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Taliboasts fall flat with real military
  • Scott McDonald (Reuters)
    Fear the winter, fear the Taliban warrior, fear the wrath of the Afghan. So run the refrains from Afganistan's Taliban rulers. But Taliban boasts of dealing a death blow to US ground forces in the same way that Soviet troops were driven out of their landlocked country of deserts and mountains will fall flat, military analysts said on Friday.
    This is because we're not doing the same things the Soviets were doing. The U.S. government is devoting a certain amount of attention to what kind of government will sit in Kabul after the Taliban is disposed of, but we really don't care. What we do care about is killing Osama bin Laden and his henchmen. If we did care about post-Taliban Afghanistan we'd be giving it more thought. We'd shut out Pakistan and try and draw in Uzbekistan -- a much "cleaner" regime without the baggage Pakistan has been carrying. If we really cared, we might look into supporting a government headed by Gen. Dostum -- who seems the most secular of the Northern Alliance leaders. What a pity Massoud is dead.
    Posted by: Fred Pruitt 2001-10-19
  • http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=2740