Afghanistan/2001 Invasion

 Afghanistan/2001 Invasion (war)

Date	7 October 2001 - 30 August 2021
Location	Afghanistan
Perpetrators	NATO
Description	The war in Afghanistan, instigated within a month of 9/11, supposedly in retaliation, with the claimed justification - for which no evidence has been presented - that the attacks were planned by Ossama bin Laden, and that he was based in Afghanistan.

The 2001 Afghanistan war lasted 19 years. It was a US-led attack, but involved military contingents from many other countries. It began on October 7, 2001, as the US military's Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF) with substantial British military support, allegedly (as the official narrative has it) 'in response to the September 11^th, 2001 attacks on the US'. The UK has, since 2002, led its own military operation, Operation Herrick, as part of the same war in Afghanistan. By 2015, it has cost the US government over $1,000,000,000,000.

Official Narrative

The justification for the attacks we as that the 9/11 attacks of September 11, 2001 were carried out by Al-Qaeda under the leadership of Osama Bin Laden, who was taking refuge in Afghanistan, under the protection of Taliban forces. NATO's December 2009 publicity strategy states that "building on NATO’s current media operations and public diplomacy efforts in support of the operation in Afghanistan, NATO will pursue more targeted and expanded communication activities to generate broader and more comprehensive reporting on what NATO’s operation has already achieved in Afghanistan". As far as opium production is concerned, predictable smoke and mirrors are used to hide that fact that production has increased since the NATO-led invasion of the country.

Problems

There were reports that indicated that the US would go to war in Afghanistan as early as March 2001. Planning continued up to the day of 9-11. The BBC reported a week after 9-11 that "Niaz Naik, a former Pakistani Foreign Secretary, was told by senior American officials in mid-July that military action against Afghanistan would go ahead by the middle of October".

Osama Bin Laden denied responsibility for the attacks and no evidence has been presented of his responsibility. On 5 October, the Taliban offered to try bin Laden in an Afghan court, so long as the U.S. provided what it called "solid evidence" of his guilt. The U.S. government dismissed the request for proof as "request for delay or prevarication".

Motives

A recommended video by James Corbett

While the MICC profits from war anywhere, a range of local factors undoubtedly contributed to the selection of Afghanistan as a target. Afghan grown opium is an obvious major factor.

Opium

Sibel Edmonds links the war to Operation Gladio/B, suggesting that - drug eradication rhetoric not withstanding - a major motive for the war was control of the world's opium production. This was very low in 2000 after the crop was banned by the Taliban, but has quickly risen again and exceeded pre-invasion levels.

Oil

Charlotte Dennett suggests that the Trans-Afghanistan Pipeline, planned since the early 1990s provides a more credible alternative explanation. The secret intelligence agencies have long been interested in the large profits to be made from the global drug trade, for which

Mineral wealth

A 2007 study by the USGS noted about $1 trillion in mineral wealth in the ground in Afghanistan.

War crimes

Full article: The Massacre at Mazar

War propaganda

Malala Yousafzai

Full article: Malala Yousafzai

Education

Images of NATO troops building (girls') schools in the country was a continued propaganda trope.

“From a strictly economic perspective, if America's goal was to provide a quality education to Afghan children, it would have achieved far better social impact, at lower cost, with no suffering if the military followed these steps; Buy a used Gulfstream IV (~$4m), pack it full of Afghan children, fly them across the world to Andover, Groton, Eton, or some Swiss boarding school, and pay for their entire education (~$4.7m for 24 students, all four years, with boarding). And after everyone is off the private jet, fill two briefcases with money - $1 million, each; $2 million, in total, in brick of $100 bills - place them on the jet while it's still on the tarmac, and proceed to blow up the jet with high explosives. This is the effective cost of building a mud and cinder block shanty school in Afghanistan.”
Erik Edstrom (2020) 
Former captain in the U.S. Army

 

Related Quotations

Page	Quote	Author	Date
Seymour Hersh	“But one of the things we did, ostensibly to improve the conditions of prisoners, we demanded that the American soldiers operating in Afghanistan could only hold a suspected Taliban for four days, 96 hours. If not... after four days they could not be sure that this person was not a Taliban, he must be freed. Instead of just holding them and making them Taliban, you have to actually do some, some work to make the determination in the field. Tactically, in the field. So what happens of course, is after three or four days, "bang, bang" — I'm just telling you — they turn them over to the Afghans and by the time they take three steps away the shots are fired. And that's going on. It hasn't stopped. It's not just me that's complaining about it. But the stuff that goes on in the field, is still going on in the field — the secret prisons, absolutely, oh you bet they're still running secret prisons. Most of them are in North Africa, the guys running them are mostly out of Djibouto [sic]. We have stuff in Kenya (doesn't mean they're in Kenya, but they're in that area).”	Seymour Hersh	January 2011
Joint Special Operations Command	“The point of the 'Special Operations’ teams (SOT) is that they do not distinguish between civilian and military oppositions, between activists and their sympathizers and the armed resistance. The SOT specialize in establishing death squads and recruiting and training paramilitary forces to terrorize communities, neighborhoods and social movements opposing US client regimes. The SOT's 'counter-terrorism' is terrorism in reverse, focusing on socio-political groups between US proxies and the armed resistance. McChrystal's SOT targeted local and national insurgent leaders in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan through commando raids and air strikes. McChrystal was a special favorite of Rumsfeld and Cheney because he was in charge of the 'direct action' forces of the 'Special Missions Units'. 'Direct Action' operative are the death-squads and torturers and their only engagement with the local population is to terrorize, and not to propagandize. They engage in 'propaganda of the dead', assassinating local leaders to 'teach' the locals to obey and submit to the occupation.”	James Petras	2009

