I Pray We Don’t Have a Vietnam Type Troop Withdrawal
I’ve Always Known We’d Have A Rough Afghan Pullout
Two Following Archive Blogs Express What I Believe!
February 12, 2014
http://www.tribulationperiod.com/
Begin Afghanistan Archive Blog 1
Afghanistan will become a part of Antichrist’s Caliphate
After the fall of Jerusalem to the Islamic Antichrist Forces!
Little “Buckey Beavers” of the Turkish, Syrian, And Iranian
Axis are scurrying across Middle East to strengthen for War
November 27, 2009
http://www.tribulationperiod.com/
Being a believer, and believing Middle East war is inevitable, my opinion as to what we should do is heavily biased, since I do not believe the war is a far distant event. I don’t care how many troops we send over there, the topography, Islamic religion, the number of tribes and dislike for each other, the Afghanistan lands being a historical graveyard of powerful nations, and with the President and Congress we have, I don’t believe it will make any difference how many troops we send because when we do finally pull them out, the outcome will be the same. It would not bother me if we pulled all our troops out, and let the tribes fight it out among themselves. The longer we stay the more dangerous it will be during the withdrawal.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Demographics of Afghanistan are a mix of ethnic and linguistic groups. The population of Afghanistan is 28,396,000, according to the “significantly revised” October 30, 2009 CIA Factbook. This reflects its location astride historic trade and invasion routes leading from Central Asia into South Asia and Southwest Asia. The majority of Afghanistan’s population are Iranian peoples, notably the Pashtuns and the Tajiks. The Pashtuns are the largest ethnic group followed by Tajiks. The Hazaras are the third largest ethnic group, then the Uzbeks, Aimak, Turkmen, Baluch, Nuristani and other small groups. Pashto and Persian (Dari) are the two official languages of the country. Persian is spoken by at least half of the population and serves as a lingua franca for most. Pashto is spoken widely in the south, east and south west as well as in western Pakistan. Uzbek and Turkmen are spoken in the north. Smaller groups throughout the country also speak more than 70 other languages and numerous dialects.
The term Afghan, though (historically) synonymous with Pashtun, is promoted as a national identity. It is, however, hard to combine the varying groups. Often the Pashtun are referred to as Afghans while some of the other groups hold on to their ethnic names such as Tajiks, Hazaras, Uzbeks, and so on. The citizens of Afghanistan are in many ways some what distinct from the notion of ethnic Afghans as a result of this understanding. In order to solve the problem, in recent years, the term Afghanistani (meaning of or from Afghanistan and analogous to Uzbekistani, Pakistani or Tajikistani has been suggested for the citizens of Afghanistan in contrast to ethnic Afghans who would be the Pashtuns. The idea is supported by some politicians in Afghanistan, such as Latif Pedram. However, in a research poll that was conducted in Afghanistan in 2009, 72% of the population put their identity as Afghan first, before ethnicity.
99% of Afghanistan’s population adheres to Islam. An estimated 80% of the population is Sunni, following the Hanafi school of jurisprudence; 19% is Shi’a. Despite attempts during the years of communist rule to secularize Afghan society, Islamic practices pervade all aspects of life. In fact, Islam served as the principal basis for expressing opposition to communist rule and the Soviet invasion. Likewise, Islamic religious tradition and codes, together with traditional practices, provide the principal means of controlling personal conduct and settling legal disputes. Excluding urban populations in the principal cities, most Afghans are divided into tribal and other kinship-based groups, which follow traditional customs and religious practices.
Begin Excerpt from New York Times via World News
Taliban Reopen Northern Front in Afghanistan
By CARLOTTA GALL
November 27, 2009
http://www.tribulationperiod/
KUNDUZ, Afghanistan — Far from the heartland of the Taliban insurgency in the south, this once peaceful northern province was one place American and Afghan officials thought they did not have to worry about.
Afghan officials cut the police force here by a third two years ago and again earlier this year. Security was left to a few thousand German peacekeepers. Only one Afghan logistics battalion was stationed here.
