Asia

The Taliban claimed credit for a bombing of a bus in Kabul, which killed 13 US security personnel (apparently 5 US troops and 8 security contractors). Three innocent bystanders, Afghans and a policemen, were also killed. Military officers focused on the big picture hate stories like this one, because, they say, ‘if it bleeds, it […]

Afghanistan

Islamic Law not a problem in Bush’s Afghanistan & Iraq, but a Problem in Libya?

Juan Cole

George W. Bush said of Iraq and Afghanistan,, “I’d like to be a president [known] as somebody who liberated 50 million people…” The 2004 Constitution of Afghanistan [pdf], drafted and passed under the rule of George W. Bush in that country, makes Islam the religion of state and forbids any law that contravenes the sharia […]

Afghanistan

Karzai: Afghanistan would Side With Pakistan in War with US

Juan Cole

Admiral Mike Mullen, outgoing Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, recently told Congress that the Haqqani Network, a guerrilla group accused of hitting the US embassy in Kabul, is an “arm” of Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI). Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) immediately suggested that if the US military wanted to attack Pakistan, it would have […]

Pakistan

Pakistani Newspapers Respond to US Threats, call for War Readiness

Juan Cole

The USG Open Source Center translates or paraphrases Pakistani Urdu newspaper editorials responding to the US threats against Pakistan should it not curb the Haqqani Network (Pashtun Mujahidin based in North Waziristan). The US is convinced that Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence is running the Haqqani Network to project Pakistani power into Afghanistan. Some newspapers urge that […]

Pakistan

Lindsey “Dr. Strangelove” Graham & War with Pakistan

Juan Cole

Sen. Lindsey Graham, a major proponent of the idea of a US perpetual war, now wants conflict with Pakistan. He told Fox News Sunday, “The sovereign nation of Pakistan is engaging in hostile acts against the United States and our ally Afghanistan that must cease. I will leave it up to the experts, but if […]

Afghanistan

Rabbani’s Assassination Sharpens Afghanistan Contradictions

Juan Cole

Burhan al-Din Rabbani’s assassination late Tuesday was a further signal that things are going very badly in Afghanistan. Rabbani is a former president of Afghanistan (1992-1996) who, however, was impossible to work with and was therefore sidelined after the overthrow of the Taliban (whom he fought) in 2001. He was recently brought back by President […]

Afghanistan

Cole on the 9/11 Aftermath at AskM

Juan Cole

I cover questions about Iraq, Afghanistan, al-Qaeda and the Arab Spring in this recent interview at AskM (a program of the University of Michigan News and Information Service)

Afghanistan

77 US troops Wounded in Truck Bombing of Base in Wardak; Top Reasons US should get out of Afghanistan

Juan Cole

Never before in the Afghanistan War, the longest-running military conflict in US history, have so many US troops been wounded in one day. Some 5 Afghans were killed and some 77 American military personnel were wounded at a forward operating base in Wardak Province in the Pashtun south by a suicide bomber with a truck […]

Afghanistan

A tale of two Afghan Leaders, before and after 9/11

Juan Cole

Ten years ago, a horrific suicide bombing carried out by Algerian al-Qaeda operatives posing as journalists snuffed out the life of Ahmad Shah Massoud, the great Afghan Mujahidin leader and among the few Afghans who could have hoped to unite the country against the Taliban. Massoud told journalist Sebastian Junger that he opposed the religious […]