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The first step: Voice of Russia
The first step
Jul 2, 2011 10:30 Moscow Time
President Barack Obama has announced the American withdrawal from Afghanistan. This marks the closing stage of Operation Enduring Freedom initiated by President George W. Bush ten years ago. The US unleashed a large-scale military campaign in Afghanistan to fight against Osama bin Laden and the Taliban, which it blacklisted as the worst terrorist organizations ever.
Obama’s statement was preceded by official reports from the Pentagon chief Robert Gates saying that American diplomats had been in talks with the Taliban but no representatives of the Hamid Karzai government were taking part. A frustrated Karzai said what he had never dared say before. “We’re not going to thank the US, - he said, - the Americans are using Afghanistan for their own political agenda”.
Most analysts say that Obama’s decision to start the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan resulted from his plans to run for a second term. Naturally, ending the war in Afghanistan, which has triggered disapproval from three quarters of Americans, would boost his ratings ahead of the November 2012 presidential campaign.
However, the failure of the American campaign in Afghanistan makes but a fraction of the overall abortive US foreign policy which just recently aimed at planting an American political order in countries which belonged to the so-called ‘third world’.
The recent revolutions in countries of the Middle East and North Africa have toppled the regimes which Washington had nurtured and leaned on for years. Hosni Mubarak, who ruled Egypt for decades, is facing trial. Threatened by angry crowds, Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali fled Tunisia with stolen gold. Yemen, which is in control of Middle Eastern oil supply routes, is swept by chaos. Mass protests in Bahrain are posing a threat to a major US air base. And explosions which kill US servicemen continue to rock Iraq.
Pakistan is causing Washington a particularly bad headache. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has described the situation in Pakistan as “beyond US control and dangerous”. Mrs.Clinton warns that the incumbent government in Pakistan could be toppled and that the Taliban might get a hold of the country’s nuclear arsenals. Just recently, such a prospect was Washington’s worst nightmare.
All these events suggest the demise of the US colonization agenda. By announcing a withdrawal from Afghanistan, Washington de facto admitted the abortiveness of this agenda. But this is only the first step in this direction.
The first step
Jul 2, 2011 10:30 Moscow Time
President Barack Obama has announced the American withdrawal from Afghanistan. This marks the closing stage of Operation Enduring Freedom initiated by President George W. Bush ten years ago. The US unleashed a large-scale military campaign in Afghanistan to fight against Osama bin Laden and the Taliban, which it blacklisted as the worst terrorist organizations ever.Obama’s statement was preceded by official reports from the Pentagon chief Robert Gates saying that American diplomats had been in talks with the Taliban but no representatives of the Hamid Karzai government were taking part. A frustrated Karzai said what he had never dared say before. “We’re not going to thank the US, - he said, - the Americans are using Afghanistan for their own political agenda”.
Most analysts say that Obama’s decision to start the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan resulted from his plans to run for a second term. Naturally, ending the war in Afghanistan, which has triggered disapproval from three quarters of Americans, would boost his ratings ahead of the November 2012 presidential campaign.
However, the failure of the American campaign in Afghanistan makes but a fraction of the overall abortive US foreign policy which just recently aimed at planting an American political order in countries which belonged to the so-called ‘third world’.
The recent revolutions in countries of the Middle East and North Africa have toppled the regimes which Washington had nurtured and leaned on for years. Hosni Mubarak, who ruled Egypt for decades, is facing trial. Threatened by angry crowds, Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali fled Tunisia with stolen gold. Yemen, which is in control of Middle Eastern oil supply routes, is swept by chaos. Mass protests in Bahrain are posing a threat to a major US air base. And explosions which kill US servicemen continue to rock Iraq.
Pakistan is causing Washington a particularly bad headache. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has described the situation in Pakistan as “beyond US control and dangerous”. Mrs.Clinton warns that the incumbent government in Pakistan could be toppled and that the Taliban might get a hold of the country’s nuclear arsenals. Just recently, such a prospect was Washington’s worst nightmare.
All these events suggest the demise of the US colonization agenda. By announcing a withdrawal from Afghanistan, Washington de facto admitted the abortiveness of this agenda. But this is only the first step in this direction.