Good Article on Comparing Uribe's attack on the Farc to what Obama should do in Afgan

[LastLion]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...040303362.html



Great comparison, although for some dumb reason I am not convinced our gov't learns much from history, lets see if OBAMA can change that..

here is a piece of the article..

Afghanistan share far more similarities with one another than either does with Iraq, which I covered in 2003 and 2004. The Taliban have caves and Colombian guerrillas their triple-canopy jungle and mountain hideouts -- terrain far more useful to insurgencies than Iraq's desert. Afghanistan's opium poppies fund the Taliban, just as coca fuels Colombia's guerrillas. As Pakistan does for the Taliban, Venezuela and Ecuador provide sanctuary to Colombia's insurgents.
Perhaps the most important parallel, though, is the lack of a strong central government. Colombia's government has rarely held sway beyond Bogota's nearly two-mile high plateau, and the frail Karzai administration in Kabul has a similarly short reach. As a result, Colombia has relied on brutal paramilitary forces to support a weak army, alienating much of the population in the process. In Afghanistan, that role is played by U.S. forces, which, although by no means as savage as the Colombian irregulars, have cost Afghanistan's government support among a people famously hostile to foreign invaders.
The parallels extend even to the U.S. ambassador in Pakistan, Anne Patterson, and the outgoing ambassador to Afghanistan, William Wood. Both previously headed the embassy in Bogota. And during a visit to Colombia last month, Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, noted that some of that country's lessons are applicable "specifically to Afghanistan."

[JMitch1959]

I think that destroying the opium drug trade in Afghanistan is the most effective way to defeat the Taliban. This is where the terrorists are getting their funding and it should be destroyed. The Russians the Iranians and other neighbors of Afghanistan need to be brought in to develop a comprehensive regional strategy to interdict drugs from crossing national borders. We can use sattelite technology to pinpoint where the drugs are, and herbicides to destroy them.

Putting U.S. troops into Afghanistan is stupid. They are just sitting ducks for the terrorists.

I think collaborating with and using President Uribe's expertise in fighting the FARC in Colombia is a wise move, also.

Here's an article concerning this collaboration, http://www.larouchepac.com/node/9431