Talk:War in Afghanistan (2001–2021)

Statistics Needed

The most frequent facts people will be looking for are:

• 1. the number of invading Americans killed, by year. Possibly broken out by soldier/contractor.
• 2. the number of people from other invading countries killed.
• 3. the number of Afghan/Taliban resistance killed
• 4. the number of Afghan civilians killed. Possibly broken out by culprit though that number is probably meaningless.

Obviously such numbers are disputed, but a range would be nice. RoedyG —Preceding undated comment added 13:27, 1 April 2012 (UTC).

How could the Northern Alliance invade their own country?

The article posits that Afghanistan was invaded. Technically the foreign powers chose to intervene on behalf of the insurgent party of a very, very long civil war. Labeling the 2001 action as a foreign invasion is non-factual and leading to a biased conclusion about intervening in an existing situation.

ANSWER: First, the Northern Alliance would not have succeeded in re-conquering the North, nor would the south been taken by President Karzai and Gul Agha Sherzai, had there been no overwhelming US air support, Special Forces, CIA operatives who bought the loyalty of various commanders who defected, a time-honoured Afghan tradition. For more on this see Sarah Chayes: the Punishment of Virtue. Second, what is "factual" is the motivation for the invasion of Afghanistan, which was due to the inability of the Taliban government to hand over Osama Bin Laden to US authorities, as outlined by President Bush in which he said: "The Taliban must act and act immediately. They will hand over the terrorists, or they will share in their fate." (http://911research.wtc7.net/cache/post911/attacks/afghanistan/metimes_taliban_defies_bush.htm) Third, if it was not an invasion, then wouldn't have been a steadily increasing occupying force of ISAF soldiers and the growing control over the country. --Finally, I am not against ISAF in Afghanistan, in fact I served there myself, but let's call it what it was: an invasion and occupation.

Iranian participation

Currently source #2 claims that Iranian SF forces fought side by side with American SF forces during the invasion. Considering that the same source also claims that the American casulties of Op Eagle Claw were caused by an Iranian ambush, I'm going to go out on a limb here and just remove it as soon as I've finished writing this. Pavuvu (talk) 22:22, 4 February 2012 (UTC)

Weasel Words in opening section

"In 2010, the War in Afghanistan became the United States' second longest continuous military conflict. Only the Vietnam War (1959–1975) lasted longer." This is just a blatant attempt to compare the WiA to vietnam. When in reality the longest armed conflict the US has been involved in was the Philippines that lasted from the late 1800's all the way into the 40's. It went hot and cold several times but hostilities remained constant. This paragraph should be updated.

Lets change it out. Also:

Weasel out image.

U.S. Marines in Southern Afghanistan-A ...(Special Operations Capable) ...

Please change the photo the green camuflage on desert palete looks very poor.

• 1. to evade an obligation, duty,
• 2. to use weasel words; be ambiguous; mislead — Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.90.197.87 (talk) 22:07, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

The photo op picture is weasel lame too. Why they walking by plain to sky terain with the hevy stuf ? In Background is a chopter, if landed closer to camera they will have shorter way. What is the sense to back pack mule having parked by truck to use ? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.90.197.87 (talk) 22:17, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

File:Ahmad Zia Massoud.jpg Nominated for Deletion

An image used in this article, File:Ahmad Zia Massoud.jpg, has been nominated for deletion at Wikimedia Commons in the following category: Deletion requests - No timestamp given What should I do? Don't panic; a discussion will now take place over on Commons about whether to remove the file. This gives you an opportunity to contest the deletion, although please review Commons guidelines before doing so. If the image is non-free then you may need to upload it to Wikipedia (Commons does not allow fair use) If the image isn't freely licensed and there is no fair use rationale then it cannot be uploaded or used. To take part in any discussion, or to review a more detailed deletion rationale please visit the relevant image page (File:Ahmad Zia Massoud.jpg) This is Bot placed notification, another user has nominated/tagged the image --CommonsNotificationBot (talk) 00:47, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

Front lines? Territory under control?

Article suffers from a lack of information regarding who has control of what areas. It appears that the govt/NATO now only control most of Kabul, while most of the rest of the country is controlled by the Taliban. How true is this? How have the 'front lines' changed over the last 11 years? Perhaps some sort of map/graphic would be useful if there's one around (I can't find one, nor any info re areas controlled)? 82.44.28.101 (talk) 17:54, 25 February 2012 (UTC)

Maoist involvement?

