Our American militarists love war so much that they even bankroll the enemy, just to keep the blood money flowing. This odd but absolutely crucial characteristic of the Never-Ending Terror War was borne out again in a remarkable story in the Guardian (with an expanded version in The Nation).

As Aram Roston reports -- and U.S. military officials openly admit -- American taxpayers are giving Afghan insurgents at least 10-20 percent of the war machine's multibillion-dollar transportation contracts. Hundreds of millions of dollars are flowing into Taliban coffers every year from bribes offered to stop insurgents from attacking supply convoys -- convoys which are increasingly controlled by local warlords and druglords, including convicted drug dealers in the Corleone-like Karzai family.

Of course, in Iraq, the Pentagon finally started paying insurgents as well. But in that instance, they were at least paying the enemy to stop fighting. Here, they only ask that the Taliban allow some trucks to roll through the countryside -- which seems to be entirely in the hands of the insurgents, despite eight years of war and months of Obama's "surge". The Americans pay handsomely for the privilege -- sometimes up to $1,500 per truck, depending on the cargo -- even though they know the insurgents will use the money to keep fighting.

It's a nice racket all around, everybody makes out -- the American militarists and war profiteers, their criminal Afghan allies, and the insurgents (who use the American money to top up the cash flow they get from American allies in Saudi Arabia, Yemen, etc.). So where's the harm?

OK, OK, there are all those civilians being slaughtered -- women and children ripped to pieces, to shreds of flesh and fragments of bone – by the bombs of the defenders of Western civilization. And yeah, there are all the American and British soldiers being killed, wounded, and brutalized, year after year, in a senseless, criminal conflict. And then there's the looting of the American treasury by the warmongers, and the relentless and inevitable destruction of American liberties by the all-corrosive acid of perpetual war.

But as Stalin liked to say: when wood is chopped, chips fly. And what are these few paltry chips – life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness – when there's so much juicy loot out there?
 

Comments (11)

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yankee 30 said:

... "Our American militarists love war so much that they even bankroll the enemy, just to keep the blood money flowing." Wise men tell us that there is no intrinsic evil in the existence of sidearms, automatic rifles, grenade launchers, landmines, hellfire missiles, 500lb. bombs, DIME explosives, flechette anti-personnel weapons, white phosphorus, hydogen bombs,....... And I suppose it's true. It does takes human volition to unleash this stuff. 2009 looks to be another record breaking year for US arms sales. 40 billion dollars? Up from 30 something last year. And 20 something the year before that. America has always been the world's foremost arms dealer. And they'll sell to pretty much anyone who's paying.

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November 13, 2009
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Shazam said:

	when there's so much juicy loot out there?... Well said! That pretty much sums up the US from the end of WWII to the very present day.
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November 13, 2009
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Dammerung said:

war to end all wars This really is funny, in a way. Like the Romans desperately trying to pay off the barbarian tribes and then eventually crowning some hapless Goth, Caesar. The nice thing about the age of communication and technology is that the leap from tragedy to farce can take place in the space of five minutes instead of a century. I don't think the United States will dissolve peacefully like the USSR though. The reptilians in Washington DC have one last, great war to wage before fading from history - total war against its own people.

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November 13, 2009
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Jimmy Montague said:

During the Vietnam War -- American POWs worked as slave labor on opium plantations in the so-called "Golden Triangle" of Southeast Asia. CIA knew all about it. They bought the opium crop, flew it out of Asia, and wholesaled raw opium to the world's crime syndicates. People such as Col. David Hackworth and a few media types knew all about it. They reported it at the time (1975-85, thereabouts) but Americans didn't care. Neither did Americans care when Gary Webb reported that CIA supplied cocaine to Freeway Ricky Ross and other gangsters nationally, and that the profits were paying for Reagan's Contra war against Nicaragua. The known perpetrators of that outrage are chief among those now milking the Afghan war for all they can get. Nobody cares. Thousands of Americans show up to picket G20 conferences in Pittsburgh and Seattle and the Teabaggers, in their tens of thousands, marched on Washington to demand a copy of Obama's birth certificate, but nobody gives a shit for American GIs being killed in a global drug war for the profit of their superiors. The upshot is that I don't know where all of this is going but America, as a nation, deserves whatever befalls it. Teabaggers and 'progressives' alike should burn in hell together. They don't give a shit for the country. They just want abortion on demand and cheap gas forever.

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November 14, 2009
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Shep said:

Axis of Evil The supreme irony is the US designation of the so-called "Axis of Evil" or placing other nations on the "sponsors of terror" list when it is the primary progenitor of terrorism itself and is an axis of evil all on its own. Americans will care only when the weapons that they paid for are turned against them, and killer drones are patrolling the skies above Los Angeles and Cleveland, searching for "terrorists". Then it will finally sink home that allowing your government to run wild wasn't the best idea.

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November 15, 2009
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Jimmy Montague said:

	Right you are, Mr. Shep -- I've been saying the same thing for years and it will come to that before we've done. The only hope for the restoration of constitutional government and the rule of law in America is revolution from within or aggression from without.
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November 15, 2009
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Debbieaussie said:

	... I really can't believe how f*cking stupid we (the plebs) are. All the bullsh*t we put up with and how disinterested the majority are of the important things (unlike the latest celebrity divorce/affair or how low can he go Obama).
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November 16, 2009
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ohnisi said:

	... This is so true! If you want to understand it better read the book The Creature From Jekyll Island. It explains how the Federal Reserve was set up and how countries pay for wars on both sides of the fence. Makes me sick to my stomach.
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November 16, 2009
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Mulciber said:

The War in Afghani$tan On a micro level, the US military is paying off insurgents so it can travel around the country more freely. On a macro level, of course, America is essentially funding its opponents in this latest bloody quagmire. But that works just fine for every parasite in the iron triangle of the military-industrial complex. If you work for Boeing or Raytheon, prolonging the war for as long as possible prolongs your profit margin for as long as possible. Ergo, a win-win situation for the defense contractors. Has there ever been any society in human history so warped by money?

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November 16, 2009 | url
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football shirt said:

	... Afghanistan is a bloody mess because the US insists on following exactly the same failed strategies the British and Russians followed before them. This is not Iraq and any "surge" will work into the Taliban's hands.
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November 16, 2009 | url
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Kevin Schmidt said:

	Let them eat U.S. sponsored terrorism? The French Revolution had a solution. They called it the guillotine. Some Americans like to call them Freedom Blades!
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November 18, 2009 | url
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