Monday, March 23, 2009

“All-Time Low”

Not good.

Relations between President Karzai’s Afghan government and Washington are at an all-time low. As Richard Holbrooke - President Obama’s envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan - prepares to make his first visit to the region since being appointed, the BBC’s Ian Pannell in Kabul looks at why the relationship has soured.

Hamid Karzai has become increasingly vociferous in his criticism of American military tactics and has been making half-hearted threats to shift his allegiance to Moscow if he does not get his way.

Washington has yet to publicly declare its hand but a series of well-placed leaks, briefs and snubs have raised the prospect that it could move its support elsewhere in this year’s presidential election.

One Afghan newspaper spoke of “a new cold war”.

A senior Afghan government official says the new Obama administration has insulted President Karzai and one prominent MP accuses America of “running a shadow-government”.

The decline in relations began with a visit last year by Joe Biden, now the vice-president, to Kabul.


Joe Biden’s meeting with President Karzai reportedly did not go well

At the time, as the Democratic vice-presidential candidate, he attended a private meeting with Mr Karzai.

A well-placed source describes Mr Biden, exasperated at not getting “straight answers” on drugs and corruption, launching into a verbal tirade and storming out of the meeting.

In a country where honour and decorum are second only to God and country, this was less than tactful.

(6) Comments
Posted by Owen at 0621 hrs
Foreign Affairs + Politics + Politics - General

  1. What do you mean ‘Not good’?  This is playing beautifully into BO’s hands.  If support gets switched to Moscow, he will have no choice but to leave Afghanistan.  Don’t you get that his whole ‘improving foreign relations’ schtick is the same as ‘bringing people together’ in America?  If you are liberal and have the elite label our relations will be improving.  I expect that by the end of his first four years, relations with France and Germany will be at an all time high, most of the rest of Western Europe (with the exception of the UK because they are so last administration), and Japan will be on good terms and the rest of the world just doesn’t matter unless they can learn some manners and put away their silly customs.

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 23, 2009 at 0735 hrs


  2. ...At least with the former President of France, anyway…

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 23, 2009 at 0738 hrs


  3. If Biden can’t control his temperament, why was he visiting with the Afghan President? bet Hillary loved this report…

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 23, 2009 at 0747 hrs


  4. Hillary and Bill have been strangely quiet in all of this. Bill was never my favorite president, but he knew who the present leaders in office were and he didn’t go out of his way to piss them off.

    They obviously know what needs to be done here. Are they biting their tongues because Obama has muzzled them - or are they sitting back and laughing at his mistakes and hope that this gives Hillary a window for 2012?

    Biden is a barrel of laughs when he is at home, but he is NOT a diplomat.

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 23, 2009 at 1228 hrs


  5. Nobody needed this questionable report to know that Biden’s an ass. Still, I’m hard-pressed to imagine he did this badly.

    Nonetheless: “and [Karzai] has been making half-hearted threats to shift his allegiance to Moscow if he does not get his way” ?

    Really?

    Sure, rock-and-a-hard-place diplomacy isn’t new to any Mideastern nation, but even among that crowd, the idea is ludicrous.

    The only ones expected to believe it are American/western diplomats.

    Posted by tee bee on March 23, 2009 at 1247 hrs


  6. Speaking of Biden, I’m surprised that with the power of the Internet, we don’t know what mental sanitarium he’s being kept at.  He did get a pass for Saturday appearance at the annual Gridiron dinner.  According to the article, Obama is the first sitting president since Grover Cleveland to miss this.

    http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/2009/03/22/2009-03-22_biden_takes_geithner_joke_to_the_bank_as.html

    I must admit, this one is funny:

    Turning to the suffering newspaper business, he disagreed with those who say they’re obsolete. “I recently got a puppy, and you can’t housebreak a puppy on the Internet,” Biden said.

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 23, 2009 at 1251 hrs


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