What's
Worse? Trump Dropping 'Mother of All Bombs' or
That 70% of Americans Approve
Widespread support comes despite the lack of
information from the Pentagon about damage from
the "Mother of All Bombs" in Afghanistan
By Deirdre Fulton
April 21,
2017 "Information
Clearing House"
- Despite
the lack of information from the Pentagon about
President Donald Trump's
deployment on
April 13 of the "Mother of All Bombs" in
Afghanistan—or its aftermath—close to 70 percent
of American voters say they "strongly" or
"somewhat" support the bombing,
according to a
new poll.
Defense Secretary James Mattis said Thursday
that "he does not intend to discuss damage
estimates from last week's use of the military's
most powerful non-nuclear bomb on an Islamic
State stronghold in Afghanistan," the
Associated Press
reported.
An Afghan official said this week that the
bombing killed 96 Islamic State [ISIS]
militants, though "the official provided no
proof of the deaths or information on how
officials reached the number of 96," as the New
York Times
notes. There
have been no confirmed reports of civilian
casualties.
The
Times further reported on Tuesday:
It was
unclear whether any Afghan or coalition
forces have made it to the bombing site five
days after the attack. The senior Afghan
security official said the day after the
bombing that Afghan commandos had done so
and, after clearing the site, had handed it
over to American military forensic teams.
[Zabihullah] Zmarai, the provincial council
member, said local officials in Achin told
him that neither Afghan nor American forces
had arrived at the site.
A
spokesman for the Afghan commandos, Jawid
Salim, agreed. "It is not true that the
members of U.S. forensic are at the scene of
bombing—no one is there," he said. "We are
in the area and we see everything."
According to
Agence France-Presse on Wednesday,
security forces are blocking both journalists
and local residents from accessing the site. The
outlet reported:
The
blast triggered shockwaves which residents
said they felt miles away. It was said by
the Afghan defence ministry to have killed
at least 95 militants, including some IS
commanders and foreign fighters, but no
civilians.
The
statement could not be independently
verified, with reporters including AFP
correspondents turned away from the site
again Wednesday even though there was no
sign of fighting in the immediate area.
Ahmad Jan, a resident of Achin who fled IS
fighting and moved with his family to the
provincial capital Jalalabad long before the
bomb was dropped, told AFP he had no idea
whether his house or relatives survived the
attack.
"No
one can go there, they have completely
blocked the area. I don't know if my house
is destroyed. They have not even shown any
dead bodies to anyone," he said.
Ali M. Latifi, a writer based in Kabul,
Afghanistan,
offered this first-hand account
in Thursday's New York Times:
Two
hills obstructed view of the bombed area.
American helicopters flew overhead. Three
hours passed but we weren't allowed to
proceed further. Officials spoke cheerfully
of resounding success and precision of the
operation.
Yet
every time we sought permission to visit the
bombed area, they found excuses to keep us
away: "The operation is ongoing!" "There are
still Daesh"— Islamic State—"fighters on the
loose!" "There are land mines!" and finally,
"The area is being cleared!" “No civilians
were hurt!"
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"In the
end, 'Madar-e Bamb-Ha' [the Dari translation for
'Mother of All Bombs'] became the star of a
grotesque reality television show," she wrote.
"We know how much it weighs, what it costs, its
impact, its model number, and its code name. We
know nothing about the people it killed except
they are supposed to be nameless, faceless,
cave-dwelling Islamic State fighters. It was a
loud blast, followed by a loud silence. It is
yet another bomb to fall on Afghan soil, and the
future of my homeland remains as uncertain as
ever."
But
that uncertainty is not reflected in the United
States, where respondents to a Politico/Morning
Consult survey seem to have been swayed by Trump
and the military's latest display of "shock and
awe."
"As you
may know, the United States recently dropped the
military's largest non-nuclear bomb on a cave
complex suspected to be controlled by ISIS, in
Afghanistan, according to the U.S. Department of
Defense," the 1,992 registered voters were
asked. "Knowing this, do you support or oppose
the military dropping the largest non-nuclear
bomb on an ISIS cave complex in Afghanistan?"
Forty-three percent said they strongly supported
the action, while 26 percent said they were
"somewhat" behind the bombing. Just eight
percent said they strongly opposed it.
The results lend credence to author and analyst
Phyllis Bennis' call,
published this
week, "to integrate opposition to these wars
into the very core of the movements already
rising so powerfully against racism, for women's
and LGBTQ rights, for climate and economic
justice, for Native rights, for immigrant rights
and refugee protections, for Palestinian rights,
and much more."
"We'll
need new strategies, new tactics," she wrote,
"but we continue to stand on the shoulders of
those who have gone before us. Our country is
waging war against peoples across the globe,
indeed waging war against the earth itself. But
we are still here, challenging those wars
alongside those who guard the earth, who protect
the water, who defend the rights of those most
at risk."
Indeed,
wrote Seelai
Popal, Ali A. Olomi, and Laila Rashidie on
Thursday, it is time "for people of conscience
in the U.S. to step forward and demand an end to
the murder of the Afghan people and the
poisoning of our land. The terrorism waged by
the U.S. and its allies in the name of the 'war
on terror' far outstrips the violence of those
they claim to fight. It is time for the global
community to demand that all militaries
stop using our people and our lands as the
testing grounds for war and weaponry. It is time
to end the occupation of Afghanistan."
This
article was first published at
Common Dreams
The
views expressed in this article are solely those
of the author and do not necessarily reflect the
opinions of Information Clearing House.
