God save the Queen and end the war in Afghanistan
By Laurie Essig at True/Slant
I just watched the Queen deliver a bit of a talk for Christmas. I got that warm, fuzzy, happy holidays feeling inside. Although I don’t believe in Santa anymore, I really do believe in the Queen. I want to grow up to be an old woman who dresses just like her and does that stiff wave of the hand to my adoring subjects. Of course, I won’t have any adoring subjects, but neither will the Queen if she keeps up her support of the war in Afghanistan. In her Christmas message the Queen tries to support “young people” and the issues that are important to them while simultaneously giving a pro-war bit about Afghanistan.
Who does the Queen think is being sent to fight this useless war in Afghanistan? Old gals like her? Or me? Nope, it’s young people and when the war in Afghanistan manages to collapse the American Empire, just like it did the Soviet one, I would hate to think that Great Britain would also finally collapse under the weight of its long dead Empire. After all, that would lead (if I can push the Sex Pistols reference a bit farther), to Anarchy in the UK. And then would the Queen be allowed to appear in a lovely aqua-marine frock with some costume-jewelry looking broach and address the young people of the Commonwealth? God save the Queen.
But even if the British Empire survives, it is pretty clear that the American Empire, like the Soviets before them, will collapse under the weight of the endless war in Afghanistan. A recent video from Rethink Afghanistan makes that clear.
The US is making the exact same assumptions about fighting the war in Afghanistan that the Soviets made: that more troops would lead to victory, that they could win without the support of the people (a minority of Afghans now believe the US occupation is a good thing), and that spending that much economic and political capital on foreign wars would not lead to an eventual collapse at home. It’s pretty scary when every assumption of the Soviet government mirrors the assumptions made by Dubbya and now Obama. It’s also pretty scary when the likes of Mikhael Gorbachev are trying to warn Obama of the dangers of sending more and more troops to back up an unpopular government with an even less popular war and no one in the White House seems to care.
According to Representative Eric Massa, Christmas Eve marks a sobering collection of milestones in Afghanistan.
As we begin our deployment of 30,000 additional troops to Afghanistan, this Christmas Eve will also mark the 3,000th day of the war in Afghanistan and the 30th anniversary of the initial Russian invasion of Afghanistan in 1979. Thus far, this war has already cost the American taxpayer a minimum of $300,000,000,000 according to the Congressional Research Service (and that’s just the funding that’s “on budget”).
That’s a lot of 3s. Now we need 3 Wise human beings to make the US understand that Afghanistan is not “winnable.” The US can’t even wage a war on drugs there successfully, let alone a war for what? Democracy? Christianity? Who can even say what the goal is. Because there is no victory in Afghanistan. Only defeat.
And as difficult as the collapse of the American Empire will be, as it sinks under the weight of costs of this war, losing the Queen will be like losing our belief in Santa. We’ll just never be able to get that warm and fuzzy feeling of seeing her wave and wish us a Merry Christmas again.