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Negotiations in Qatar end with the signing of a peace agreement with the Taliban for the first time in two decades. President Trump persisted in the effort following stalled talks in September 2018. Talks went on for 18 months with Afghan American diplomat Khalizad appointed by president Trump to lead negotiations. The agreement was signed in Qatar by Khalizad and Mullah Baradar, in the presence of Secretary of State Pompeo. President Trump stated his view on Afghanistan and places such as Iraq in a New Delhi press conference recently- the U.S. could not act in a (permanent) police role in foreign countries. Efforts were made under previous presidents to end the conflict. President Trump persisted and made this a priority of his administration, following similar policy in Syria and Iraq, where strong deployment of American forces was followed by removal of forces. From beginning to end the deployment was planned in this way, so that resources could be used to improve capabilities for future needs. ...

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Disneyland beyond middle class reach- $1213 parking, 1 meal $210, 2 Mickey Mouse wands $60. Americans like this bank compliance officer, her husband a driver at a warehouse and their children, feel sticker shock while visiting Disneyland. Skip the line for popular rides that before the pandemic cost nothing now costs $208. The Kindells family say they were stressed thinking of the cost, and are not going back. Both of the conventional parties after years of the Reagan wars reigniting under Bush in 2000 in Afghanistan and Iraq and the wars being pursued through the Obama years of stagnation, and no effort to get to the root causes of the global financial crisis that hit the financial backup savings of millions of Americans, were hit again by the Covid pandemic and the cost of living crisis. This story from Disneyland shows that it is still with us today even after DJT as a rejection of the status quo attempts to overhaul the whole system. ...

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The culture wars around the national debt and government spending as the national debt reaches $12 trillion.

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How a resurgence of violence by Muslim Kashmiris plays out in a new atmosphere of India-Pakistan rapprochement and the political uncertainty in Pakistan with the transition to democratically elected government there still being tested. The efforts this time were relative to the violence of a decade previously rather innocuous, efforts to break a blockade of a key highway by Hindu nationalists that blocked shipping out Kashmiri apple harvest to the outside world. The Hindus were reacting to Muslim Kashmiris protesting a grant of 98 acres by the government (later rescinded) to Hindu pilgrims visiting a religious site Amarnath in the Kashmir Himalayas.

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This opinion piece in DW.com says India's prime minister should not isolate prime minister Sharif of Pakistan, as he had no part in the escalation of tensions in Kashmir. Foreign and military affairs are now run by the Pakistan Army, and isolating Sharif only entrenches the Army it says, which has kept up tensions similar to the situation in 1999 with the Kargil crisis when the Pakistan Army initiated a conflict in Kargil region. At that time Indian premier Vajpayee and Pakistan premier Sharif were improving relations. 

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New York Times executive editor gives his account of how the Wikileaks documents came to be published in the paper, and the erratic relationship with Julian Assange.

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A documentary that will be shown on HBO in fall 2016 was screened at the Tribeca Film Festival in April 2015. It shows the disagreements between Holbrooke, who negotiated the Bosnia accords that ended the war there, and president Obama.

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A senior military oficer, Admiral Fallon head of the Central Command overseeing both wars in Iraq and Afghanistan questions US policy towards Iran in major differences with President Bush. Its a bit strange though as Defense Secretary Gates points out that US policy towards Iran changed towards diplomatic pressure and political moves as opposed to a possible military action after the new intelligence report that questioned earlier reports of Iran moving towards nuclear weapons itself a result of vigorous debate and questioning in the intelligence department. So why would this result in public differences when the Bush administration has already changed both its rhetoric and its policy posture towards Iran? The Admiral is near retirement after 40 years of service, and may not have authorized the article in Esquire magazine or been aware that the journalistic world would turn this over the internet into a public spat with President Bush.

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Pakistan's GDP growth is expected to be 4% in 2012, an increase from 2% in 2011. Foreign exchange reserves are up to $18 billion. Repayments in 2015 to the IMF will be a quarter of the payment in 2012, says Finance Minister Abdul Hafeez Shaikh. Tax collections are up 24% for the first 9 months of the fiscal year 2012. Remittances from Pakistanis aborad are up 21% to $9.7 billion and exports up 5.5% over the $25 billion exports for 2011. In an WSJ op-ed, April 16, 2012, Michael Boskin,who helped negotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement for the elder President Bush, says it is time for a free trade agreement between India and Pakistan. Shaikh says he expects to see trade with India up from the insignifcant levels of $2.7 billion in 2012 to $10 billion by 2015. Boskin sees the potential for trade at $50 billion based on trade models. This would help change the landscape in the South Asian region after decades of neglect, strife and conflicts and is long overdue to benefit the billion people on the subcontinent....

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This piece in DW.com is critical of Merkel and Macron, leaders of Germany and France, following the Russian invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022. It says the West - European and American leaders bear partial responsibility for the developments in Ukraine.  Another view that also is critical of the western leaders says that NATO's role needed to be redefined, Russia's role in security cooperation in Europe needed to be defined not in the old terms of European history but in a new way so that NATO did not become a new form of shifting Eastern Europe into the opposite of what it had become under the Soviet Union. The western leaders of the last 20 years never addressed these issues and allowed them to be decided by default by different countries in Eastern Europe, just as they engaged in small lengthy wars in remote corners of the world - in Afghanistan to Iraq. From Reagan to Bush Sr and Bush Jr, from Clinton to Obama, from Kohl to Merkel and Schroeder these leaders never addressed the basic underlying issues creating the situation that is faced today. ...

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Only refugees from war zones are eligible for asylum in Germany. People coming from the Balkan countries looking for better job opportunities are being sent back home in September 2015.

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General McChrystal lacks support from Senators who backed him earlier, after comments in a Rolling Stone article showed disdain for the Obama policy team and for Vice President Biden.

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Frank Rich talks to Goldstein author of Lessons in Disaster on the Vietnam War and how John Kennedy refused to commit combat troops to Vietnam. He asks whether Obama can arrive at the right decision?

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Schmidle describes how the militancy in Pakistan's border provinces is shifting to younger people who continue fighting the old battles against America and the West. He observes the opening of a campaign office of the Islamist party, the Jamiat Ulema -e-Islam or J.I.I., from a crowded rooftop in Quetta, Baluchistan, where this party runs the provincial government. The rhetoric against the U.S. is mild compared to earlier years, as a new election approaches. In the last election the Islamist parties under the alliance Mutahida Majlis-e-Amal, won 10% of the vote with pro-Taliban sentiment running high. The MMA alliance ran two provincial governments. Now there is asplit in the Islamist parties, between the factions working within the democratic process and other factions including younger militants who are against Musharraf and elections. This comes after the shooting of Benazir Bhutto by militant Islamists.

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Mohamed Hanif of the BBC's Urdu Service points to the manner in which the CIA and the ISI collaborated in the two time destruction of Kabul. And he points to a Pakistani view outside of the military which is not obsessed with India and would like to get down to the basics- electricity and infrastructure, better lives, and a safer neighborhood. In this perspective the Pakistani military and the Americans both do not understand the basic needs of the large majority of Pakistanis yearning for a better life. Contrast this with the Thomas Friedman piece which complains on the other side, with a note of innocence, of becoming a sucker in this game of a two-faced Pakistani military and intelligence services using the Americans for their own game, supporting the Americans and the insurgents at the same time. Hanif almost has the last word in this, pointing to the ordinary Pakistanis who are just poor and looking in.