After all of the fore-going, what is there left to debate? the on-going war in Afganistan is a blatant breach of all the civilized "rules of engagement".
By the time this is sorted out it must have become clear to everyone that war, in whatever guise it is presented, is a manipulating of the common people by polititians for ulterior motives that may never be fully revealed, because they would be condemned on morality and common decency.
As I see it, the right to make war must be taken away from the polititians, where it is misused for personal image building and to firm commercial alliances for commercial gain.
It looks like the only way to get there, though, is to invoke the war-crimes acts and try some of them for the crimes against humanity they are committing, and label every person who kills another person under the guise of war, as a war criminal.
History has taught us many things, but one of the most important we should remember, is that war never solves the problem for which it was started. In the end negotiation always has to clear up the mess it created.
Alfred

War in Afghanistan is a new way of dealing with terrorists. If we leave Afghanistan, it will revert to Taliban control and be a haven for terrorists and training terrorists. If they continue to allow poppy growing, they will have capital as well.

We can't look backwards and say this is different to the civilised way we practiced war in Europe or anywhere else. Every war is new, every war goes through a stage of learning how to prosecute it by both sides. Both sides believe they are right and will eventually be victorious.

Vietnam was lost due to restriction in rules of engagement. If the US forces had been allowed open slather, they could not have lost - they were restricted by political processes. not so here, well, not yet.

Trying to couch this war in UN terms, resolutions, rules and guidelines will get people killed and will drag it out. The politics muddies clear objectives. The UN is a group of political apointees who all have personal vested interests, why anyone deals with them at all amazes me.

Why do people keep asking politicians for exit plans or strategies, they will only reflect what they think their trading partners, or their community thinks, depending on election cycle.

There should be more outrage that we might actually leave this part of the world to become a breeding ground for terrorists, instead we get the hand wringers whining about how we are affecting the lives of simple farmers - the Taliban will fix that, and there will be no next generation of farmers as all the young men will go to jihad.

We stay till the job is done, no leaving till then if it takes 10, 20 or 50 years we stay till the threat from such people is wiped out.

Well rpg you have well and truly been taken in by the Neocon propaganda.
It would be pointless trying to give you the facts on the war in Afghanistan; you would have too closed a mind to analyze them
But the good thing is that your *war to the finish, even if it takes 50 years*, is not going to happen.
The reasons?
Peak oil will stop the US war machine cold in its tracks.
The US economy is going to implode in the near future, dragging down the rest of the world, even China and of course Australia.
Climate change will affect the outcome but take a bit longer as it affects the world population and starvation rears it’s ugly head.
In the meantime a lot more innocent people are going to die or be maimed to continue this farcical war started by a deluded cowboy and his paranoid string pullers.
The speeches we have had so far in the Australian parliament show that the present lot of so-called leaders (except for the Greens and a minority of the others)are obviously not able to comprehend the fact that this is an unwinnable war.

sarnian .. what neocon propaganda?

It's always the resort of the desperate to try to raise a straw man to explain why people think differently isn't it?

This is the reality, I've studied war professionally, have you? Or are you just taken in by leftist propaganda? All your arguments relate to either fantasies or prophesies of doom, probably from leftist blogs eh.

American economy imploding, you wish! It won't happen, they are not stupid people as you seem to think.

Peak Oil, not an issue, we will switch to biofuels as soon as the cost benefit curve crosses decreasing oil. You lot keep forgetting that other substances can be made into fuel. You can "hope and pray" they do not, but it's not a reality.

Climate change, jeez, another fantasy. You'd be better of holding your breath to stop war quite frankly

A lot more people would die in Afghanistan if the Taliban get back into power .. why is that OK? Why is it OK for the Taliban to harbour terrorists? Do you think it will all stop if everyone is nice to each other? Talk about delusions and sucking up leftist propaganda.

It's really the "cowboy" you have a problem with isn't it? Also PM Howard (MOS) I'm sure. If it was President Clinton, would you have the same problem? No I'm sure you wouldn't.

The war in Afghanistan is just a tool for the left to express its outrage, nothing to do with the treatment of women, or anyone else there. For the rest of us, it's a line in the sand that the terrorism and the rolling up of Taliban/sharia law, stops here.

You think people are pulling the strings do you, are they behind the doors where ever go?

Are they pulling the strings of everyone in our parliament too? Are they at NATO HQ where the war is being led from? Are they everywhere .. horrors!

When you talk about people being deluded, reread your own posts.

Have a good weekend, watch out for people pulling the strings, ok.

I think "leftist propaganda" was enough to know that Sarnian was right.

If our presence is illegal under international law, if the Taliban may have offered Bin Laden, if Opium production has gone UP since we took over, and our troops are dying just to prevent a backwards tribalistic warband conquer the rest of the tribalistic warbands at present run by a corrupt vote-rigging criminal, we should not be there.
Our presence has forced the Taliban to spread outwards into neighbouring Pakistan, and they are in a position to wait centuries for us to leave anyway.

Also rpg, you DO realize that all the terrorists were people that were LET INTO THE COUNTRY TO LAUNCH A DOMESTIC ATTACK?

Also, how do we 'win' this war? How do we get every last "Taliban"- do we merely kill the "Taliban" and suddenly all the other jihad psychos in the world (using this conflict as a recruiting drive) will suddenly, magically disappear too?

THIS is why we should ditch that place- in fact, we should be laying out terms for the Taliban on our withdrawal (and conditions which we will simply launch a bombing run if they defy, and leave).

"Also rpg, you DO realize that all the terrorists were people that were LET INTO THE COUNTRY TO LAUNCH A DOMESTIC ATTACK?"

What on earth are you talking about ..what terrorists and which DOMESTIC ATTACK?

Get your act together and try to write something coherent, please. Just blithering incoherently is not an argument, nor can anyone respond to or understand what you mean.

Our presence is not illegal by international law, even if it was .. so what? Terrorists tend not to be bothered by International Law, why should we when pursuing them .. in fact, most legal system have a clause to allow "hot pursuit", consider this such a pursuit - there are no time limits on such things.

"Also, how do we 'win' this war?" Why do we need to? Why not just stay there forever and deny the terrorists a place to train and hang out bothering the locals. The poppies etc we can deal with once the country is safe and yes, we kill every last Taliban. Why do we have to rush these things, that's when things go wrong ..of course, that's what politics does to war, stuffs it up.

Consider it a police action where we stay once the pests are removed.

You all look at this as if we can just go in, do something and leave and it will all be OK, it is not like that, those days are over - terrorism is a new form of warfare it is "asymmetric", if you don't understand that, go look it up and stop trying to apply old styles of thinking and warfare to a new way of prosecuting terror.

We stay till the job is done, it may take time