Dear Old Fart,How many more Canadian peacekeepers have to die before Prime Minister Stephen Harper pops his head out of George W. Bush’s ass?Peter Arsenault, MontrealSuccinct, Peter, we like that in a letter. A more verbose letter has been received from Chicago, see below. TOF.

Dear Old Fart,

May I use your space to sound off on the war in Afghanistan? The historical facts behind this war do not seem to be well known.

The facts are these:

One, the Al Qaeda Arabs were brought to Afghanistan by the Pakistan ICI and the operation and the arming of them and the establishment of the eponymous base camp was paid for by the CIA.

Two, the Taliban never really liked or trusted them.

Three, the Taliban was the de facto and de jure goverment of most of the country in September 2001. The Bush government however chose to attack it and allied itself with those old friends of Donald Rumsfeld’s, the murderous thieving raping war lords.

Four, the Taliban had succeeded in defeating most of the war lords and eradicating the opium trade and had established the rule of law. Maybe their laws are not the same as ours – in particular with respect to women. But they did respect the chastity of women. Any western woman who I has traveled in the country and written about it confirms this.

For most of these facts I am indebted to Ahmed Rashid’s book published in 2001 just before the September attack.

Five, the Taliban in September 2001 offered to catch bin Laden but rather than turn him over to the USA, promised to turn him over to a neutral country for a fair trial; the Taliban suggested France. The Bush government declined this offer and instead went to war with them, for no good reason. Cynics say the war was about oil or pipelines. But maybe this is too generous. The Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld families are heavily invested in the munitions industry. In studying the causes of World War One we students would laugh at the notion that the war was initiated by munitions manufactures; the notion was naïve. But this time it is no joke. And of course Bush had all those generals and admirals, chafing at the bit. Eisenhower warned us about the military industrial complex and his warning is ignored – even by Canada, where the Harper government is in bed with American owned Canadina munitions manufacturers

Six, the headquarters of both the Taliban and Al Qaeda are both in Pakistan in the ungovernable west of that country. The Pakistan government from the beginning told the Bush administration it would co-operate in trying to apprehend the terrorists but would not assist in attacking the Taliban whom they respected for its achievements. It is impossible – any military person will agree – to defeat an enemy whose headquarters are in a neutral country!

Now it’s a mess. The Taliban and the terrorists have been driven into each other’s arms and the terrorists have corrupted the Taliban, who have lost their ideals and respect for the rule of law. And the position of the Pakistan government is awkward to say the least.

There is no end in sight – what the hell is NATO doing there? Since when was Afghanistan to be found in the North Atlantic?

Dennis McCracken

Chicago

It’s not really surprising that the new policy of the U.S. and the Afghanistan government is to make peace with the Taliban on the condition that they end their alliance with Al Qaeda, an alliance, which they never wanted, and which was forced on them when their country was invaded. Most, not all, of the acts of terrorism currently taking place in Afghanistan are made by foreign born Al Qaeda fanatics, not native Taliban Afghanis. O.F.

But if Mr. Crooks had been familiar with Naomi Klein’s The Shock Doctrine, he would not have been surprised that the right wing would appear to desert it principles in time of crisis. The evening of September 29^th, the day the Dow fell 777.68 points, when the market learned that Congess had rejected the plan of Henry Paulson, the former head of Goldman, Sachs, to rescue the bankers with public funds, we went to hear the popular Naomi Klein, author of No Logo and The Shock Doctrine, speaking in a sold-out rented movie theatre. In her book, The Shock Doctrine, she showed how the right consistently uses a financial crisis to invoke fear in the people, and to convince them to allow capitalists more power to reduce social legislation, government regulation, public ownership, etc. and make a grab for public funds for themselves. According to the pattern she reveals, the right will deliberately bring on a crisis, and has, in Poland, say, or Russia, or numerous South American countries to achieve its goals.

This time the crisis was not created on purpose, and fear ruled Congress, not the electorate: Fear of losing their seats over public indignation at the bailing out the incompetent bankers with public funds, a good many Republicans, two thirds of them in fact, rejected the Bush administration’s request. Sometimes democracy works.

Readers are invited to send in letters to curmudgeons@oldfartwebpage.com .