It is somewhat pointless, respectfully, in quoting figures "from the New York Times" regarding casualties in both Iraq and Afghanistan. One could safely multiply the numbers by three in Iraq and double the numbers in Afghanistan. No American government wants the real numbers known and no American government is the slightest bit concerned either. Collateral damage covers any number of things, civilian deaths being one.
Controlling a compliant media makes it is so easy to ensure that these numbers or anything that is in any way detrimental to the "war" objectives do not receive any real coverage. No different here as the Likudist Murdoch and his empire feeds the public whatever chickenfeed suits the climate.

It has been a long time since even the poor apathetic people of the US were ever in receipt of anything that has a grain of truth in it and so it will continue. Anyone who has the ability to comprehend how the US works in 2011, where the money comes from, why elections now cost billions as opposed to $10 million, what the real reasons are for this incursion into a backward state like Afghanistan that everyone knows will revert to all those " undemocratic" ways that have been their heritage since time began. Trying to foist US democracy and values, such as they are in 2011, on a simple people, is so stupid there has to be another reason.

Massive incontrovertible evidence now indicates that the Bush Administration, at some point, recognized drug revenue as a powerful political tool to control America and much of the world. Working off the “Bush number 1” model, the Iran/Contra drug cartels, at some point, perhaps as early as 2002, America went full steam ahead on the War on Terror and guarding their southern border with Mexico, as well as “full speed ahead” with flooding the world with narcotics.

Cont'd

Whether you naively believe Afghanistan was involved in 9/11 or are a part of the intelligent majority who view 9/11 as a Bush conspiracy, one fact is inexorable.
“America has built the largest drug empire imaginable in Afghanistan, not just ‘looking the other way,’ but spending millions on improving opium harvests and building a heroin processing industry”
Quote, US Veterans Today.

All protected by the US military, transportation care of the military as well. A great enterprise. Not one poppy plant has been removed. Productivity is higher than ever. Of course, we all know from reading Murdoch that we are fighting those evil Taliban (natives of Afghanistan...they live there...it is their country) with the al Qaeda myth is no longer fashionable

American military and intelligence resources have been used to distribute drugs worldwide and handle tens of billions of dollars in narco-profits. As they say, follow the money.

The US can always rely on countries like Australia to ‘tag along’ and give it some credibility. With Howard and his sycophantic nature, it was easy, Butter up the “man of steel” and he was panting at their feet. We have been doing it for years. Every warlike dalliance has had a compliant Australian government in there, boots and all, with the explanations for public consumption well rehearsed, as with the current so-called ‘leader’ who parrots once again as did Howard, then Rudd, that Australia will “stay the course’.

In other words, jump to the dictates of the world’s #1 terrorist.

The US economy just cannot exist without a warlike environment in which to hide their real activities, to contribute perhaps over 20% of their employment numbers to military infrastructure and the sale of armaments. Right now, they are sitting on as much as 40 million people below or just on the poverty line.
Easy to control people when they need food stamps just to stay alive.

Pakistan is next. The innuendo has started. I am sure that overtures have already been made to our fawning politicians for our connivance to be part of whatever the US is planning in that geography.

OK, so the people of Afghanistan like us.

That’s nice.

Now will someone explain to me why we are risking the lives and well-being of Australian soldiers to fight a hopeless war that, in the end, is none of our business?

What exactly are we trying to achieve in Afghanistan?

This piece in The Australian illustrates what an awful, convoluted, mess we’re involved in over there.

WRONG SIGNALS IN INDIAN-AFGHAN DEAL

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/wrong-signals-in-indian-afghan-deal/story-e6frg6ux-1226159567513

We should stay out of this conflict.

Assertions that "capture and kill" is

an update of the Vietnam's War's notorious Phoenix Program http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_Program

- containing most, or all, of the elements of the Phoenix Program

should be dismissed out of hand...

Are you convinced?

Although I support the basic premise of this article, a much bigger questions needs to be asked, was the invasion and our continued involvement in the occupation of Afghanistan a legal act?

My understanding was the UN Security Council should have been consulted and given express authority on who, what and where the U.S. and by folly the Australian Government or any other nation could invade another sovereign country?

One also must ask another basic question, if as the U.S. has stated, the purported 9/11 attacks were a criminal act, why were the perpetrators not pursued under criminal law?, we now have the U.S. assassinating U.S. citizens in foreign countries under Obama’s watch with no consideration of the basic constitutional rights of U.S. citizens no matter where they are or what they are doing. Moral hazard one would think.

Also, it is evident the only true reason for the United States not seeking UN approval for the invasion of Afghanistan was that they knew the UN Security Council would not provide this approval.

Many questions about the war in Afghanistan need to be considered and answered. The Australian public have a right to know the truth, however unpalatable this might be. Wars are always expensive, socially and economically and in this case we have a right to know why we are wasting such money in a truly futile pursuit.

"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired, signifies in the final sense a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed - Dwight D. Eisenhower", never a truer statement has been said

Good to see you quoting from Eisenhower, Geoff, a man who has made relevant comments worth reading, perhaps more than any other world leader since that time, Nelson Mandela being the exception. Of course, Eisenhower was a man whose values just wouldn't fit into his country today and he would be seen as a fuddy-duddy when compared to the evils of Bush and his cabal, behaviour which is now the norm. Even worse are the once worthy staff who have become corrupted as well, along the way. Even the FBI is tainted, never to recover.

Give me fuddy-duddies any day.

Those days of decency and moral values are vanishing everywhere. Just look at the quality of our federal parliamentarians; their backgrounds, their vested interests, their behaviour.
Now if one was asked to find a decent leader for this country, a real honest leader we could all respect, try and name him or her. Just one will do.

Sad, isn't it.

Within a year, the new leader would have compromised on everything he/she valued just to gain a political consensus, sold out for a sheckel when offered and it would be offered for services rendered, formed liaisons with the US for egotistical reasons and put aside values for the quick fix. Probably would have lied a few rimes as well.

Eisenhower, seen as a pushover President after the war, but a man to whom his country owes great credit. These days, they couldnt even spell his name, perhaps not even remember him at all.

He anticipated all that is happening today. The beginning of the end of US empire.