But over the last two years the Taliban have steadily staged a resurgence in Kunduz, where they now threaten a vital NATO supply line and employ more sophisticated tactics. In November, residents listened to air raids by NATO forces for five consecutive nights, the first heavy fighting since the Taliban were overthrown eight years ago.
The turnabout vividly demonstrates how security has broken down even in unexpected parts of Afghanistan. It also points to the hard choices facing American, NATO and Afghan officials even if President Obama decides to send more soldiers to Afghanistan, as he is expected to announce next week.
Even under the most generous deployments now under consideration, relatively few additional troops are expected in the north; most will be directed to the heartland of the Taliban resistance in the south and east.
Afghan and international officials say security never had to deteriorate so badly here. The Taliban were a scattered and defeated force in northern Afghanistan, long home to the strongest anti-Taliban resistance, the Northern Alliance.
But the government, and American military trainers, failed to remain vigilant to signs of Taliban encroachment, and reduced deployments in the northern provinces in order to bolster other, more volatile regions.
The decisions created vulnerabilities as Kunduz became a target with the opening of a new logistics route here for NATO supplies from Russia and Central Asia, over an American-financed bridge that opened in 2007. The route is supposed to serve as a strategic alternative to the treacherous passage through Pakistan, which is regularly attacked by Taliban militants.
Now, the Taliban have re-emerged with such force that during the presidential election in August, police officers were fending off attacks on the outskirts of the city of Kunduz, and militants were poised to overrun the center, officials said.
“The Taliban were at the door of the city; the people thought the government was at an end,” said a senior security official, who asked not to be named because of the nature of his work.
Since then, the threat has been somewhat contained after an operation by NATO and Afghan forces, but the province remains at risk.
Residents of Kunduz said they noticed that the Taliban reappeared in numbers in the region in the spring of last year.
At just that time, under pressure from the American military in charge of training the Afghan security forces, the government of President Hamid Karzai reduced the number of police officers in Kunduz to just 1,000 from 1,500, officials said. Then, earlier this year, the Interior Ministry ordered 200 police officers from every northern province to help secure the capital, Kabul, which was suffering increasingly serious attacks from insurgents.
A district like Khanabad, with a population of 350,000, has just 80 police officers now, the governor of Kunduz, Muhammad Omar, said in an interview. In the district of Chahardara, where hundreds of insurgents are at large, there are only 56 police officers, enough only to guard the district center and the main road.
“It deteriorated suddenly,” the governor said. “The first reason is that we have very few police in Kunduz considering the strategic position of our region, and our police are not able to cover the whole region.”
In fact, after their defeat in 2001, the Taliban never left the region. The insurgents lay low but remained a menace to be constantly watched, according to the former governor of Kunduz, Gen. Muhammad Daoud, now a deputy interior minister.
The Taliban, who are mostly Pashtun, draw natural support through tribal ties with Pashtuns, who make up nearly half of Kunduz’s population. Many of the fighters are local men who fled to Pakistan after 2001 and have returned in the last two years.
Central Asian fighters from a group linked to Al Qaeda, the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, who also took refuge in Pakistan have reappeared, Afghan security officials said. Local journalists have seen some of them. The officials, who have captured some of the insurgents, accuse Pakistan’s intelligence agency, Al Qaeda and even Iran of supporting the resurgence. Pakistan and Iran routinely deny supporting the insurgency.
Whether it is the influence of foreign fighters, or the growing capability of the Taliban and another regional militant group, Hezb-e-Islami, Western officials say the insurgency in Kunduz has grown more sophisticated, mounting coordinated suicide car bombings and ambushes.
“Clearly this year we have seen much better fighters, capable of complex attacks,” said one Western official.
Kunduz, a fertile farming region interspersed with desert, has had a trajectory similar to that of many other provinces, as the insurgents extended their hold through calculated intimidation and exploitation of tribal ties.
By the spring of 2008, militants started appearing in groups of as many as 100, with some foreign fighters among them, local residents and officials said.
They assassinated local leaders, including a Pashtun Koran reader who was beheaded, and quickly took control of several Pashtun areas, forcing ethnic Uzbeks from their homes in some districts, said Wakil Qara Qushlik, a local leader who had to flee his village last year.
