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Fool's Errand: NATO Pledges Four More Years of War in Afghanistan
Dr. Ron Paul

(Editor's Note: In my humble opinion,U.S. troops are in Afghanistan to protect and control the poppy crop. The poppies are harvested and transported, via NATO military aircraft, to Turkey, where it is refined into herion and distributed worldwide. The profit from this criminal conspiracy provideds a significant portion of the "black budget". Although Dr. Paul sees the entanglment as "irrational", I see it as criminally evil. - JSB)

The longest war in US history just got even longer. As NATO wrapped up its 2016 Warsaw Summit, the organization agreed to continue funding Afghan security forces through the year 2020. Of course with all that funding comes US and NATO troops, and thousands of contractors, trainers, and more.

President Obama said last week that the US must keep 3,000 more troops than planned in Afghanistan. The real reason is obvious: the mission has failed and Washington cannot bear to admit it. But Obama didn't put it that way. He said:

"It is in our national security interest, especially after all the blood and treasure we've invested over the years, that we give our partners in Afghanistan the best chance to succeed."

This is how irrational Washington's logic is. Where else but in government would you see it argued that you cannot stop spending on a project because you have already spent so much to no avail? In the real world, people who invest their own hard-earned money in a failed scheme do something called "cut your losses." Government never does that.

Isn't 15 years of US "blood and treasure" enough of a "best chance" to succeed?

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg announced at the summit that thanks to an additional billion dollars in NATO member-country donations, the organization had come up with close to the $5 billion per year that it has pledged to the Afghan government. Of that $5 billion you can guess who is paying the lion's share. That's right, we are. We send $3.45 billion every year to, according to Transparency International, the third most corrupt country on earth -- while Americans struggle with unemployment, stagnant wages, and inflation. That is why I always say that foreign aid is money stolen from poor people in the United States and sent to rich people overseas.

NATO head Stoltenberg said, "Our message is clear: Afghanistan doesn't stand alone. We're committed for the long haul." How nice of the Norwegian politician to commit Americans to financing the war in Afghanistan for "the long haul."

When I suggested in a recent interview that the only sensible US policy in Afghanistan would be to bring all the troops home, the host asked whether I was worried the Taliban would rush in to fill the vacuum. That's what has already happened, I said. The Taliban are stronger than ever in Afghanistan. They control more territory than at any time since the original US invasion in 2001. Despite 15 years of US interventionism, nearly 2,500 dead US soldiers, and well over a trillion dollars, Afghanistan is no closer to being a model democracy than it was before 9/11. It's a failed policy. It's a purposeless war. It is a failed program.

The neocons argue that Iraq, Libya, and other US interventions fell apart because the US did not stay long enough. As usual they are wrong. They failed and they will continue to fail because they cannot succeed. You cannot invade a country, overthrow its government, and build a new country from the ground up. It is a fool's errand and Washington has turned most Americans into fools. It's time to end this game and get back to the wise foreign policy of the founders: non-intervention in the affairs of others.

Ronald Ernest "Ron" Paul (born August 20, 1935) is an American author, physician, and former politician. He served as the U.S. Representative for Texas' 14th and 22nd congressional districts. He represented the 22nd congressional district from 1976 to 1977 and from 1979 to 1985, and then represented the 14th congressional district, which included Galveston, from 1997 to 2013. On three occasions, he sought the presidency of the United States: as the Libertarian Party nominee in 1988 and as a candidate in the Republican primaries of 2008 and 2012. Paul is a critic of the federal government's fiscal policies, especially the existence of the Federal Reserve and the tax policy, as well as the military–industrial complex, and the War on Drugs. Paul has also been a vocal critic of mass surveillance policies such as the USA PATRIOT Act and the NSA surveillance programs. Paul was the first chairman of the conservative PAC Citizens for a Sound Economy^[2] and has been characterized as the "intellectual godfather" of the Tea Party movement.

 

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