33|| Front Page Top

#9 I don't read this as doom and despair, or waah, waah. I see a guy who is not a Ranger reporting on their life - full pack, 10,000 feet, dealing with sh*t. It's a tough job - both the soldiers' job and Junger's. Sometimes the news is bad, sometimes it's good, and mostly you just won't know for a while, but you just keep doing your job.

Posted by Glenmore">Glenmore 2006-03-30 18:55|| 2006-03-30 18:55|| Front Page Top

#10 Matt, "The Pefect Storm" is actually a true account of the Andrea Gail. No one actually knows what happened but the Andrea Gail was lost in the fall of 1991. I was living in the Boston area at the time and it was big news there.

Posted by Deacon Blues">Deacon Blues 2006-03-30 19:11|| 2006-03-30 19:11|| Front Page Top

#11 rjschwartz:

We should use napalm.
We have napalm.
We can't use napalm.
In the campaign against Baghdad, we used concrete-bombs.
The enemy got the message.

Posted by Listen to Dogs 2006-03-30 20:23|| 2006-03-30 20:23|| Front Page Top

#12 I find it hard to fathom why we have not made a major operation (Airstrikes followed by napalm, followed by ground troops) to destroy the bulk of the poppy fields and deny our enemies that economic resource.

Immediately after any such strike, the jihadis would gather up a school full of children, take them into a burnt-out field, tie them up, douse them with gasoline, and set them on fire. Once the flames burnt down, they would invite every camera crew they could find to show the world "what the Americans did".

Posted by Robert Crawford">Robert Crawford 2006-03-30 20:48|| http://www.kloognome.com/]">[http://www.kloognome.com/] 2006-03-30 20:48|| Front Page Top

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