Attackerman

The Haqqani Gangsters: A Massive U.S. Blunder

The Times has a very good story about the virulence of the Haqqani Network, which every U.S. military expert and east-Afghanistan veteran I've ever talked to considers far and away the most sophisticated and capable insurgent fighting force. (I'll be going into this in more detail in a forthcoming Danger Room piece.) They're a gangster organization that exhibits, as David Rohde learned the hard way, flashes of ideological motivation. They make their money running "what is in effect a protection racket for construction firms -- meaning that American taxpayers are helping to finance the enemy network."

A NATO officer who tracks Haqqani activities in southeastern Afghanistan gave a blunt assessment of the Haqqanis’ brutal ways of intimidation, saying: “They will execute you at a checkpoint, or stop you and go through your phone. And, if they find you’re connected to the government, you’ll turn up in the morgue. And that sends a message.”

When you think about it, the fact that the Haqqanis ended up on the side of the insurgency is an unspeakable American blunder. Jaleleddin n' sons were not an unknown quantity to the United States. In fact, despite wide-ranging ignorance of Afghanistan during the invasion and early years of the war, the Haqqanis were an exception, since they were CIA allies during the anti-Soviet jihad. 

American intelligence officers who worked directly with Mr. Haqqani had a somewhat less starry-eyed view. “He was always a wild-eyed guy,” said the former American intelligence official who worked with the Haqqanis. “But we weren’t talking about getting these guys scholarships to Harvard or M.I.T. He was the scourge of the Soviets.”

I remember hanging out in Khost with a crusty Australian reporter named Tony Davis in 2008. He pointed at a ridge close to the Pakistan border and told me, with pride, that that was where he had crossed into Afghanistan nearly 20 years earlier with Jalaleddin following a long trek from Peshawar.

What happened? Why weren't the Haqqanis brought into the fold? If you know that the Haqqanis were the scourge of the Soviets, and you know that you can work with them, why wasn't every effort made to secure -- at the very least -- their neutrality? As it happens, the Wall Street Journal went a long way toward answering that question in 2007:

Mr. Haqqani is now one of the major rebel leaders roiling Afghanistan. But back in autumn 2002, he secretly sent word that he could ally with the new U.S.-friendly Afghan government. The warlord had once been a partner of the Central Intelligence Agency, and later closely collaborated with Osama bin Laden and the ruling Taliban. CIA officers held talks with his brother, Ibrahim, and made plans to meet with Mr. Haqqani, who was leading some of the Taliban’s troops. 

But U.S. military forces operating separately from the CIA arrested Ibrahim — cutting off the talks and entrenching his brother as a nemesis. Mr. Haqqani is still fighting U.S. troops along the Pakistan border. “We blew our chance,” contends one of the CIA officers involved who had worked with Mr. Haqqani in the 1980s. “I truly believe he could have been on our side.”

That's way beyond Accidental-Guerrilla territory. If that account is correct, then a gangster network with a bathtub full of American blood on its hands was turned into an enemy because of a bureaucratic screw-up of the worst kind. Even if it's not true, there's no excuse for the U.S. failure to make courting Haqqani a top imperative for the Afghanistan war. 

Schism: In Which X-Men Conscript Child Soldiers

Spoilers herein for X-Men: Schism #4.

Mmm, so on second thought, maybe Schism -- the storyline Marvel promises will Divide The X-Men Forever -- isn't really about an integrationist/secessionist debate. Maybe it's about the burdens of governance in an apocalyptic world. Or maybe that's a pretext for a personal feud. 

Schism has been a more enjoyable story than it has a right to be. We've known before it started how it would end: the decimated remains of Mutantkind cleaved between the followers of Cyclops and the followers of Wolverine. What we haven't known is the issue that prompts the division.

The first three issues have been a kind of misdirection. There's a mutant-terrorist incident during an arms control conference in which Scott and Logan attempt to persuade the world on a Sentinal Ban Treaty. A group of mischievous kids takes over the Hellfire Club and unleashes chaos on Cyclops' attempt at P.R. rectification. To save the day, Scott allows one of the X-babies to kill people, ignoring Wolverine's objections and basic morality.

