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Jailed Taliban Supreme Commander Released

The Obama administration approved the release of Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar with the assumption that he would join peace talks with the Afghan government of Hamid Karzai.

by
Josh Shahryar

Bio

October 19, 2010 - 12:00 am
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The Taliban’s supreme commander in Afghanistan, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, was captured in Pakistan earlier this year. He was the highest ranking Taliban commander ever arrested. But instead of his extradition to Afghanistan or hand-over to the U.S., he was kept in a cozy house in Islamabad.

On Saturday, he was freed.

Yes, the man second in command only to Mullah Omar, the one-eyed leader of the Taliban, has reportedly been released and no one knows where he went. (The smart bet is he rejoined his buddies in the fight against NATO and the Afghan government.)

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Apparently, his release has the backing of the Obama administration, the reason being the ongoing “talks” between the Taliban and the Afghan government. This is not the first time the Afghan government has claimed it has been holding talks with the Taliban. For years, President Hamid Karzai’s government has been attempting to negotiate with the Taliban. But every single time, a few headlines are made out of how he’s reaching out to them and how they’re talking back, then, nothing.

It’s easy to lose count of the number of times the Taliban have held talks with the Afghan government and at the same time unleashed terror all over the country. But these talks, according Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. military commander in Afghanistan, are just preliminary and cannot even be considered “negotiations,” the Associated Press reports.

Furthermore, the current talks are being touted as attacks in Afghanistan continue. During the parliamentary elections of last month, there were hundreds of Taliban attacks. Taliban allies have been burning Coalition supply trucks across the border in Pakistan the past few days as the border remains sealed and fuel trucks are backed up for miles. NATO soldiers are being killed and injured on a weekly basis in the bloodiest year of the war. To top it off, there is no formal indication from the Taliban that they are in any kind of negotiations. And here we are releasing their top commander so that his captivity won’t disrupt the “talks.”

These “talks” apparently are so far only confined to the imagination of the Afghan government and the trust that Gen. Petraeus has in their word. The Associated Press boldly asserts in a piece published on Saturday that,

In Afghanistan, Taliban leaders have told followers that there are no official peace talks with the U.S.-backed Afghan government, an apparent move to persuade their rank- and-file to stay in the fight.

Now if the Taliban were on the losing side of the fight, it would be understandable. But they’re not. They’ve taken over most of the countryside in the south and the east after losing all of the country in 2001. They’ve stepped up their attacks on NATO and its allies. The Afghan government has lost control over huge swaths of the country and is increasingly viewed as weak and on the brink of collapse. NATO has been forced to add more troops to the country to win back areas it has lost, or has won back and lost again. All signs show that the Taliban are winning.

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35 Comments, 15 Threads

  1. 1. Throbbin Yobbin

    Perhaps this man can provide witness to the genocide of his fellow Muslims in the American Auschwitz (Gitmo). While Obama has demonstrated some compassion for the victims of the Bush Holocuast of Muslims, he has failed to expose its true horror to the world and hence has done nothing to de-Bushify the country. In a sane world, Mullah Abdul Ghani Barada would be testifying at the Hague in a trial of Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rove, Coulter and the rest of the Rethuglican genocidal warlords and propagandists. However, maybe he can now tell the truth on a more objective media source like Al-Jezeera.

    • Paul -Indiana

      And you want to believe that all those car bombs in Afghanistan and Iraq don’t kill Muslims? More Muslims have died at the hands of fellow Muslims than all those killed by US forces.

    • Constitutionalist

      Go play to playing with your Yobbin which is why it’s Throbbin. Be glad that I am not President, I’d have your sorry heiny arrested for treason, specifically aiding and abetting our enemies in time of war.

      • Throbbin Yobbin

        This person really believes that challenging the corporate agenda is treason. Unless you are an idle billionaire, you’re interests are the same as the enemies of the American corparchy. Muslims and American workers share a common struggle against the forces of global corporate oppression.

        Besides, my criticism of the current adminstration is pretty limited. The final solution for Muslims seems to be off the agenda.

        • jjkrn

          OMG is that some funny stuff right there…..if’n you really believe that stuff….or are you off your meds…man..i spit my coffee out that is so funny

        • FreeBird

          “Muslims workers”, do you mean suicide killers?

        • Duke-Jinx

          “The final solution for Muslims seems to be off the agenda.” Not so… we do have a few in mind.

    • kjatexas

      No response is necessary to your screed. Your own words exemplify your incoherent thought process.

    • I stopped reading the second the word ‘Godwin’ popped into my mind.

    • Comparing Guantanamo to Auschwitz shows either a complete departure from reality or a complete contempt for truth or both.

      Putting it another way, you’re off by a couple million.

  2. 2. Bob From Virginia

    Even his Democratic opponents in the election pointed out Obama was naive in the world affairs (read stupid). Now we have people dying in a war he is losing through incompetence by setting deadlines for withdrawal and now this. Well 53% you wanted a sexy young President no experience required rather than some old guy. Pity his legacy will be death and plenty of it.

