Charlie Rose

BENEZRAA  03/03/2011 03:12 PM Report

DD & JG ...

Thanks all around, and JG: thanks for your WW2 service and for the very sound awareness that the media "Left vs. Right" show is killing the country.

JohnGelles  03/01/2011 07:50 PM Report

Thank you doodah for kind words. The whole nation fought to win WW II. Sixteen million of us were in uniform. My classmates who were wounded and died sacrificed for me and our nation. My ship sailed through mine fields but escaped untouched. The hardest day of my service was loading ammunition on board in what seemed like endless quantities before we sailed to Ulithi to be part of the invasion fleet destined to land on Japanese soil. The Manhattan project saved us from that bloody prospect. I served thirty nine months, 24 months in the Pacific Theater: but on an LST there was risk but no real sacrifice compared to the troops we carried whom we landed in China after the war was over. I was 17 when I reported for duty in July 1943 and 20 when I was honorably discharged in 1946. Before I entered the Navy my family experienced many a hard year in the depression. During and after the war, America licked the depression and assumed leadership of the free world. The great sacrifices in that period fell on other people -- but I have always tried to be worthy of all they did. Our youth today in the armed services merit our dedication to all the great principles they are defending. Our nation, in my view, is short changing great numbers of our veterans of the current wars -- and our fighters ought to have far more high tech defensive and offensive systems to protect them as they protect us.

Were I the President I would demand spending by Congress to arm and defend our fighters with the very best we can invent and produce. Price would be no object. Our Secretary of Defense says things I disagree with on the topic of his department's budget and needs to accomplish our purposes.

My LST in WW II was jokingly called a large slow target. But it was not. It was the finest ship ever built for landing 30 medium tanks as high up on the beach as possible. It cost a small fortune to build -- by the Chicago Bridge and Iron Works who had never before built a vessel. We out maneuvered typhoons where some older ships were capsized.

Our most pressing need today is for diplomacy to keep Russia and China as allies and for high tech anti-terrorist systems to prevent WMD's from killing innocents. But we need also to assume leadership of many great nations now capable of ending poverty and unemployment overnight. These ancient curses are left over from historical errors in systems of production and trade evolved in the middle ages. Science and technology repaired my arteries and heart ten years ago. These realms of human effort have fallen behind their potential because law, economics and politics have refused to keep up with the best of medical practice in the complex world of today and tomorrow.

I was once the chief of budgets and statistics for my employer. Budgets must have a purpose. And some statistics help to let you know how you're doing in relation to purpose. The balance of cost and revenue is never enough: you must always keep purpose in mind, and force your whole system to adjust to performance not just to initial revenue projections. When a nation has unemployed people and resources,its performance demands employment of all and then some. America today is loafing because our leaders have failed know our purpose in the way that Abdul Rahim Wardak does. There may be reasons for this deficit in knowing -- but it is the deficit worth correcting, and other more talked about deficits are likely to be less meaningful.

doodah  03/01/2011 08:26 AM Report

Thank you for the intelligent and worthwhile comments provided, BENEZRAA and JohnGelles.

Mr. Gelles, if that is your definition of, "a man of the Left", then I too, am "a man of the Left"; and a real American Too Boot. ;)

Only I did not serve in the WWII as did you. On behalf of the fortunate masses to benefit from your sacrifice, I Thank You.

JohnGelles  03/01/2011 08:01 AM Report

Defense Minister Abdul Rahim Wardak at the end of the transcript comments:

.... "So throughout the history, I think every nation has tried to defend itself as far away from home as possible. And that was the rationale for your participation in World War I and World War II. In this case also, in this time time also, I think the nature of the threat is

different -- it is even more dangerous.

..... "The threat doesn’t recognize any boundaries. It cannot be overcome by a single nation, regardless how powerful.

..... "It needs a strategic global response, and also

the coordinated and concerted effort of the community of nations. Otherwise I think nobody’s going to be safe on this planet.

..... "if we are going to defend the collective freedom of this global village, I think everybody has to contribute.

..... "BUT, the United States has borne most of the burden and other allies have not ..."