The Maoist party was formed to fight the American invasion in 2004, but it isn't meantioned in this article. They might be a minor group but surely they warrant a meantion in the "insurgent group" section for being an insurgent group. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.109.4.156 (talk) 03:16, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

Vietnam comparison

There's an ongoing edit war over the start year of the Vietnam war, and thus whether this war is longer. There are edits (e.g. one, two) saying the war started in 1959. Others then revert (e.g. one, two), saying the war started in 1965.

Of course, this dispute is not confined to this page, as it's debated in its own right. Since we're comparing for the purposes of understanding the duration of U.S. involvement, does it make sense to use the DoD's definition? As described at Richard B. Fitzgibbon, Jr., that's 1955. Superm401 - Talk 02:15, 14 March 2012 (UTC)

Photo of a deceased victim?

Excuse me but I just want to point out that there is a photo of maywand district killer posing with the dead body of its victim.....Posting such a photo seems to be deeply immoral in nature - it is the lack of respect for the victim.....Such a photo -if I understand it correctly -should be removed.....immediately..... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.25.0.13 (talk) 22:38, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

Removal of sections "US troops urinating on Taliban fighters" and "U.S. Soldiers Posing With Body Parts"

Hello. Sometimes I make contributions to topics I'm interested in. One of these topics is the ongoing War in Afghanistan. Over the course of the last days I made contributions with respect to US troops urinating on Taliban fighters and U.S. Soldiers Posing With Body Parts in order to showcase a deterioration in Afghan-American relations and the reasons therof. The sections dealing with US troops urinating on Taliban fighters and U.S. Soldiers Posing With Body Parts however have been ereased. Could me someone please explain why? Because I'm only a part time contributor could me someone also say what I can do so that the sections remain in the article after their restorement? Thanks. Orion 91.42.34.23 (talk) 20:42, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

There are some other potential issues with your entries but the specific reason it was reverted this time by Darkness Shines seems to be that thinks you are a sockpuppet. If you're not a sock puppet than I'm sure he'd clear up any misunderstanding if you were to ask him about it on his talk page. If you do so and you still feel you're being treated unfairly bring it up here again and someone will steer you in the right direction. If you need help with translation we have plenty of German speakers who could help you as well. TomPointTwo (talk) 20:57, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

This is why[1] If I am wrong feel free to revert me once the SPI has concluded. Darkness Shines (talk) 21:19, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

Request for update of U.S.-Afghan strategic partnership section

Hello. User:MuZemike has me directed to this page for my rquest to update U.S.-Afghan strategic partnership section. I have two requests for this section:

1.) After the sentence "According to the document, the US will continue to provide logistical support for 12 months and a joint US-Afghan commission will decide on any detainee releases until a more permanent pact is adopted."[303] please the following source code add:

The United States signed in March 2012 with Afghanistan an memorandum of understanding which shifts the responsibiliy for all detention facilities in the country to the Afghanistan.

2.) To add at the bottom of the section:

After more than a year and a half of negotiations Afghanistan and America finalized on April 22, 2012 the draft text for the US Afghan strategic partnership, which will be reviewed by both countries governments before it becomes final after the Afghan and American president signed it. The agreement has a duration of at least 10 years, lays out the framework for a future U.S. role in Afghanistan, including aid assistance and governance advice, and covers the areas of social and economic development, institution building, regional cooperation and security. The status of U.S. troops and the details of their operations after the 2014 withdrawl of NATO forces is not included in the partnership, but shall be covered in in a separate status of forces agreement. Obstacles on the way to the agreement of the draft text were the issues of night raids conducted by U.S. troops and the operation of detention facilities by the United States. The New York Times reported in this context in April 2012: "In March the two sides signed a memorandum of understanding shifting responsibility for all detention facilities in the country to the Afghans, and earlier this month they handed final authority for night raids to Afghan security forces, who are now carrying out all raids unless American assistance is requested. With those two issues resolved, the strategic partnership was quickly completed."

Could someplease do these changes? Thanks in advance. Orion 91.42.23.40 (talk) 23:49, 22 April 2012 (UTC) Update by Orion on 91.42.23.40 (talk) 00:03, 23 April 2012 (UTC)

 Done. --Tyrannus Mundi (talk) 19:34, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Taliban and insurgents casualty figure removed from the infobox

I've just removed the casualty figure for "Taliban and insurgents" from the infobox. This figure was unreferenced, and appears to be someone's calculation of the totals from the List of Taliban fatality reports in Afghanistan. According to the BBC's Defence correspondent (circa 2010), "there are no reliable or verifiable source figures available" for Taliban deaths, and the BBC has a policy of not reporting them as a result. As such, our figure was both obvious original research and certain to be wrong. Nick-D (talk) 07:42, 29 April 2012 (UTC)