Now, a giant super-Sentinel is racing toward Utopia, the island haven of mutantkind, while the X-Men are basically out of commission. All that's left is Cyclops, Wolverine, and a bunch of untrained mutant children. Cyclops sees an army of last resort. Wolverine sees an unconscionable utilitarian calculation by a man who used to be the X-Men's moral center. And this is what splits Wolverine and Cyclops, (supposedly) irrevocably.

Sentence of the Day

You have to read Moe Tkacik sentences like Talmudic passages to even begin to understand their meaning, but it's not difficult to grasp her visceral contempt for Tim Geithner:

The deadly mix of arrogance, ruthlessness and impunity Geithner radiates is of a magnitude so at odds with his adolescent physicality—as Mike Barnicle put it, “he has the eyes of the shoplifter”—that his public appearances invariably beg the question, who is the Dr. Evil to this clearly overcompensating loser son who is lucky to have more hair than Seth Green? 

So should I bother reading Suskind's book? Matthew Yglesias has convinced me I should read some far wonkier text from an economics professor but I've already forgotten the dude's name. And my Kindle's right there...

When There's Nothing On The Horizon, You've Got Nothing Left To Prove

IMMEDIATE RELEASE

No. 818-11

September 23, 2011

DOD Identifies Marine Casualty

The Department of Defense announced today the death of a Marine who was supporting Operation Enduring Freedom.

Lance Cpl. Terry C. Wright, 21, of Scio, Ohio, died Sept. 21 while supporting combat operations in Helmand province, Afghanistan. He was assigned to 1st Battalion, 6th Marine Regiment, 2nd Marine Division, II Marine Expeditionary Force, Camp Lejeune, N.C.

This incident is under investigation.

The Weekly Standard Has Cracked Abbas's Code

See, you think Mahmoud Abbas is seeking an independent Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza because he's, like, submitted a plan for the United Nations to recognize such a state and his last decade's worth of political actions point to that. But that's anti-Jewish naivete. Because the Weekly Standard has cleverly deciphered the truth. Abbas obviously is out to take all of Israel. After all, it's all there, plain as day, in a logo on Abbas' own stationary. Now it can be told. 

All us other reporters need to hang our heads in shame. If only we had paid attention to the logo! 

Quote of The Day

Give Andrew Sullivan the mic:

 ...the fact that these indignities were heaped on a man risking his life to serve this country, a man ballsy enough to make that video, a man in the uniform of the United States ... well, it tells me a couple of things. It tells me that these Republicans don't actually deep down care for the troops, if that means gay troops. Their constant posturing military patriotism has its limits.

The shocking silence on the stage - the fact that no one challenged this outrage - also tells me that this kind of slur is not regarded as a big deal. When it came to it, even Santorum couldn't sanction firing all those servicemembers who are now proudly out. But that's because he was forced to focus not on his own Thomist abstractions, but on an actual person. Throughout Republican debates, gays are discussed as if we are never in the audience, never actually part of the society, never fully part of families, never worthy of even a scintilla of respect. When you boo a servicemember solely because he's gay, you are saying he is beneath contempt, that nothing he does or has done can counterweigh the vileness of his sexual orientation.

Not really anything that I could add, but Santorum's posture that he was against "sexual" conduct by anyone in the military wrankled me with its abject dishonesty. DADT was about way more than sexual activity, as anyone with the slightest familiarity with the law could tell you. It was about having to conceal your identity down to the most minute details that straight people like me take for granted every day. Imagine not being able to put a picture of your spouse on your desk, for instance, let alone inviting him/her to the company holiday party. That was reality under DADT, for people Rick Santorum does not respect. 

Other People's Shoes

Count on Jeffrey Goldberg to come up small in the biggest moments:

I'm running around a bit doing some other journalism today (there are apparently other issues in the world besides the demand to create a 23rd Arab state)

-- Um. That's the most offensive possible way to put it. I'll be charitable and presume that Goldberg's running around and didn't think that phrase through. Since I'm constantly told what a fair-minded observer he is, I'm sure he doesn't actually believe that the aspirations of millions of Palestinians are just about getting yet another "Arab state." Nor does he truly believe that 22 states are indistinguishable aside from the fact that there's a bunch of A-rabs in 'em.

