Category Archives: Loving the Taliban

That most scrupulous and ethical organisations, the United Nations, has released statistics that claim 3,000 civilians were killed in Afghanistan last year. The BBC covered it this morning. 77% of deaths were caused by the Taliban, with the balance attributed to NATO forces. Guess which element of these statistics the BBC focused on? Let’s not talk about Taliban savagery towards fellow Muslims, shall we?

The propaganda is always there, as brought to my attention by an eagle-eyed B-BBC reader;

‘Missile attacks by US drones in Pakistan’s tribal areas have more than trebled under the Obama administration, research by the BBC Urdu service shows. Compared with 25 drone strikes between January 2008 and January 2009, there were at least 87 such attacks between President Obama taking office on 20 January 2009 and the end of June 2010.’

(more than trebled’…Pre-Obama: 25 strikes in 12 months = 2 / month Post-Obama: 87 strikes in 17 months = 5.1 / month)

‘The militant backlash over the same period has been even more violent. Extremists have struck more than 140 times in various Pakistani locations, killing more than 1,700 people and injuring hundreds more, the BBC research shows.’

(‘backlash’ – meaning militant direct retaliation for the strikes, implying that if we stop the attacks they will too.
But…)

‘While attacks by militants cannot be described as direct retaliation for drone strikes, they are firmly part of the battle the US and Pakistani authorities are fighting against radical Islam’s operational bases in Pakistan.’

So militant attacks aren’t direct retaliation. Then what are they? Indirect retaliation? Or a systematic campaign of violence intended to destabilise the Pakistani government, a step en route to the re-establishment of the caliphate.