BROWN’S FUZZY SPEECH
On Friday 11/06/2009, U.K PM Gordon Brown held a special speech on his government strategy in Afghanistan.
After a firm statement that as long as Al Qaeda continued to plot attacks on Britain from the region, UK “cannot, must not and will not walk away from its mission in Afghanistan” he said, when referring to Hamid Karzai’s regime in Afghanistan that he will not put UK troops “in harm’s way for a government that does not stand up against corruption”. Assuming that the Afghan regime remains corrupted, which is the most reasonable scenario, it does not diminish in any way Al Qaeda’s capabilities but on the contrary. Actually Gordon Brown admitted that Afghanistan is a total failure (see – Afghan Failing-State).
Indeed about 200 home grown terror plots were foiled in UK after The 9/11. It is true that 75% of those plots were linked to the Afghan-Pakistani border and to terror training camps and operators in FATA region. But those arrested and interrogated in UK repeated time and again that their motive was the presence of UK troops in Iraq and Afghanistan and the alliance between USA and Great Britain in the so called “war on terror”. There were only very few terror plots initiated by Muslims in UK, against British targets prior to the invasion to Afghanistan in 12/2001 and London was a safe haven to terrorists operating elsewhere (see – Londonstan). By all means the bitter truth is that UK presence in Afghanistan increased dramatically the likelihood of terror on UK streets and not vise versa.
Gordon Brown mentioned Helmand province as a relatively good example of governing with large investment in the region and a 38% reduction in the poppy harvest. The fact is that the total production of poppy in Helmand is still at list 3 times higher then in 2001 under the Taliban (see – Opium’s kingdom). Despite the good governing of Helmand it is also the most violent part of Afghanistan with 89 British soldiers, out of 230 soldiers killed in Afghanistan since 12/2001, killed in just the last year in action (see – CIA-Payroll).
After putting five benchmarks ultimatum to President Hamid Karzai, as a condition for international continuation of support to Afghanistan, Gordon Brown said the UK’s mentoring program would continue “because it is what distinguishes a liberating army from an army of occupation” (see – British interference).
Occupation is a situation when a foreign army serving the interest of a foreign power, uninvited, is taking control on population which does not seek their presence, imposing foreign values and controls the local administration according to goals set up not by the locals but by the foreign force. Britain is indeed an occupant in Helmand (see – Afghan Voice).
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