But c'mon, man. You should know better than this:

...but I'll try to watch the Abbas speech, and the Netanyahu speech, later on. I hope my expectations are wrong, and that these two sometimes-very small men manage to surprise us, though I doubt it. Mahmoud Abbas, in particular, doesn't seem -- these days especially -- interested in putting himself in the shoes of Israelis, when he declares that the occupation of his people's lands dates back 63 years -- namely, to the creation of Israel itself, not the Six Day War, which was provoked by the allies of the Palestinians, and then lost by the allies of the Palestinians. 

Do herrings come any redder? Whatever Abbas' rhetoric -- and his rhetoric was pretty damn good, to a liberal American Jew's ears -- Abbas' actions should give any sane Israeli leader a boner. Check the Palestine Papers for his extraordinary sensitivity to Israeli, uh, sensitivities. If Abbas put himself in Israelis' shoes any more, he'd have his own foot on his neck at a West Bank checkpoint.

Anyone who thinks that Netanyahu would make a deal with Abbas if only Abbas rhetorically started the Palestinian experience in 1967 is clowning himself.  And the Israelis have occupied the West Bank for over four decades. It's not Palestinians who need to put themselves in Israeli shoes. And if Netanyahu ever came close to even a moment of empathy, that would be the first emotional fact that would dawn on him.

Mahmoud Abbas Tears The Roof Off

If you'd like to read Abbas' speech to the United Nations on Palestinian statehood, it's here. On paper, however, it's a bunch of boilerplate rhetoric and familiar history. And then this happens:

When we bring our plight and our case to this international podium, it is a confirmation of our reliance on the political and diplomatic option and is a confirmation that we do not undertake unilateral steps. Our efforts are not aimed at isolating Israel or de-legitimizing it; rather we want to gain legitimacy for the cause of the people of Palestine. We only aim to de-legitimize the settlement activities, the occupation and apartheid and the logic of ruthless force, and we believe that all the countries of the world stand with us in this regard.

I am here to say on behalf of the Palestinian people and the Palestine Liberation Organization: We extend our hands to the Israeli government and the Israeli people for peacemaking. I say to them: Let us urgently build together a future for our children where they can enjoy freedom, security and prosperity. Let us build the bridges of dialogue instead of checkpoints and walls of separation, and build cooperative relations based on parity and equity between two neighboring States - Palestine and Israel - instead of policies of occupation, settlement, war and eliminating the other.

I didn't read those words. I listened to them, in translation, as Abbas delivered them. And they were electric. Abbas blew the doors off the United Nations, with a clarion call to rectify a perpetual injustice, in the absence of realistic alternatives, and issuing a call that resonated, emotionally, with many in that room.

Imagine what they sound like in Arabic. And imagine what it sounds like in Arabic when the U.S. objects. I actually thought President Obama's U.N. speech made as strong an argument as can be made for why Abbas' move is misguided. But I didn't hear it in Arabic. 

Does anyone seriously believe that after Abbas' move comes in spite of Israel and the United States, and after he forces a vote, that the Palestinian leadership that succeeds him will be more quiescent to Israel or the U.S.? More accomodating? More empathetic? 

It's difficult to watch that speech -- to see the reaction to it -- and avoid the conclusion that the United States isn't placing itself on the wrong side of a watershed moment in the Arab/Israeli conflict. 

Update: My friend Mark Leon Goldberg adds, "This is about as a dramatic as it gets for a General Assembly here at the United Nations."

Incesticide Changed My Life

 

September marks the 20th anniversary of Nevermind. For the best take on it, read Latoya Peterson. I can only tell my story, which is that Nevermind was less important than Incesticide. Thanks to Amanda Marcotte for reminding me that I've been meaning to write on this.

I was 11 when Nevermind came out. And it was great! A great record that I liked a lot. But not a record that sounded much different to my unsophisticated ears than what was out there. That's because of the deservedly-derided mastering that coated Nevermind's amazing songwriting, performances and Butch Vig's virtuoso production under a gloss of radio-ready pop-metal. I think I convinced my mom to buy me the Metallica black album at the same time as Nevermind. The two records sounded the same to me, down to the chorus effect on the intro guitars on "Enter Sandman" and "Come As You Are." What, you think I got the Pixies reference on "Teen Spirit" at 11?

