Very interesting. If true, this is what you call a buried lead.
US officials speaking on condition of anonymity told AFP the military removed Korans from a prison at Bagram because inmates were suspected of using the holy book to pass messages to each other.
The backlash over the incident is likely to continue for several more days, said Martine van Bijlert of the Afghanistan Analysts’ Network.
“The demonstrations are a combination of religious outrage, pent-up frustration and groups wanting to stir trouble,” she wrote in an analysis.
If that’s the case, then the terrorists were mutilating the scripture over which Afghans are rioting and killing. So far 12 people and the idea of a civilized Afghanistan have died in these riots. Among them, two NATO troops killed by an Afghan soldier.
“An individual wearing an Afghan National Army uniform turned his weapon against International Security Assistance Force service members in eastern Afghanistan today, killing two service members,” ISAF said.
President Obama’s apology for burning the Korans hasn’t done a thing to calm the Afghan street. It’s likely to make things worse over the long haul. Perhaps we should be grateful that he didn’t accuse our troops of “acting stupidly.”
After 10 years of war, the people of Afghanistan don’t love us, they don’t fear us, and they don’t respect us. We lack the confidence in our culture to demand better of the country that harbored al Qaeda and whose soil was the launch pad for 9-11. As long as that’s the case, and it has been the case ever since we’ve been involved there and is more the case with the current regime in power in the US, we stand little chance of achieving anything there that will last more than 10 minutes after we exit.
wot he said
Bush showed excessive respect for Islamic craziness about the Koran and whatever, out of deferrence to his Saudi friends, and because he is a truly religious man. Obambus – ah, complete this sentence yourself. But it still comes out excessive, improper, atavistic and counter-productive.
The sooner we leave that benighted land the better. Obama should’ve said “Please convey the idea we have in the West that there is a difference between falling down and accidentally hitting someone and deliberately punching someone. To this end the American gov’t is sending dictionaries to you which we assume will be promptly burnt but we believe in try, try again even with monkey-people just revived from the Dark Ages.”
The problem, as I see it, isn’t that we retaliated against the people that at least assisted in the 9/11 attack, it’s that we think we can drag these neanderthals into the 21st century. When McCarthur helped set up the Japanese constitution after WWII, he was quite clear that no reference to religion or the emperor being some kind of deity would not be tolerated. When we went into Iraq and Afghanistan, constitutions bases on sharia was allowed. So even though they say they have embraced democracy and freedom for all citizens, we let them base it on an ideology that directly contradicts the notion of equality.
Time to just leave and let them rot in their self imposed misery.