The Taliban were at first more subtle with their fellow Pashtuns. A group of them came last spring without guns to introduce themselves to one prominent Pashtun family in Chahardara, and asked for support. They were worried about their own safety then, one family member said, asking not to be named. “They were behaving very well with the people,” he said. “They stopped thieves, and brought law and order to the area.”
But as elsewhere, that changed as the Taliban gained power and confidence, he said. This year the Taliban arrived with “lots of cash, new dollars and guns,” and began collecting ushr, an Islamic tax, from farmers.
Now, he said, they come to his home and demand to be fed, and have begun an intimidation campaign against his family for not supporting them at the beginning.
“It is dangerous for us if a guerrilla force has an income,” said General Daoud, who as deputy interior minister has responsibility for counternarcotics efforts.
Drug smugglers with an eye to Kunduz’s border with Tajikistan have jumped into an alliance with the Taliban to create instability that allows their illegal business to thrive, he said.
The former Taliban government was so harsh that many Afghans offered little resistance. “What surprises is how easily people capitulate when they come because the memories are so fresh,” the Western official said..
Shoaib, 25, a villager from the Archi District who moved to the city of Kunduz to find work, said: “We are forced to be happy with the Taliban. They force the people in each street to prepare 10 guns and men. They say come and do jihad.”
Begin Afghanistan Archive Excerpt 2
The Soviet Union could not maintain victory in Afghanistan
Against Guerilla Warfare, And Neither Can the United States
Sustain Lasting Democratic government in Afghanistan or Iraq!
Afghanistan has for Ages Buried the dead of many foreign Powers,
And will continue to do so until Jesus returns at this Second Advent,
Jesus will cause worship of the multiplicity of world false gods to Stop,
And the City of Jerusalem shall be the Place of Worship for All Mankind!
December 2, 2009
http://www.tribulationperiod.com/
Revelation 19:19-21 – And I saw the beast, and the kings of the earth, and their armies, gathered together to make war against him that sat on the horse, and against his army. [20] And the beast was taken, and with him the false prophet that wrought miracles before him, with which he deceived them that had received the mark of the beast, and them that worshipped his image. These both were cast alive into a lake of fire burning with brimstone. [21] And the remnant were slain with the sword of him that sat upon the horse, which sword proceeded out of his mouth: and ALL THE FOWLS WERE FILLED WITH THEIR FLESH.
Ezekiel 39:4-8 – Thou shalt fall upon the mountains of Israel, thou, and all thy bands, and the people that is with thee: I will give THEE UNTO THE RAVENOUS BIRDS OF EVERY SORT, and to the beasts of the field to be devoured. [5] Thou shalt fall upon the open field: for I have spoken it, saith the Lord God. [6] And I will send a fire on Magog, and among them that dwell carelessly in the isles: and they shall know that I am the Lord. [7] So will I make my holy name known in the midst of my people Israel; and I will not let them pollute my holy name any more: and the heathen shall know that I am the Lord, the Holy One in Israel. [8] Behold, it is come, and it is done, saith the Lord God; this is the day whereof I have spoken.
Ezekiel 37:24-28 – And David my servant shall be king over them; and they all shall have one shepherd: they shall also walk in my judgments, and observe my statutes, and do them. [25] And they shall dwell in the land that I have given unto Jacob my servant, wherein your fathers have dwelt; and they shall dwell therein, even they, and their children, and their children’s children for ever: and my servant David shall be their prince for ever. [26] Moreover I will make a covenant of peace with them; it shall be an everlasting covenant with them: and I will place them, and multiply them, and will set my sanctuary in the midst of them for evermore. [27] My tabernacle also shall be with them: yea, I will be their God, and they shall be my people. [28] And the heathen shall know that I the Lord do sanctify Israel, when my sanctuary shall be in the midst of them for evermore.
