overview of Afghan War

1)   Trump gave a speech in VA a few hours after the full solar eclipse of 8-21-17 across America:

  “Ultimately, it is up to the people of Afghanistan to take ownership of their future, to goven their society, and to achieve an everlasting peace.  We are a partner and a friend, but we will not dictate to the Afghan people how to live* or how to govern their own complex society.  We are not nation-building again.  We are killing terrorists.”  https://www.npr.org/2017/08/21/545038935/watch-live-trump-s-address-on-afghanistan-next-steps-for-u-s-engagement    

video of above at 14:35:   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jf__Z0NOab8

at 16:10 of same video:     "The Pakistani people have suffered greatly from terrorism and extremism.  We recognize those contributions and those sacrifices, but Pakistan has also sheltered the same organizations that try every single day to kill our people.  We have been paying Pakistan billions and billions of dollars, at the same time they are housing the very terrorists that we are fighting.  But that will have to change.  And that will change immediately.  No partnership can survive a country's harboring of militants and terrorists who target U.S. service members and officials.  It is time for Pakistan to demonstrate its commitment to civilization, order and to peace.”   -Trump

*There is concern that the Afghan traditions of rape and graft and division suck a great deal of money, blood and looking-the-thee-way from America and the West, not to mention what it does to Afghanistan itself.    -r, Yreka, CA

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In this 2013 photo, a vehicle drives along a stretch of Highway 1 damaged by a roadside bomb in Sayedabad, Afghanistan. (Kevin Sieff/The Washington Post)

10-30-16    KABUL — Thirteen years ago, the United States called the reconstruction of the Kabul-Kandahar highway “the most visible sign” of efforts to rebuild Afghanistan.  But today, that stretch of road is no longer a sign of progress.

Instead, it is now littered with craters from bombs and insurgent checkpoints and is “beyond repair,” an Afghan official said, and it is a symbol of the failed U.S. intervention here.  https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2016/10/30/the-u-s-spent-billions-building-roads-in-afghanistan-now-many-of-them-are-beyond-repair/?utm_term=.62edd1bf61ae

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8-1-17   The United States has spent $714 billion on a war it’s losing.

That’s according to the latest quarterly report from the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, its 36th on the subject in the more than 15 years since the U.S. military invaded Afghanistan after the September 11th, 2001, attacks.  An estimated 86%, or $675 billion, was doled out by the Department of Defense — a particularly alarming figure, given that Secretary of Defense James Mattis declared on June 13 that the armed forces “are not winning in Afghanistan right now, and we will correct this as soon as possible.”     http://taskandpurpose.com/war-afghanistan-us-spending-cost/

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8-9-17     ISIS is most accepted by Pakistan among 13 Muslim countries, according to poll:

 http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/08/09/muslims-and-islam-key-findings-in-the-u-s-and-around-the-world/

10-14-14     but Pakistani support of ISIS mirrors Saudi support of ISIS:

http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/view/isis-has-almost-no-popular-support-in-egypt-saudi-arabia-or-lebanon