(cross posted at montanamaven.com) In an article entitled "The Wrong Man for the Job", the former Iraq weapons inspector in Iraq, Scott Ritter, lays out his reasons for why Richard Holbrooke is a bad choice for U.S. special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan.
http://www.truthdig.com/report...
"There will be no peace without a negotiated settlement that includes the Taliban. To accomplish this, leadership is required which recognizes the Taliban as a force of moderation, and not extremism. Holbrooke does not have a record which indicates he would be willing to consider direct negotiations with the Taliban. He tends to seek military solutions to difficult ethnic-based problems, and he is likely to argue for the deployment of even more U.S. troops to that war-ravaged nation. That would be a historic mistake."
Scott Ritter knows this area. Scott Ritter was right about there being no WMDs in Iraq. Rather than listening to the conventional wisdom that the Taliban is all evil and must be destroyed, read what Ritter has to say about moderates in the Taliban.
We keep making the same mistakes. We back the wrong people who eventually turn on us. We depose real democrats like Mosadaq in Iran in 1953 and get a dictator like the Shah whose cruel rule eventually leads to our embassy being taken hostage in 1979 by Islamic fundamentalists. We back Hamas originally to fight against the evil commie Palestine Liberation Organization. Now the PLO is our friend and Hamas is the enemy. Read Stephen Zunes America's Hidden Role in Hamas Rise to Power http://www.alternet.org/audits... We give Osama bin laden missiles to shoot down Russian helicopters. And on and on.
The answer is not a military one in any of these places. But Ritter sees Holbrooke as a person who always chooses a military option.
Is there another solution to wiping each other off the face of the map? Is it possible to put away the childish things like tanks, drones, weapons that burn the skin or tear the flesh? Is it possible to put away childish things and become mature men and women by figuring out how to share oil, gas, food and water? Are there no grownups that ever think about going into politics? There certainly don't seem to be any in Washington or on Wall Street. Just way out here on the edges of democracy and with voices like Ritter and Zunes.
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