--- Yoshie Furuhashi <furuhashi.1 at osu.edu> wrote: Failure to capture Osama bin Laden and other high-ranking Al Qaeda leaders in Afghanistan? If the main idea had indeed been to arrest the planners of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, the invasion of Afghanistan was a dumb thing to do. The invasion was, first and foremost, a reassertion of power and prestige, necessary because the 9/11 attacks put big holes in them, showing that even the Pentagon itself -- the headquarters of the biggest military in the world -- is not invulnerable to attacks. Afghanistan was the most convenient target among all countries -- reportedly about sixty -- in which Al Qaeda is said to have its cells. It was poor, it was diplomatically isolated, it had internally fractured, its military force was weak. Washington couldn't have very well invaded Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, for instance, which are all Washington's allies.
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It was also the only country that had large, pretty much openly government-sponsored, infrastructure for supporting Islamist terrorism, and the only country whose leadership was ideologically devoted to spreading their brand of Islamism throughout the Muslim world, violently if need be.
Thank God the US invaded Afghanistan. Everybody in Eurasia is very grateful. Too bad they fucked up afterward though.
Nu, zayats, pogodi!
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