Hey, Joe Biden! Put Down the Pom-Poms

Vice President Biden dusted off a pair of Bush administration
pom-poms and trotted out its best cheer for war last week: continued
military effort and occupation in Afghanistan, he told the BBC, are in
the U.S. and U.K.'s best interests as they're the only way to prevent
another terrorist attack like Sept. 11. "It is worth the effort we are
making," Biden said, as terror groups could "wreak havoc" on Europe and
the US, and both countries must endure more "sacrifice."

It's shocking, really, from an administration that promised change,
this couldn't sound like more of the same misleading rhetoric that
tricked Americans into the bloody, unjust war in Iraq. For seven long
years, Bush & Co. argued that "Islamist terrorists" of the Middle
East would run free and Americans would be in constant danger of
another Sept. 11 -- end of story. By inflating the threat of attack
with faulty logic, the administration scared Americans into ignoring
facts and supporting a massive push of troops into a largely innocent
country. (Listen to an Afghan woman's critique of the occupation in the
interview below by CODEPINK activist and journalist, Liz Kimmerly.)

Eventually the truth emerged: Iraq possessed no weapons of mass
destruction, Saddam Hussein and Iraqis were disinterested in and
disconnected to Al Qaeda or the Taliban, and there existed no
withdrawal or rebuilding plans for Iraq. Thousands and then millions of
Americans began to see through this fear-mongering propaganda, although
it was too late for over a million Iraqi civilians and 4,000 American
(and counting) soldiers killed, the US economy, the women sent back to
the middle ages and Iraq's destroyed infrastructure.

Biden's words really shouldn't shock us. For months, the Obama
administration has taken its cues from the Bush regime and given us
more of the same. In February, the New York Times reported
that the Obama administration had already signaled its commitment to
continuing the C.I.A.'s program of transferring prisoners to other
countries without legal rights, and indefinitely detaining terrorism
suspects without trials even if they were arrested far from a war zone.
Guantanamo prison is still open, despite his campaign promise to close
it. In February, Obama reneged on another promise to withdraw troops
from Iraq immediately and instead announced an Aug. 2010 deadline, with
residual troops left behind until December 2011. My partner, Medea
Benjamin commented that "this timeline and leaving tens of thousands of
residual troops sounds more like occupation-lite than an end to
occupation." In March, he announced a troop surge in Afghanistan, an
increase of 4,000 combat troops and spending 60 percent more than the
current levels of $2 billion per month, and pushed through Congress an
additional $94.2 billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, a
supplemental that will further destabilize the Middle East and Central
Asia, threaten worldwide security and push the total cost to the U.S.
taxpayer over $700 billion.

But these policies will fail, just like those of the Bush
administration. They fuel the Taliban and Al-Qaeda and lead to more
civilian deaths -- in 2008, amid U.S. military operations, civilian
casualties climbed 40 percent, further alienating Afghans who
increasingly view the U.S. as an occupying force. They create
instability in Pakistan and continue to bankrupt the U.S. economy at a
time of sky-high unemployment.

Americans will soon see through these policies, and the rhetoric
that surrounds them, despite more cheerleading from the administration.
A USA Today/Gallup Poll in March found 42 percent of
Americans felt the Afghanistan war was "a mistake," an increase of 30
percent earlier this year and 34 percent in August 2008. They're
assurance that the United States cannot defeat an ideology, cannot
fight the "war on terror" with troops and bombs will grow. Biden must
invest his energy in calling for diplomacy, development, investment in
infrastructure and accountability from the corrupt leaders in
Afghanistan and Iraq that the US supports. That is, if he's serious
about ending these twin wars and occupations and keeping Americans safe.