Moscow Reacts to US Buildup in Afghanistan
Thursday, February 5th, 2009 by RLRFrom The Global Research
By F. William Engdahl
Moscow has correctly assessed that the announced Obama troop buildup in Afghanistan has no relevance to the stated aim of combatting the ‘Taliban’, but rather with a new attempt by the Pentagon strategists to encircle both Russia and China on Eurasia in order to retain US global military dominance. It is not waiting for a new policy from Washington. Rather Russia is acting to secure its perimeter in Central Asia through a series of calculated geopolitical moves reminiscent of the famous Great Game of more than a Century ago. The stakes in this geopolitical power game could not be higher—the issue of world war or peace in the coming decade.
Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Admiral Mike Mullen are asking Obama to double US troop presence in Afghanistan. Both Gates and Mullen said that while they’re thinking about the war in Afghanistan in terms of a 3-5 year time frame, their immediate goals are ‘unclear.’ That’s highly revealing. It is clear from the deliberate pattern over months, despite vehement protest from Pakistan’s government, of US bombing attacks on villages inside Pakistan, allegedly to hit Taliban targets, that the US intends to widen the conflict to Pakistan as well. What could be the possible aim?
Militarily, adding 30,000 more US troops to Afghanistan could never secure peace in that wartorn tribal region. It has been documented that many of the groups whom the US Command labels ‘Taliban’ are in fact armed bands controlled by local warlords, and not ideologically close-knit Taliban cadre in any sense. By labelling them Taliban, Washington hopes to convince its NATO allies such as Germany to send their troops to fight in an unwinnable war. Afghanistan presently has an estimated 40% unemployment and some five million living below the poverty line. It has been ravaged by more than four decades of continuous war.
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