It took until I went to my friends' houses to watch Nirvana videos on MTV for it to really dawn on me that Nirvana were like nothing else out there. (My mom didn't have cable -- in fact, she just got it something like eight years ago; thanks, YES Network.) The Ed Sullivan send up of "In Bloom." The anarchy cheerleaders of "Teen Spirit." Wow. I remember taking a walk with my father from a Bay Ridge movie theater while he encouraged me to decipher the lyrics to "Come As You Are." See, he knew that Nirvana was different. (Even if he persists in deriding Dave Grohl as a drummer.)

The next year Nirvana released the apocrypha album Incesticide. I remember this very vividly: Bonnie Edner and I went to the Tower Records on Broadway near Bleeker Street and I bought it on cassette. The liner notes had me ignoring my friend on the D train home. Kurt Cobain was writing about getting the chance to access the world he imagined as a punk rocker in Aberdeen, unlocked for him like a video game level, and it turning out to be a big misinterpretation on his part. As it happens, there aren't copies of NME hidden in vending machines in London, even though something about the way he revealed that had me imagining there actually were. I must have preferred to see the world through Young Kurt's eyes rather than those of Kurt Cobain From Nirvana.

But it was the first two songs that told me there was no going back. "Dive" bridges the gap between the dirge of Bleach -- not that I knew what that record was at the time -- and the mutant pop of Nevermind. There could be no further debate about the uniqueness of Nirvana. But then "Sliver" comes on. Remember: at that point, I had no idea there was such a thing as pop punk. I was unprepared for that chorus, for the feedback introducing it, for the way the chords of the verse sound so brittle and abrasive, and especially for Kurt straining his voice to go up an octive in the third verse and beyond. (That still gets me every time.) And what could a 12 year old want more after the awkward, embarassed and sexually frustrated protagonist of "Dive" than the re-imagined child's temper tantrum of "Sliver"?

The correct answer is "Molly's Lips" and "Son of a Gun." Oh my God. You have to remember -- I didn't know what a Peel Session was (those liner notes taught me, though!) and I definitely had no idea who the Vaselines were or why they wanted to call their band that. By that point on the record, Nirvana are holding a clinic in punk rock. You know who definitely paid attention? Blake Schwarzenbach on "Boxcar." 

"Son of a Gun" is a turning point. If you don't like that version of the song, you simply don't like punk rock. And at that point, we will shake hands without acrimony and part company.  If you do, there is a very good chance that your life will never be the same, because you will spend it excavating the depths of punk rock, hardcore and all its sectarian offshoots for meaning. Forever. 

And one of the first caves you will explore is "Aneurysm," which closes the record after some weird or very grungy ephemera. I submit to you that "Aneurysm" is the finest song Nirvana ever wrote. It's got arguably the band's best performance. It's got Kurt's second-rawest lyrics. ("Pennyroyal Tea" has to beat it.) It's got the most intense intro and then, a minute in, it becomes a completely different song. It's got the unexpected girl-group-style call and response in the chorus, which, given the backstory lyrics, I've got to consider a fuck-you to Tobi Vail.  (Also up for debate: Is that chorus the birth of the Foo Fighters?)

No 12 year old can possibly understand "Aneurysm." For real: "Love you so much it makes me sick"? "She keeps it pumping straight to my heart"? All I knew back then was that "Aneurysm" was the obelisk in 2001 -- it meant something, and that something was intense beyond my understanding. To be explored forever.

Update: This is why Matt Yglesias & I are friends:

If “at this point in Rock history, Punk Rock (whilestill sacred to some) is, to me, dead and gone” then what was it while it lived?

Perfectly stated.

When There's Nothing On The Horizon, You've Got Nothing Left To Prove

IMMEDIATE RELEASE

No. 816-11

September 23, 2011

DOD Identifies Army Casualties

The Department of Defense announced today the deaths of two soldiers who were supporting Operation Enduring Freedom.

They died Sep. 21, in Kandahar province, Afghanistan, of injuries suffered when insurgents attacked their unit with small arms fire. They were assigned to the 2nd Battalion, 34th Armor Regiment, 1st Heavy Brigade Combat Team, 1st Infantry Division, Fort Riley, Kan.

Killed were:

Spc. Jakob J. Roelli, 24, of Darlington, Wis.; and

Spc. Robert E. Dyas, 21, of Nampa, Idaho

For more information media may contact the 1st Infantry Division public affairs office at 785-240-6359/4928.