Arguments for ground war - forget it

Doug Henwood dhenwood at panix.com
Wed Nov 21 12:58:11 PST 2001


brettk at unicacorp.com wrote:


>That's a good point. If al-Qaeda really was part of the Taliban, then we
>really would have been at war with Afghanistan. ObL certainly says there
>is a war against the US, and if he's speaking as a member of the Afghan
>government, then you're correct.
>
>I'm open to this possibility, but I haven't seen anything to convince me of
>it yet. And is this really the position of the Bush Administration? I've
>always heard them say that the Taliban is harboring al-Qaeda. I've never
>heard anyone say they are indistinguishable.

I've read accounts - in the Financial Times, I think - saying that al Q folks were in the Taliban defense ministry. It's been widely reported that al Q subsidized the Taliban government, too. "Indistinguishable" might be an exaggeration, but deeply enmeshed wouldn't be.

And lots of both aren't Afghans, so the sovereignty issue gets very complicated.

Doug



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