US General: Russian Aid To Taliban In Afghanistan Is Increasing

[Insight]

US General: Russian Aid To Taliban In Afghanistan Is Increasing | True Pundit


US General: Russian Aid To Taliban In Afghanistan Is Increasing

Posted on February 10, 2017 by admin

Russian aid to the Taliban is increasing, according to the commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, hampering U.S. interests in the country.
Gen. John Nicholson warned of Russia’s malignant influence while testifying before the Senate Committee on Armed Services about the state of the joint U.S.-NATO support mission in Afghanistan. Nicholson added that he believes Russia’s involvement in Afghanistan is meant to undermine U.S. and NATO interests. The Kremlin is attempting to legitimize the Taliban by claiming the terrorist group is fighting the Islamic State branch in Afghanistan known as the Islamic State in Khorasan, he explained.
“Russia has become more assertive over the past year, overtly lending legitimacy to the Taliban to undermine NATO efforts and bolster belligerents using the false narrative that only the Taliban are fighting ISIL-K,” said Nicholson in his written statement for the record.

Responding to questions from Florida Sen. Bill Nelson, Nicholson claimed that Russia’s attempts to undermine U.S. interests in Afghanistan started in 2016.


“When did the evidence of them (Russia) cozying up to the Taliban start?” asked Nelson.
“Sir, it started in 2016, so just within the last year, this has started, and it was a gradual progression,” answered Nicholson.
“And is that progression increasing?” Nelson continued.
“Yes sir.” Nicholson replied.
“I think we better let President Trump know that,” added the general.
The general also confirmed that by helping the Taliban, Russia isalso indirectly aiding al-Qaida and other terrorist groups.
“The Taliban are the medium for many of these other terrorists groups to operate,” said Nicholson, stressing that the same relationship does not exist between the Taliban and ISIS, given the two groups are in conflict with each other.
(DAILY CALLER)
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[Insight]

[MENTION=1058]Bengal_Tiger[/MENTION] [MENTION=1444]Azmal[/MENTION] [MENTION=1498]ComradePashtun[/MENTION]

Your thoughts?

[BarakzaiAbdali]

The Russians may perceive a threat if NATO leaves since that would leave a problem at their istan state door step.

I think this is a game where multiple interests overlap. The Military Industrial Complex is trying to force Trump to stay and spend and is using the Russian ruse to force his hand (i.e. since he has all these accusations of being a Russian puppet they are trying to goad his ego into proving he is not by chasing Russian proxies supposedly backed by Moscow). The media/MIC will present a pull out or pull back as surrendering Afghanistan to not only Islamist but somehow Russian interests (a very dumb thought process if the American people actually buy that).

Russian is probably fine with this arrangement as they certainly do not want an Islamist oriented government on their doorstep but they also don't want to have to fight against it if that happens. Putin is not a dumb man I wouldn't put it past him to create the ruse in order to keep the US/NATO entrenched and spending as well as killing his enemies as well as those enemies killing his historical adversaries. If he is behind the ruse its brilliant actually (not that I am in any way a fan but credit goes to where it is due).

[khushal]

I was thinking the same thing.

http://www.pashtunforums.com/literature-/51177-russia-helping-anti-insurgents-afghanistan.html#post803821

The irony is that America is falling for the same trick that they themselves did to the Soviets in the 70'-80's. The commies used to have a saying in Kabul back in the day "that a capitalist would sell rope even when he is one that is being hung."

[Insight]

The Russians may perceive a threat if NATO leaves since that would leave a problem at their istan state door step.

I think this is a game where multiple interests overlap. The Military Industrial Complex is trying to force Trump to stay and spend and is using the Russian ruse to force his hand (i.e. since he has all these accusations of being a Russian puppet they are trying to goad his ego into proving he is not by chasing Russian proxies supposedly backed by Moscow). The media/MIC will present a pull out or pull back as surrendering Afghanistan to not only Islamist but somehow Russian interests (a very dumb thought process if the American people actually buy that).