    And just wait till the Mullahs get the bomb.

  3. This shows you what side the Pakistanis are on. If they had a high-ranking Taliban leader like Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar and didn’t hand him over to the United States for interrogation, Pakistan isn’t much of an ally. Well, I guess they never really were. Anyway, kind of shows you what side the ISI (the Pakistani intelligence service) is on.

    I wouldn’t trust this guy to give you the right time of day, let alone “negotiate” a settlement to the war. This makes the Pakistanis, and the CIA, look foolish. I wonder what General David Petraeus had to say about this?

    • kjatexas

      I have to wonder why Petraeus even took the job. It’s a losing propostion with this President in charge.
      And the good General has not yet loosened the rules of engagement, allowing the troops to fight back effectively.
      If we are not going to fight this war to win, then let’s just bring the troops home. Why sacrifice them for nothing.
      When the Taliban control Afghanistan again (as they will under our current policy), and our homeland is subject to another attack planned and executed from there, we can go back in under a President who has some cajones.
      When you are facing a ruthless enemy, you have to be ruthless also. Apparently they didn’t teach that to Obama at Harvard.

    • Gen. Petraeus should’ve never taken the job. Gen. McChrystal was totally right about Obama and the Afghan government. Pity he wasn’t kept. That’s even after Robert Gates asked for him to be kept after that Rolling Stone article.

      • Larry in the Silicon

        McChrystal didn’t want to ‘stand with the Muslims.’ It’s that simple, and why Obama gives a pass to Pakistan.

  4. 4. BILOXIPAT

    “The Taliban’s supreme commander in Afghanistan, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, was captured in Pakistan earlier this year. He was the highest ranking Taliban commander ever arrested. But instead of his extradition to Afghanistan or hand-over to the U.S., he was kept in a cozy house in Islamabad.

    “On Saturday, he was freed.”

    WHAT???!!

    • That’s exactly my reaction when I read the reports about his release.

    • Tyler F. Long

      You have to really hand it to those in charge of decisions like this. Here a world war criminal is kept on a cushy island, and freed early, while more “common” criminals sit in a 10 X 10 cell.

      Tyler F. Long
      Dunwoody Norcross GA

  5. 5. kjatexas

    Here is another example of the treachery of the Pakistanis, and the incoherence and incompetence of the Obama administration.
    Mr. Baradar will go back to his number one job of killing American soldiers.

  6. 6. RebeccaH

    This is why extensive use of drones and a policy of not bothering to take prisoners should be paramount.

  7. 7. SDbatboy

    PLEASE tell me we implanted an RFID chip in his head before he was released. And maybe a microphone and a small HD camera.

    • Duke-Jinx

      ……better yet, our latest trick.. a GPS transmitter. So we can send them all a big present.

      • Nope. The US army didn’t even touch him. He was in the hands of the Pakistanis the entire time. They’re more likely to have kept him on a strict diet of steroids.

  8. 8. Steven Johnson

    First and foremost, I have to say, ‘Buck oFama’. He ties our troops hands behind their backs with nonsensical rules of engagement(can’t return fire if enemy fires and drops weapon or is within 500 yards of ‘unarmed’ collaborators posing as civilians) while promoting talks with the Taliban and letting high level prisoners of war go free. Whose side is this son of a bitch on anyway? THIS IS NOT WAR THIS IS SUICIDE. You can be d@mn sure that Russia and China are watching closely as they position themselves for military and energy dominance around the world, all the way up to our back yard, by making friends with our enemies. The damage this scumbag has done and continues to do will possibly take decades to reverse – if ever!!

    • Dianne

      I agree with you 100%, except that, like Brian said, I think that Holder was to blame, too.

  9. Why on earth would Obama release him? It beggars belief.

    As for any further negotiations, the Taliban have proved time and time again they cannot be trusted.

  10. 10. Brian

    The release of that terrorist wasn’t just Omama’s doing. It was Eric Holder’s doing, also. Suffice to say, Eric Holder is the most irresponsible and the most incompetent Attorney General that this country has ever had. That damned fool doesn’t have any common sense or any morals, absoutely none whatsoever. Only that extremely irresponsible lightweight, Obama, would have appointed that other extremely irresponsible lightweight, Holder, as Attorney General. Together, they are making alliances with our country’s worst enemies. THAT is what affirmative action has done for this country. Thanks 52%ers, you effing a-holes.

  11. 11. porjosh

    I agree with Josh. Another senior Taliban leader, Mullah Zakir, was released from Guantanamo Bay upon request from Karzai, a couple years ago. He rejoined his fellow Taliban soon after, and is now leading and overseeing all Taliban operations in the south.
    Policy of appeasing Pakistan and the Taliban with such sweeteners has failed. One has strategic depth in mind; the latter is ideologically tied to Al-Qaeda. The two are inseparable from their obsessions. Unless you send shivers in the spine of Pakistan and make it to abandon Taliban tool, the danger is that sooner or later the West will be forced to fight Al-Qaeda in its borders.

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