=================

The trust in America's mission and effort evidenced in this comment is welcome indeed -- at this moment in history when Arabia is demanding a better future for its people -- especially its youth.

The safety of the planet is not at the top of the agenda of America's home grown critics of our missions abroad who have formed the Tea Party on the right and US-Uncut party on the left.

At the top of their missions is to "stop spending" on the right and "begin taxing corporate tax avoiders" on the left.

It's as though Wardak sees America at war and our American activists see America coming apart at the seams.

Both sights are there for all of us worry.

I am a man of the left, ashamed of all the left is doing. Instead of the Wardak view of history, the left is flirting with becoming a tax collector with no chance in hell of making an income tax solve the problem of fairness that plagues us.

War is diplomacy by other means. Income tax is robbing the poor by other means. If we would have the means and muscle to be successful diplomats for peace and plenty on Earth, we should be fair to our own workforce. This means taxes must protect their jobs, incomes and liberty. This means a value added tax -- repeal of the income tax -- and exemptions in the VAT that guarantee full employment and high wages here and invite the same over there: in China and every other low cost competitor in trade and influence.

International terrorism is loose. International trade is potentially just as threatening. Wardak has said thank you to America. Whom do we thank for wrecking our middle class and preparing to drill holes in the bottom of our ship of state. I guess we thank the left and right critics in our parties who will be taking up air time with Charlie after Afghanistan and Arabia are talked out.

BENEZRAA  02/28/2011 11:58 PM Report

DEFENSE MINISTER WARDAK IS SPOT-ON IN HIS ANALYSIS.

To Afghanistan's west is Iran; to the north are the "stan" nations spun off from the former USSR, nations still to one degree or another under Russian influence; to the northeast is China; and to the south is Pakistan.

Extended American influence in Afghanistan beyond 2014 is critical to stability in Central Asia, as by example the extended American influence in Japan and South Korea has been critical to stability in the Pacific region and as by similar example extended American influence has been essential to European stability.

Extended American influence in Afghanistan makes resolution of Afghan-Pakistan issues practicable, which in turn has positive implications for Pakistan-India issues. Less obvious is the possibility of positive influence on China vis-a-vis Tibet.

For the USA to abandon Afghanistan in 2014 would be to surrender and nullify years of effort and commitment; it would be a choice to favor the defeat of freedom in favor of a manifest destiny of victory; it would be to choose contentment by temporary possession of a shadow rather than holding tight to the real thing.

blank  02/28/2011 08:41 PM Report

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-12389399

Ellen_Dibble  02/28/2011 05:26 PM Report

http://www.npr.org/2011/02/28/134137014/another-bailout-looms-but-this-time-its-for-kabul

See today's All Things Considered report on corruption and how the United States is going to have to bail out Kabul bank because of a billion dollars in self-loans to Karzai's brothers and other high officials, while the Afghans thought this was one part of the new regime that was trustworthy.

As you say, robd, Wardak is going to be returning to the region, and he did point this out a few times. "Reintegration" is what he expects of most Taliban as they become part of the establishment, but "reconciliation" is his word for something similar on a "higher" level, with those Taliban leaders who have safe havens over the border. He was pretty explicit that those safe havens are the determining factor.

Speaking of Pakistan, I didn't hear him say that India seemed poised to set up in Afghanistan to lord it over Pakistan. I didn't hear anything explicit about Iran. I heard the usual spiel about how a pre-announced withdrawal can only be seen as an earmarked opportunity for overthrow of the government he is part of.

I did note he allowed he has, when fighting with the mujahaddin, met Osama bin Laden. First he said once. Then he described a couple more occasions.

Wardak was describing that the United States has done more than its share, and maybe he's seeing that American involvement may have just about ruined our middle class. But he's also saying his nation has a tradition of unity, going back through the millennia, and that was at the beginning of the hour, and though I've read some about the history, there was plenty of notice there about credibility and so on. I felt I had a front row seat to what that country's formal position is. It's a lot more authentic than funneled through our State Department or Defense Department, in its own way.

robdverity  02/28/2011 04:44 PM Report

What a laundry list of hostage demands. He exemplified what fools we are by blantantly listing his (Afghan's) requirements for success after we supposedly leave in 2014. Obama's war is as effective as his war on the financial corruption and moral hazard. They both are pillaging the treasury. There are more Al-Qaeda in Yemen and Somalia than remain in Af-Pak. His empty threats that they will return is a ho-hum compared to the other 'real' threats out there. But Obama can't waste a chance to waste money (and lives).