 

Related Documents

Title	Type	Publication date	Author(s)	Description
Document:A warring nation, united against us	Letter	19 August 2021	Craig Murray	Craig Murray's letter to The Herald from prison in Edinburgh: "As with the previous three times when UK invasions were defeated in Afghanistan, we have united a warring nation in hatred of us."
Document:Britain’s delusions that it could take on the Taliban alone are ludicrous - what are our empire-nostalgic MPs smoking?	Article	19 August 2021	Tom Fowdy	The UK Parliament was recalled for an emergency debate over the Afghanistan/2021 withdraw. While the BBC focused on the divide between the sides of the house with their face mask wearing, Parliament was united against the withdrawal of NATO troops from Afghanistan. Most MPs are urging Boris Johnson to go back to Afghanistan, and take on the Taliban, alone if necessary.
Document:CIA Killings Spell Defeat In Afghanistan	article	8 January 2010	Douglas Valentine
Document:Gaddafi's 2009 speech: "Let's call it the UN Terror Council"	Speech	23 September 2009	Muammar Gaddafi	No one is above the UN General Assembly. All nations should be and should be seen to be on an equal footing. At present, the UN Security Council is security feudalism, political feudalism for those with permanent seats, protected by them and used against us. It should be called, not the UN Security Council, but the UN Terror Council.
Document:General Hamid Gul - Interview	interview	26 November 2001	Arnaud de Borchgrave Hamid Gul	Just 15 days after the 9-11, an exclusive interview with former Pakistani Gen. Hamid Gul. in which he opines that Mossad, not al-Qaeda were the perpetrators of the attacks, and suggests that it USA has any evidence against Al Qaeda, it should present it to an international court.
Document:How British journalists are seduced by the Ministry of Defence and spooks	Article	28 September 2021	Richard Norton-Taylor	In the world of the spooks, few in the media raised questions about the root causes of terror attacks in Britain even when Eliza Manningham-Buller, then head of MI5, warned that the invasion of Iraq would increase the terrorist threat in Britain.
Document:Pushing Ukraine to the Brink	article	9 July 2014	Mike Whitney	An illuminating introduction to extent that control of both gas and oil pipelines defines Usaian global policy and actions - especially in the Middle East, Central Asia and Ukraine. It is essentially anti-Russian and aimed at maintaining Ango-US dominance over the EU and Europe
Document:The 20-year war on Afghanistan was a mistake	Speech	18 August 2021	Zarah Sultana	Speaking outside Parliament on 18 August 2021, prior to the Afghanistan emergency debate, Zarah Sultana joined colleagues including Jeremy Corbyn to say: "The war on Afghanistan shows – once and for all – that the West cannot deliver liberal democracy at the barrel of a gun. This war – the first 'War on Terror' – must be Britain's last war of aggression."
Document:The bloody legacy of Bomber Blair	Article	1 January 2022	Alex Snowdon	"Petition for Tony Blair to have his 'Knight Companion of the Most Noble Order of the Garter' rescinded" Such an honour rests upon expecting us to conveniently forget or ignore the enormous damage that Blair did. People are right to be angry.
Document:Truth lies and Afghanistan	report	2011	Daniel L Davis
Document:US Afghan exit may depend on a Syria one	article	23 June 2013	Sharmine Narwani
Document:We are the war criminals now	Article	29 November 2001	Robert Fisk	George W. Bush says that "you are either for us or against us" in the war for civilisation against evil. Well, I'm sure not for bin Laden. But I'm not for Bush. I'm actively against the brutal, cynical, lying "war of civilisation" that he has begun so mendaciously in our name and which has now cost as many lives as the World Trade Center mass murder.
File:Afghanistan - Exit vs Engagement.pdf	paper		Unknown
File:Dereliction of Duty II.pdf	report	27 January 2012	Daniel Davis
File:ISAF-Spokesperson.pdf	presentation	17 September 2012	ISAF Staff
File:Inside-the-wire-reference-guide.pdf	handbook	2 February 2012	US/Military	A US Army pocket reference guide given to all US military personnel serving in Afghanistan from February 2012. It provides advice on how to prevent so-called 'green-on-blue' attacks, where Afghan security forces turn their weapons on the coalition soldiers who have trained them.
File:Nato-master-narrative-2008.pdf	handbook	6 October 2008	NATO
File:PSR Body Count.pdf	report	15 March 2015	IPPNW	Casualty figures for the 'War on Terror' after 10 years
File:UN-Protection of Civilians in Armed Conflict-2010.pdf	report	2010	UN
File:Understanding 911 and 911 wars.pdf	commentary	30 May 2004	John McMurtry	A guide to understanding the events of 9-11 and the resulting wars for which it became the casus belli

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See Also

• Set of Radio Shows on The Invasion of Afghanistan