BeyondGeography
BeyondGeography's JournalA family says 10 of its members were killed in a US drone strike in Kabul
Source: NY Times
Hours after a U.S. military drone strike in Kabul on Sunday, Defense Department officials said that it had blown up a vehicle laden with explosives, eliminating a threat to Kabul’s airport from the Islamic State Khorasan group.
But at a family home in Kabul on Monday, survivors and neighbors said the strike had killed 10 people, including seven children, an aid worker for an American charity organization and a contractor with the U.S. military. Zemari Ahmadi, who worked for the charity organization Nutrition and Education International, was on his way home from work after dropping off colleagues on Sunday evening, according to relatives and colleagues interviewed in Kabul.
As he pulled into the narrow street where he lived with his three brothers and their families, the children, seeing his white Toyota Corolla, ran outside to greet him. Some clambered aboard in the street, others gathered around as he pulled the car into the courtyard of their home. It was then that they say the drone struck.
…On Monday, Capt. Bill Urban, the spokesman, reaffirmed an earlier statement that the military hit a valid target, an explosives-laden vehicle. He also repeated that the military was investigating claims of civilian casualties. Mr. Ahmadi was a technical engineer for the local office of Nutrition and Education International, an American nonprofit based in Pasadena, Calif. His neighbors and relatives insisted that the engineer and his family members, many of whom had worked for the Afghan security forces, had no connection to any terrorist group.
They provided documents related to his long employment with the American charity, as well as Mr. Naser’s application for a Special Immigrant Visa, based on his service as a guard at Camp Lawton, in Herat.
Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/live/2021/08/30/world/afghanistan-news/a-family-says-10-of-its-members-were-killed-in-a-us-drone-strike-in-kabul
Capitol Police officers sue Trump, extremists alleging conspiracy, terrorism on Jan. 6
Source: USA Today
Seven officers from the United States Capitol Police are suing former President Donald Trump, his longtime adviser Roger Stone and members of far-right extremist groups, alleging they conspired to use violence to attempt to prevent Congress from certifying the results of the 2020 presidential election on Jan. 6.
The lawsuit, expected to be filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia Thursday morning, alleges that Trump and the other defendants conspired with one other through the use of force, threats and intimidation that culminated in the attack on the Capitol.
Officer Jason DeRoche, an 18-year veteran of the Capitol Police and a Navy veteran, said the civil lawsuit isn't about winning a financial settlement. Rather, he said, the lawsuit aims to set the record straight about what happened on Jan. 6 and make sure history doesn't repeat itself.
"We don't want something like this happening ever again," DeRoche said. He added that he wants Trump and the other defendants to be held accountable for what they did, so that "if they were to do this ever again, there would be consequences."
Read more: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2021/08/26/capitol-police-sue-donald-trump-roger-stone-far-right-extremists/5593486001/
Six years for the first Whitmer defendant
Ty Garbin admitted his role in the alleged scheme weeks after his arrest last fall. He is among six men charged in federal court but the only one to plead guilty so far. It was a key victory for prosecutors as they try to prove an astonishing plot against the others.
Garbin apologized to Whitmer, who was not in court, and her family…
https://www.wsaw.com/2021/08/25/1st-sentence-be-handed-down-michigan-governor-kidnapping-plot/
Biden to stick to Aug. 31 Afghan withdrawal deadline (*)
There is a contingency plan in place to stay longer if the mission requires it, the sources told NBC News…
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/white-house/biden-stick-aug-31-afghan-withdrawal-deadline-u-s-speeds-n1277536
Taliban to US: Don't encourage Afghans to leave, no deadline extension
https://www.bbc.com/news/live/world-58279900-At a press briefing, Zabihullah Mujahid also said that women should stay at home for now, for their safety
-US allies have warned they will not be able to evacuate all those fleeing the Taliban by 31 August
-The warning comes as a G-7 summit is to hear allies press President Joe Biden to delay the withdrawal of US forces beyond that date
-US troops control Kabul airport from where some 58,700 people, mainly Afghans working for foreign forces, have been evacuated
-The Taliban say they will not extend the deadline, as it would violate the agreement with the US
-The Taliban's treatment of women will be a red line, the UN warns at an emergency session of the Human Rights Council
https://twitter.com/BBCBreaking/status/1430165188276375563
IS threat forces US changes to evacuations at Kabul Airport
Source: AP
KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Potential Islamic State threats against Americans in Afghanistan are forcing the U.S. military to develop new ways to get evacuees to the airport in Kabul, a senior U.S. official said Saturday, adding a new complication to the already chaotic efforts to get people out of the country after its swift fall to the Taliban.
The official said that small groups of Americans and possibly other civilians will be given specific instructions on what to do, including movement to transit points where they can be gathered up by the military. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss military operations.
The changes come as the U.S. Embassy issued a new security warning Saturday telling citizens not to travel to the Kabul airport without individual instruction from a U.S. government representative. Officials declined to provide more specifics about the IS threat but described it as significant, and said there have been no confirmed attacks as yet.
…Tens of thousands of translators and other Afghan wartime helpers, along with their close family members, are seeking evacuation after the Taliban’s shockingly swift takeover of Afghanistan in a little over a week’s time. The fall of Kabul marked the final chapter of America’s longest war, which began after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks.
Read more: https://apnews.com/article/11e1590d8f9976fae13e7ee83a6b193a
Josh Marshall: I Think This is Right
I think this is right. From TPM Reader JB …
President Biden has a long memory; the events of 2009-10, when then-President Obama was jammed by the military leadership into what proved to be an aimless, futile surge of US forces into Afghanistan, have to be a major factor in his thinking. A more deliberate, better planned withdrawal would have been preferable to what we are seeing now in many respects — notably, to get more of America’s Afghan friends out of the country.
Had Biden directed a withdrawal of this kind, how would the US military leadership have responded? If Biden suspected the response would have been a months-long campaign of foot-dragging and leaking — to pressure him toward the military’s preferred course of staying in Afghanistan indefinitely — would he have been wrong?
I misjudge the man if he were not convinced this very thing would happen. There seems little question that 99% of the impetus for withdrawing now from Afghanistan, in a way that cannot be reversed, is coming from Biden personally. As a matter of strategy, and as one of keeping faith with Afghans who depended on us, this withdrawal is suboptimal. Biden is fully responsible for it.
But from his point of view it probably looks like the best option available — the others being, respectively, no withdrawal at all and a protracted, semi-public tug-of-war with senior military officers deeply invested in putting off unpleasant decisions about an Afghan project that has defined so many military careers. Biden looks determined not to let the military leadership do to him what it did to Obama a decade ago.
Public discussion of this subject is not dwelling on Biden’s relationship with the US military leadership. I predict this will change.
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/i-think-this-is-right
Dark Side of the Mushroom - The Chocolate Watch Band
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