US Emirate in Afghanistan
Jon | 29.12.2003 08:40 | Analysis | World
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This is consistent with past US policy in Afghanistan. Recall that the US govt spent a lot of taxpayers money shipping fundamentalist Islamic textbooks to help out the Taliban regime:
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Bush and co were trying hard to do business with the Taliban over the Caspian pipeline up until days before 9/11. Former President Clinton had scuppered the pipeline deal over the Kenyan embassy bombings, which Bush's pals Unocal & Haliburton etc. had worked so hard to get. In 1996, a Taliban delegation was wined and dined in Texas, put up at 5 star hotels, taken on tours, and treated like royalty, to make sure that the Argentinian firm Bridas didn't nab the contract away from Unocal:
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So even though it was almost entirely Saudis named as the highjackers in 9/11, we invaded Afghanistan, and installed a former Unocal man (Karzai) as leader, assisted by another former Unocal man (US Ambassador Khalilzad). A Unocal emirate. Perfect.
If Bin Laden hadn't been named as the perpetrator on the Kenya bombings, we would be doing business with the Taliban still, same as Saudi Arabia. We would claim that Afghanistan had cut ties with Bin Laden, same as Saudi. And we'd be claiming that Afghanistan was "working hard to fight terrorism", same as Pakistan.
Jon