What is Digg?99 Comments
- thelastcivilian, on 01/24/2009, -1/+38Yeah, but what did Putin say?
- Bloake, on 01/24/2009, -2/+31Wow. That's certainly news to me.
I hope this is sincere of the Russian president and that he goes through with what he said! - seandfeeney, on 01/24/2009, -4/+23WOW! Obama's presence is already doing some good.
- wreckosaurus, on 01/24/2009, -7/+24I hope Obama cancels the eastern Europe missile shield because it's pointless and only aggravates Russia. If we ditch that plan, we could have a MUCH friendlier Russia on our hands.
- offrdbandit, on 01/24/2009, -4/+18You're right.
Shooting down nuclear capable ballistic missiles before they detonate and kill millions is pointless. I mean, the people are going to die someday, right? - inactive, on 01/24/2009, -1/+13What about them crazy Americans....
- greeniemeani, on 01/24/2009, -11/+22In Soviet Russia, Afghanistan cooperates with you!
- DaviDTC, on 01/24/2009, -0/+8It is from the AP so it will be the same article on every site. Where do you think fox got it from?
- kirbs2001, on 01/24/2009, -0/+6Wow. This is a very diplomatic move on Russia's part.
I hope that we can work with Russia. They are a great power and a very intelligent society. Competition between our two nations has, spurned both countries on to great achievements and grave follies.
With any luck a new era of cooperation can bring great achievements without the atrocities witnessed in the past. - Amazetbm, on 01/24/2009, -1/+7Not by a long shot.
- Marvelboy, on 01/24/2009, -2/+8No
- Target91, on 01/24/2009, -1/+6So what do they want in return?
- hulkamaniaz, on 01/24/2009, -0/+5The terrain is extremely harsh. Even building a railroad in that part will take years.
- J16T3CH, on 01/24/2009, -0/+4If that is the case, they wouldn't be working WITH us.
On a side note, is there a flippin way to use Italics in the comments? - BabyWookie, on 01/25/2009, -0/+4This is a great gesture of good will towards our new administration. Hopefully, Obama and team are not going to continue the neocon's policy of trying to isolate and undermine Russia. There's no good reason as to why the US and the RF shouldn't be good friends and allies.
- inactive, on 01/24/2009, -0/+4Their 'ass kicking' came mostly from the US backing so any revenge that they would seek would most likely be against the US.
- SheilaNoya, on 01/24/2009, -0/+4Russia's economy is collapsing again. Their stock market has crashed even worse than ours. They need us and we need them, even if we have ideological differences.
We have a new leader now and I think this is a good way for them to hold out an olive branch and see if we can find some common ground. We won't fully trust them and vice-versa, but it's better to be trying to find a way to co-exist than to be at each other's throats. Neither of us can afford that now.
We BOTH want to keep Afghanistan from turning into a bigger nightmare, so I say we take all the help we can get. - JROXZ, on 01/24/2009, -2/+6It's a TRAP!!!
- moulin1, on 01/25/2009, -0/+3Yes of course they are sincere. Russia has been at war with the Taleban since 1980. It was the Russian supported faction that formed the core of allies that US special forces joined to overthrow the Talebon. They were just waiting till the red baiting faction was out of power to offer publicly what they have been providing privately all along.
- vxp19, on 01/24/2009, -1/+4We are interested in the Taliban's fall as well, though.
There's a huge influx of drugs coming from Afghanistan to our southern parts (and spreading from there to pretty much everywhere else in the Federation).
We want it to end. :) - inactive, on 01/24/2009, -1/+4It's for non-military cargo only. Non-military cargo benefits the Home team (Afghans and Afghan terrorist groups) much more than the Away team (US). This will do nothing to end the fighting or to stabilize the region.
- SheilaNoya, on 01/24/2009, -0/+3CAPS will do, or you can mark a word with asterisks if you *really* want to emphasize it.
- DirtyVicar, on 01/24/2009, -1/+4Hell, ship it through China... the borders touch, they're captive to our market economy, and there's plenty of empty container ships going back to China. All you need is a railroad going through the pass, but they could probably rig one up for a fraction of what we're paying Halliburton.
- Amazetbm, on 01/24/2009, -1/+4The U.S. isn't doing much better as it stands.
- rjinso, on 01/24/2009, -1/+4After reading Watchmen, some really strange thoughts went through my head upon reading this headline.
- inactive, on 01/24/2009, -2/+5It aggravates Russia because they want first strike capability in Europe 'just in case they need it'.
- SheilaNoya, on 01/24/2009, -3/+6This is much better than Bush's failed attempt to give Turkey $40 billion to let us send military equipment through their country into Iraq. They wouldn't even let us fly over their air space.
I'm sure we'll be accepting Russia's offer with a bit of optimistic caution. Like us, they also have a vested interest in not letting Afghanistan spin out of control. They already wasted 10 years trying to control Afghanistan (while America supplied cash & weapons to Afghan rebels like Osama bin Laden, back when Republicans claimed he was a "Freedom Fighter"). America was afraid the "communists" would take over, so we helped fight against the Soviet Union. However, we ended up with Islamic religious extremists and terrorists taking over Afghanistan instead.
The Soviet Union went bankrupt and collapsed as a nation from spending all of their money on the military, while ignoring their own infrastructure at home. Sound familiar?
Maybe they realize that we're now heading down the same stupid path they once did and they want a solution this time, instead of another collapsed nation (U.S. or Afghanistan). - boulder555, on 01/24/2009, -0/+3Who is the greater danger ... the Taliban or the Empire in co-operative with Eastern Block allies? This does not reassure me in the slightest.