Also, CR was particularly obtuse when he tried to get him to admit Karzai was corrupt. He has to return. CR stays in NY. Besides our own corruption puts theirs to shame (think Xe aka Blackwater for openers).

doodah  02/28/2011 03:06 PM Report

This is why it is best to let the 'professionals of substance' do their work, and pretty much just ignore the 'professional critics and their bullshit'. General Petraeus is the one constant thread throughout the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan that results in success of mission. He is our generation's General Washington, Grant, Eisenhower, Marshal, and MacArthur, sprinkled with some Schwarzkopf.

God Bless the United States of America, despite all it's enemies (foreign OR domestic). American muscle will eventually kill them all; and a good day that will be. For America and America's Friends.

Tanin  02/28/2011 02:26 PM Report

His take on the involvement of president Karzai and his family in corruption is not clear and convincing enough. Denying it totally would mean turning a blind eye on the problem at hand, since clearly the scale of corruption in the system is incredibly high. I would also question the leadership abilities of the president and his team and the fact that they don't have a clearly defined strategy for tackling the (increasing) problems facing the country.

REMant  02/28/2011 02:16 PM Report

I don't disagree with this in principal. Nor does Sec'y Gates apparently. Anything that is sustainable will have to be accomplished by the Afghans, themselves, JUST LIKE the Egyptians, the Tunisians, the Libyans, the Iraqis, and all the rest. We can't go around saying we welcome all this North African self-determination, and then turn and say we don't welcome Afghan self-determination, now can we?

Of course, having invaded the country we certainly didn't help anything by going off and invading another. But I am sure in the end it won't really make any difference. It is not for us or even the Afghan govt to be protecting the ppl, it is a question of whether they want to protect themselves. I'm quite sure that if they really want to, they can expel the Taliban and al-Qaeda permanently. If not, there's little anyone else can do about it.

BUT this is clearly not what the minister really believes, nor our president and our judicious and eloquent ambassador to the United Nations, who declared the anti-Qaddafi bloc, innocents. Nevertheless, thankfully, all they could do is tell him to leave the room. But when will they take their own advice, and leave Afghanistan?

You certainly can't say an army is needed to ensure democracy. Armies are opposed to democracy, and they have always been viewed as such by real republicans. I'm sure all the autocrat's armies in the world say they are protecting the ppl. Neither, however, can an army impose itself for long on a ppl who will not tolerate it. Such rule will fall of its own weight. But so will democracies which, despite what Hume and Madison thought, rely on bribing their citizenry to keep them happy. At some point you must abandon the idea of an impartial higher power, no matter how elected, and rely on a mixed constitution with its element of self-reliance. And so it does no good ultimately to intervene in civil wars, because only they can produce the needed self-control and responsibility. As with children, it only results in bullies or bullied. The very fact that so many of them look to us for salvation suggests to me they are not worthy of it.

I have no quarrel with the aspirations of the Arab world. Far from it. I anticipated it and these events months, if not years, ago. But I do mind seeing our "progressives," whose support for dictators, and insane economic and monetary policies created this situation, every bit as much as the neocons, coming back, like they did after the financial collapse, this time with their tin hats on, telling us how they are going to fix the problem or how wonderful it is. If Joe and Hillary and Ms Rice want to go over there and fight, I encourage them to do it. I'll even book their passage (I'd have to pay for it anyway) - they can even take the greater NY metropolitan area with them - but leave the rest of us out of it.

No one can be quite sure anymore who is going to be labeled an innocent or a terrorist. But I'm sure that if we do get involved, somewhere in the world there will be a Timothy McVey or Osama bin Laden plotting revenge.

Ellen_Dibble  02/28/2011 12:02 PM Report

I've been waiting to vote five stars on this interview all weekend. Thanks to you both.