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The expression "moderate Taliban" is a comical oxymoron, but Saudi-sponsored negotiations are currently underway with these mythical beasts to find a way out of the Afghan quagmire.Qayum Karzai, brother of the Afghan president, is representing Kabul, and former bin Laden associate Abdullah Anas reputedly is acting as Taliban intermediary. Anas' role is unclear; he initially gave enthusiastic statements about the talks to the British press, then recanted them, insisting on Afghan TV that he "did not make the remarks. I do not know from where they took the remarks or quotes. I do not know at all whether Mullah Omar would like to start talks. I did not make the remark." For someone representing "moderates," Anas sounds terribly frightened. Taliban chieftains will not admit publicly that they are negotiating, calling the news reports "baseless lies." A Taliban spokesman said, "Our position remains unchanged. We will conduct jihad and continue resistance as long as foreign forces are present in Afghanistan. If you wait for 3,000 years, our position is that the Taliban will not enter into any kind of talks." Of course that is their going-in position; we may be able to bargain them down to 1,000 years.The Afghan government believes the talks are going well, and that supportive statements from President Obama have "created enormous optimism." The negotiations fit neatly into Mr. Obama's "let's talk it out" global strategy. The reported U.S. position is that if the Taliban cease fighting, evict al Qaeda, and promise not to support terrorism in the future, the U.S. and NATO will leave Afghanistan. Call it Anbar Awakening: The Sequel.The United States assumes only about 5 percent of the Taliban are incorrigibles, and the remaining "reconcilables" can be "peeled off." Hamid Karzai, himself a former Taliban supporter, defines the moderates as "those who are not affiliated with al Qaeda" and "who accept the constitution of Afghanistan." But most of the people who fit that description either joined the political process years ago or were killed by their immoderate brethren...To read more go to:
As in the days of Noah...