Malachi 4:1-3 – For, behold, the day cometh, that shall burn as an oven; and all the proud, yea, and all that do wickedly, shall be stubble: and the day that cometh shall burn them up, saith the Lord of hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch. 2] But unto you that fear my name shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings; and ye shall go forth, and grow up as calves of the stall. [3] And ye shall tread down the wicked; for they shall be ashes under the soles of your feet in the day that I shall do this, saith the Lord of hosts.
Isaiah 2:1-4 – The word that Isaiah the son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem. [2] And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it. [3] And many people shall go and say, Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. [4] And he shall judge among the nations, and shall rebuke many people: and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.
Zechariah 14:16 – And it shall come to pass, that every one that is left of all the nations which came against Jerusalem shall even go up from year to year to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, and to keep the feast of tabernacles.
Zechariah 14:8,9 – And it shall be in that day, that living waters shall go out from Jerusalem; half of them toward the former sea, and half of them toward the hinder sea: in summer and in winter shall it be. [9] And the Lord shall be king over all the earth: in that day shall there be one Lord, and his name one.
Begin Archive Excerpt 1 from The Chosun Ilbo
url: http://english.chosun.com/w21data/html/news/200707/200707270025.html
Afghanistan – Graveyard of Empires
July 27, 2007
On Jan. 1, 1842, the British garrison in Kabul began to withdraw. Just three years earlier Britain had occupied Kabul, a strategic point for the defense of India, but could no longer endure the incessant killing of its senior officials and officers. During the withdrawal, a long procession of 4,000 troops and 10,000 civilians crossing snow-covered valleys and hills was ambushed by Afghan warriors. Fewer than 40 survivors reached the destination of Jalalabad.
Following this humiliating and bloody retreat, Britain again attacked Afghanistan in 1878. This time it was to contain Russia, which had expanded its influence into Afghanistan’s northern areas while Britain withdrew. After several fierce battles, Britain occupied Afghanistan again. And again the occupiers were slaughtered, recalling the nightmare of 40 years previous. Britain withdrew most of its forces from Afghanistan in 1880, but maintained control of its diplomatic rights. After another war in 1919, Britain finally ceded Afghanistan self-determination in foreign affairs.
Located at the heart of Eurasia, Afghanistan has been a crossroads between East-West trade and human exchange since ancient times. The Persian Empire under Alexander the Great invaded the region, followed in succession by the Mongols and Mughal Empire. In the 19th century, Afghanistan was the center stage of a struggle for supremacy between the British and Russian empires. Foreign troops always sustained high casualties on account of the strong resentment of local fighters and the inhospitable geography of rugged mountains and arid deserts.
Afghanistan was dubbed “the graveyard of empires,” and it lived up to that nickname again during the 10-year invasion and occupation by the Soviet Union beginning in 1979. To support the People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan which seized power in a 1978 coup, the Soviets stationed 100,000 troops in the country. After long and bloody resistance from U.S.-backed anti-government Mujahideen, or “freedom fighters”, the Soviet Union withdrew. Their sacrifice was 14,453 dead and 53,753 wounded. The disaster precipitated the collapse of the Soviet empire.
The Taliban, a group of Islamic fundamentalists that seized power in 1996, was deprived of power when it offered bases to Al Qaeda, masterminds of the Sept. 11 attacks, and was subsequently attacked by U.S. forces. The Taliban, in an apparent attempt to continue Afghanistan’s long tradition of confounding foreign powers, has ceaselessly attacked foreign troops and kidnapped foreigners. Now the Taliban has kidnapped a large group of Korean volunteers, and executed one of them. They are sacrificing Korean volunteers who went to Afghanistan in order to treat Afghans suffering the ravages of war and teach them so that they may rebuild their country. Even few Afghans would regard such barbarity as a part of their struggle against foreign forces.
FAIR USE NOTICE: This site contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democracy, scientific, and social justice issues, etc. We believe this constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more detailed information go to:
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml.
You may use material originated by this site. However, if you wish to use any quoted copyrighted material from this site, which did not originate at this site, for purposes of your own that go beyond ‘fair use’, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner from which we extracted it.
SCAN DOWN TO READ PREVIOUS BLOGS