[CNSNEWS] President B.O. will not make a written apology to the Afghan people for "mistakes" made during the war in their country, National Security Adviser Susan Rice said Tuesday.Then her lips fell off.
Reports to that effect reflected "a complete misunderstanding of what the situation is," she told CNN's "The Situation Room" Tuesday afternoon.
"No such letter has been drafted or delivered," Rice said. "There is not a need for the United States to apologize to Afghanistan -- quite the contrary. We have sacrificed and supported them in their democratic progress and in tackling the insurgency and al-Qaeda."
On the same day, the News Agency that Dare Not be Named reported that Secretary of State John F.
I was in Vietnam, you knowKerry
Former Senator-for-Life from Massachussetts, self-defined war hero, speaker of French, owner of a
lucky hat,conqueror of Cambodia, and current Secretary of State...
, in a phone call, acknowledged "mistakes" and asked Afghanistan's Caped President
Hamid Maybe I'll join the TalibanKarzai
... A former Baltimore restaurateur, now 12th and current President of Afghanistan, displacing the legitimate president Rabbani in December 2004. He was installed as the dominant political figure after the removal of the Taliban regime in late 2001 in a vain attempt to put a
Pashtunface on the successor state to the Taliban. After the 2004 presidential election, he was declared president regardless of what the actual vote count was. He won a second, even more dubious, five-year-term after the 2009 presidential election. His grip on reality has been slipping steadily since around 2007, probably from heavy drug use...
to allow American troops on counter-terrorism missions to enter Afghan homes in "exceptional circumstances."
The two countries are trying to finalize the wording of a draft security agreement that will allow U.S. troops to remain in the country after 2014.
According to the AP, a Dari-language statement from Karzai's office said that Kerry told Karzai the U.S. government understands the concerns of the Afghan government and people stemming from "mistakes committed by American forces in the past in Afghanistan."
Karzai's front man, Aimal Faizi, told news hounds earlier in the day that Karzai and Kerry, during their phone conversation, ironed out final sticking points in the draft bilateral security agreement (BSA) between the two nations. The BSA is to be considered by a gathering of Afghan tribal leaders, known as a loya jirga, beginning on Thursday.
According to Afghan and foreign press reports, Faizi said Kerry told Karzai that Obama would write a letter to the Afghan people acknowledging "mistakes."
"The whole idea of having a letter was to acknowledge the suffering of the Afghan people and the mistakes of the past," Rooters quoted Faizi as saying. "That was the only thing that satisfied the president."
Afghanistan's independent Pajhwok news agency reported that according to Faizi, Kerry said Obama "was willing to hold out a written guarantee to the Afghan government that U.S. soldiers would not repeat past mistakes."
"Obama's letter, agreed by both sides, would be attached to the BSA text and placed before jirga participants for a decision, Faizi said, adding Kerry had acknowledged American forces' repeated mistakes in past offensives," Pajhwok added.