- Joe_rigby, on 01/24/2009, -1/+4Buryied is not a word.
Stop reading Fox News. - inmylife, on 01/24/2009, -0/+3Omg...same here!
- BabyWookie, on 01/25/2009, -1/+3Because, for some ***** reason, the installations are on its border and Russia is not in on the whole gig. Russia had offered the US one of they radar sites in Azeirbajan, which would have been perfect for intercepting Iranian missiles. The US refused.
- BabyWookie, on 01/25/2009, -0/+2@gasoline:
In the realities of this world, this technically defensive system, automatically becomes a part of the operator's nuclear first strike capability. The way that Russia has been treated following the official end of the Cold War, gives them every right to be concerned about this. How would the US feel if the USSR had expanded the Warsaw Pact all around its borders and started putting ABM systems in Cuba, claiming that they were intended to protect against a strike from China? - cyberdork, on 01/24/2009, -0/+2Actually the region is getting more unstable because the NATO forces have ONLY ONE major supply route via the Khyber pass which is constantly attacked by Taliban forces.
So being able to bring in cargo from the north would help the forces immensely.
"In November and December 2008, there were multiple incidents of major theft, robbery, and arson attacks against NATO supply convoys in Pakistan. Transport companies south of Kabul have also been reported to pay protection money to the Taliban. In an attack on November 11, 200 Taliban fighters in Peshawar hijacked a convoy carrying NATO supplies from Karachi to Afghanistan. The militants took two Hummers and paraded them in front of the media as trophies.
The coalition forces bring 70% (!!!!) of supplies through Pakistan every month, of a total of 2,000 truckloads in all.
The area east of the Khyber pass in Pakistan has seen very frequent attacks. Cargo trucks and Humvees have been set ablaze by Taliban militants. A half-dozen raids on depots with NATO supplies near Peshawar have destroyed 300 cargo trucks and Humvees in December 2008.
On Dec 30, 2008, Pakistani security forces shut down the supply line when they launched an offensive against Taliban militants who dominate the Khyber Pass region. After three days of fighting, they declared the Khyber Pass open.
The other supply route through Pakistan, via Chaman, was briefly shut down in early 2009. On Jan 10, tribesmen used vehicles to block the road to protest a raid by Pakistani counter-narcotics forces that left one villager dead. The protesters withdrew on Jan 14 after police promised to take their complaints to provincial authorities." - yacinebouatrous, on 01/24/2009, -4/+6i wouldn't if i was them, let the Yanks deal with the talebans themselves
no involvment in the middle-east = no terrorism - BotchaMcCoola, on 01/24/2009, -0/+2The US is probably throwing tens of billions of bribe money around there like Rip Taylor with his confetti. Enjoy it, you sucker tax payers/Chinese borrowers. Well, have they not been bribing the Iraqi Sunnis to make it look like “the Surge worked”?
- ciaran036, on 01/26/2009, -0/+2And somehow Diggers think this is "good". Sure it's lovely to have them agree on something but NOT THIS!
- inactive, on 01/24/2009, -1/+3The Russian route is for non-military cargo only and I'm sure the US is paying them (overpaying them) for the use of their route. So opening the route is probably as beneficial if not more beneficial to them than it is for the US.
- exgiexpcv, on 01/24/2009, -1/+3This is very good news. Opening a secondary route for assets to be moved will relieve pressure on our current single route, which is under more or less constant attack, and the sometimes dubious support we receive from so-called friendlies in the area.
- DaviDTC, on 01/24/2009, -1/+3You mean makes up their own news.
- shig, on 01/24/2009, -0/+2Replace "30,000 troops" with "30,000 Marines", and the reasons become clear.
- vxp19, on 01/24/2009, -0/+2I'm assuming that by the "empire" you are referring to the US.
in that case, the answer is we consider the Taliban to be more dangerous..
with the "Empire" and its NATO cronies there's an easy answer - our nuke deterrent.
It doesn't deter the Taliban. - consciousman, on 02/23/2009, -0/+1sound like good news to me...
- diggimator, on 01/25/2009, -0/+1I'm surprised that Russia wasn't part of the team already. The war sounds like something that would be in line with Russia's policies.
- BabyWookie, on 01/25/2009, -0/+1@gasoline:
This only affects Russia's position in the UN. Russia has paid a high price for keeping the USSR's UN Security Counsil seat, as they also had to take responsibility for all of USSR's humongous national debt (which they paid off).
Any ways, stability and rule of law in Afghanistan is in Russia's best interests. They were about as happy as any one to see Taliban go, as the Taliban was flooding Russia with heroin and exporting Wahabist extremism to Russia's Muslim south. - HumanNouveau, on 01/26/2009, -0/+1Easy. Stop NATO expansion in Eastern Europe.
I read the message, "Why do you want to add allies like Ukraine and Georgia, when we are in a position to help you much more." There's no small amount of logic there. No reason to believe that Russia has lost its taste for realpolitik. - oxdeltaxo, on 01/26/2009, -0/+1ABM's only have reasonable effectiveness against an ICBM as its launching. Against MIRVS they're almost pointless.
- HumanNouveau, on 01/26/2009, -0/+1Maybe, but the dust is still settling and some people in some places still seem to be blinded and/or choked by it.
- stuffradio, on 01/24/2009, -2/+3WWPD - What Would Putin Do?
- HumanNouveau, on 01/26/2009, -0/+1I don't think so. That is a lot of rough ground, like Hulkamaniaz pointed out. Materials are inadequate, support infrastructure wanting... that would be the work of decades, even if there was a long-term economic and political reason for such a route.
As it stands, you're better off building bridges to remote Alaskan islands, and transshipping via Russia. -
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