Russian is probably fine with this arrangement as they certainly do not want an Islamist oriented government on their doorstep but they also don't want to have to fight against it if that happens. Putin is not a dumb man I wouldn't put it past him to create the ruse in order to keep the US/NATO entrenched and spending as well as killing his enemies as well as those enemies killing his historical adversaries. If he is behind the ruse its brilliant actually (not that I am in any way a fan but credit goes to where it is due).

Russia and the Taliban insurgency are both admitting to the ties at the official level. I think this goes beyond perception, and that Iran has pushed Russia and Taliban to have ties.

The Taliban also insists on “political nature” of its relations with Moscow. Its spokesman, Zabihullah Mujahid, told VOA the Taliban has neither received any cooperation nor has it asked for any help from foreign countries, including Russia.

Afghanistan Continues to Fume over Russia’s Outreach to Taliban



Russia is sharing information with the Taliban to fight the Islamic State - The Washington Post
In my opinion, Russia does not want any Western military presence on it's doorsteps, in this case Afghanistan. This also goes for China and Iran.


Russia is officially stating that the Taliban are a formidable force against ISIS expansion in Afghanistan (which even US military officials admit has a very insignificant presence). This is why the US military is stating that Russia is using the ISIS threat pretext in order to give legitimacy to the Taliban, and justify it's support in order to undermine the US (which they could be viewing as a spent force on the way out?)

Russia is sharing information with the Taliban to fight the Islamic State - The Washington Post

[Zamir Kabulov, a Foreign Ministry department head and President Vladimir Putin's special representative for Afghanistan, told the Interfax news agency that “the Taliban interest objectively coincides with ours]

Russia, China, Pakistan, and Iran are leading calls for the UN to remove the Taliban from their sanctions list.


According to Reuters, Zakharova added that China, Pakistan, and Russia agreed upon a “flexible approach to remove certain [Taliban] figures from [United Nations] sanctions lists as part of efforts to foster a peaceful dialogue between Kabul and the Taliban movement.”
Russia’s New Favorite Jihadis: The Taliban - The Daily Beast

[Insight]

I also do not think the Taliban insurgency want to publicly discuss Russian ties (in contrast to their acknowledgment of Chinese ties and Iranian support) due to Russia's history in Afghanistan. Yet, insurgencies historically take support from whoever they can.

[khushal]

I also do not think the Taliban insurgency want to publicly discuss Russian ties (in contrast to their acknowledgment of Chinese ties and Iranian support) due to Russia's history in Afghanistan. Yet, insurgencies historically take support from whoever they can.

Its support is not real insight. Its a ruse to keep the US treasury to be wasted there. Russia's goal is to bankrupt the US so its influence can wane. Brezinski played the same game with the Soviets. They are trying to portray Trump as a Russian puppet to force his hand.
Trump: Russia is a ruse - YouTube


Afghanistan is money down the drain. The Brits in India realized this very quickly but the Soviets and the Americans did/are having an ego/greed issue.

[khushal]

Here is an interesting article about the subject:
Donald Trump is being sucked into the Afghan quagmire

Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin.

• Roger Boyes
• The Times
• 7:56PM March 8, 2017
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• 37

Behind me in the queue at Lloyds bank was a homeless man in a smudged khaki jacket, shifting from foot to foot. He wanted to enlist my help in persuading an unhelpful cashier to change the coins he had acquired begging on Borough High Street into a pounds 20 note he needed to pay a hostel. The man had served in Helmand for God-knows-what, he told me, and the place had cursed him.

