WILL America ever leave Afghanistan? I wonder how our media missed a report which quoted Stephen Lendman, a Chicago-based author and radio host saying: “The United States has no plans to end the war in Afghanistan despite knowing full well that there is no military solution to the ongoing conflict in the country… America’s interests in the Asian country far outweigh the costs of war.”

Mr Lendman said this while discussing remarks made by Gen Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who admitted that the Taliban “are not losing” in Afghanistan.

“Speaking during a discussion at a security forum in Halifax, Nova Scotia, the top US military officer said much more needed to be done to bring peace to the war-torn country 17 years into the longest war in American history.

“Gen Dunford admitted ‘what has been well known for so many years — that the war in Afghanistan is something America can never win, no matter how long they fight it’.”

Mr Lendman said “The war is part of a regional plot by the CIA and the Mossad to steal Afghanistan’s vast mineral resources. While the US Department of Defence’s estimates have put Afghanistan’s untapped wealth of gold, copper, uranium and other rare-earth minerals at well around $1 trillion, Afghan officials’ latest geological studies hint at figures three times larger.

“The number can probably explain Washington’s willingness to continue the war in Afghanistan, which has dragged on for 16 years and has cost the US economy more than $714 billion, according to the Pentagon’s Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction report.

“The second longest war in the US history has also killed over 2,000 American soldiers and injured 20,000 more.”

Noting that Washington had failed to weaken the Taliban over the years, Mr Lendman predicted that the militant group could continue the war for another 18 years.

S. M. Saeed
Karachi

Published in Dawn, November 23rd, 2018