America’s China Option In Afghanistan
China shares a 76-kilometer border with Afghanistan and is doing a lot of business there without committing any boots on the ground.
Without China, Afghanistan will become America’s worst military quagmire ─ making Vietnam and Somalia look like a traditional U.S. family picnic in a local park.
China and America have agreed to cooperate on ensuring that neither Afghanistan nor Pakistan is used as a terrorist base. Because of China’s long border with Afghanistan, it fears Islamic extremism is bleeding into its Western frontier which has been racked by unrest.
Beijing is also discussing intelligence cooperation with the U.S. of the sort that took place in the ’80s, when America, China and Pakistan worked together to boot the Soviets out of Afghanistan.
The original goal of America when it launched “operation Enduring Freedom” in Afghanistan in 2001, was to capture Osama-bin-Laden and other al-Qaeda leaders and bring them to justice after the attacks of 9/11. Meanwhile, they have moved to the Pakistan side of an un-patrolled border.
While America is squandering billions on the war in Iraq, after its fleeting shortsighted victory of routing the Taliban in Afghanistan in 2002, the Taliban has returned with a vengeance, and now has a presence in 80 percent of the country. Of the 42-nation International Security Assistance Force, 56 percent want their troops back home ─ and that includes America. After eight years, more than 1,500 ISAF soldiers have died. Meanwhile, China Metallurgical Group paid $3 billion in 2008 to prospect for copper deposits worth some $88 billion in Afghanistan’s Logar province. So who is really winning and why isn’t America engaging China?
With al-Qaeda leaders urging Uygurs to launch a holy war against oppressive China is there any doubt in any political realist in America, regardless of party affiliation, that this is America’s best Afghanistan option?
Without China, Afghanistan will become America’s worst military quagmire ─ making Vietnam and Somalia look like a traditional U.S. family picnic in a local park.
China and America have agreed to cooperate on ensuring that neither Afghanistan nor Pakistan is used as a terrorist base. Because of China’s long border with Afghanistan, it fears Islamic extremism is bleeding into its Western frontier which has been racked by unrest.
Beijing is also discussing intelligence cooperation with the U.S. of the sort that took place in the ’80s, when America, China and Pakistan worked together to boot the Soviets out of Afghanistan.
The original goal of America when it launched “operation Enduring Freedom” in Afghanistan in 2001, was to capture Osama-bin-Laden and other al-Qaeda leaders and bring them to justice after the attacks of 9/11. Meanwhile, they have moved to the Pakistan side of an un-patrolled border.
While America is squandering billions on the war in Iraq, after its fleeting shortsighted victory of routing the Taliban in Afghanistan in 2002, the Taliban has returned with a vengeance, and now has a presence in 80 percent of the country. Of the 42-nation International Security Assistance Force, 56 percent want their troops back home ─ and that includes America. After eight years, more than 1,500 ISAF soldiers have died. Meanwhile, China Metallurgical Group paid $3 billion in 2008 to prospect for copper deposits worth some $88 billion in Afghanistan’s Logar province. So who is really winning and why isn’t America engaging China?
With al-Qaeda leaders urging Uygurs to launch a holy war against oppressive China is there any doubt in any political realist in America, regardless of party affiliation, that this is America’s best Afghanistan option?
posted by Peter de Krassel's Custom Maid Politics at 9:18 AM
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