Afghanistan has certainly earned its reputation as the graveyard of empires, and not just for my unfortunate fellow queuer. It’s a place where nothing gets solved, lives are broken and where money sinks into the sand — and yet big powers are lining up for a replay of the Great Game. The latest iteration of this geopolitical free-for-all could see the US again stepping up its forces there, Russia itching to get back in contention, Pakistan and India at loggerheads and Iran ready to fund a new military adventure.
Soon enough Donald Trump will have to make a call: whether to supply a few thousand more US military advisers to accelerate the training of the Afghan national forces, whether to go even further to shield the government of Ashraf Ghani against the Taliban and other jihadists, or whether just to get out of the place altogether and leave it to the regional powers to sort out. This time he can’t just go to his default option and “correct” Barack Obama’s policies with a tweet or two. Obama’s flawed Afghan strategy — a military surge whose effectiveness was undermined by announcing the army’s departure date in advance — created a vacuum that an unholy alliance now wants to fill.
Just after Christmas, Moscow let it be quietly known that it was sharing intelligence and working with the Taliban; that is, the insurgent group determined to overthrow the US-backed Ghani government. The Kremlin claims that it needs the co-operation of the Taliban to stamp out an affiliate of Islamic State in Afghanistan that could, if allowed to flourish, destabilise the central Asian republics. The Afghan government claims Russia is also arming the Taliban. In a meeting in Moscow, Russia, China and Pakistan agreed certain Taliban leaders should be removed from the UN sanctions list.
Nobody from the Ghani government was invited to those talks. India was not consulted. It’s becoming pretty clear that one team in this reset of the Great Game is Moscow-Islamabad-China, plus the Taliban, plus Iran. You might as well just call them Rogues United. They smell the opportunity of a US withdrawal from the region. China, for example, is forming a so-called economic corridor through Pakistan intended to link the city of Kashgar in Xinjiang province to the Pakistani port of Gwadar.
In resetting policy on Afghanistan Trump thus has to do more than demand value for money for America’s massive military and civil aid. The US has come a long way from the panicked days after 9/11 when the CIA flew in and handed suitcases of cash to anti-Taliban warlords. These grizzled warriors became some of the richest men in the country, creating a gold market in Kabul and building flashy villas. The total spent by US taxpayers on the country since those days now exceeds dollars 900 billion.

• More: Trump won’t cheer CIA leak
• More: White House tourists stunned

To come up with an answer to Rogues United, Trump has to devise a regional strategy rather than one based on a very shaky transactional relationship with Pakistan. All the signs are that the White House could tilt towards India as a regional stabiliser. India was traditionally Moscow’s darling and an enthusiastic purchaser of Russian weaponry. Moscow’s support for Pakistan and its indulgence of Taliban leaders suggest that time is over. There is still a useful intelligence relationship with Islamabad but it is clear where the preferences of Trump advisers lie: with an India that can help contain China’s ambitions.
It could be, of course, that Trump accepts at face value Putin’s claim to be solely concerned with the elimination of Isis. Or even the argument made by Putin sympathisers that Russia and China can jointly put pressure on Pakistan to create a situation where a defanged Taliban can be integrated into Afghan politics. But the idea that Putin is a peacemaker surely died with the bombing of Aleppo. He is concerned chiefly with the projection of regional power. And there is almost certainly another element in play: Putin wants to have his finger on every global pressure point, not just in his client state of Syria, in order to engineer a grand bargain with Trump that gives Russia equal standing with the US.
Afghanistan is personal for Putin. The 1979 Soviet invasion was a mirror of the country’s decline. In nine years some 620,000 young Russians served there, about 100,000 of them Putin’s fellow intelligence officers. The returning zinc coffins were kept secret from relatives but Putin knew about them; the loss of fighting morale was a precursor for the collapse of the Soviet empire. By 1996 the Taliban had taken Kabul and seized Mohammad Najibullah, the country’s last communist president. He was castrated and strung up in the centre of the city.
Trump may shy away from the fiendish complexity of this strange war. He will surely ask Afghan veterans, such as his defence secretary Jim Mattis: where’s my victory in this? Chiefly, though, there is a presidential moment approaching, one in which he has to make considered judgments about who in the world he really trusts. On Afghanistan he has to find an answer to the question that he has so far tried to duck: am I being played by Vladimir Putin?
The Times

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news...3cc45b7e1150f7

[Insight]

I think the Russian prostitute pee pee tape on Trump is a very powerful card in Putin's hand.