Did Obama Refuse A Taliban Peace Offer?

Christoph R Horstel is a German expert on Afghanistan and has made some explosive charges against the outgoing Bush and incoming Obama administrations. Herr Horstel has worked for the German government and for the German television network ARD. He is an expert on terrorism and has advised ISAF forces in Afghanistan. He has a masters degree from Basel University in Switzerland and has taught at the Hamburg University Peace Research Institute. He was the last war correspondent remaining in Kabul when Bush's coalition forces took the capitol from the Taliban. I probably am doing an injustice to his resume as I do not speak German and am relying on a Google machine translation.

As best as I can understand from the poor quality translation I have from Google, Mr Obama was approached while he was still President-elect with a peace offer from the Taliban. Apparently, this peace offer from the Taliban had some backing from Hamid Karzai, the current President of Afghanistan. The peace plan was rejected. And we do not even have any prospect for peace talks.

Herr Horstel has also charged that NATO is leasing opium fields to Afghan warlords in exchange for their support. It does not appear to me that this plan is working very well as the Taliban controls most of the territory outside Kabul and NATO ISAF military bases. To his credit Karzai is trying to get control of the NATO troops at ISAF (International Security Assistance Force). What Mr Karzai wants to do is to stop all the high altitude bombing that is killing so many Afghan civilians. The US has bombed multiple wedding parties in less than a week's time.

Christoph Horstel also said that NATO's presence in Afghanistan is intended to destabilize the region and is not intended to bring peace. I would like to point out the role played by Zbignew Brzezinski in the Carter and Obama administrations. He was the National Security advisor to President Carter and in 1979 wrote a note to Jimmy Carter saying that a 25 million dollar appropriation for the Mujahideen would force the Soviets to invade Afghanistan which they did just prior to Christmas of that same year.

Because millions of Afghanis have died in perpetual war since 1979 that decision alone should disqualify Mr Brzezinski from any government office or from even talking to a presidential candidate.

Before we can proceed further we need to get a better translation so if you or someone you know speaks German please take a look at the two Part interview in the original language here:

http://alles-schallundrauch.blogspot.com/2009/01/interview-mit-christoph-r-hrstel.html

and part two here:

http://alles-schallundrauch.blogspot.com/2009/01/interview-mit-christoph-r-hrstel-teil-2.html

The name of that blog translates as All is Sound and Smoke.

After we get a more reliable translation, the next step would be to share it with as many people as possible and then to make a list of radio and cable programs that might be willing to interview Mr Horstel over American air waves so he can reach a larger audience.

As soon as soemone sends me a better translation, I will post it here.

We need to get peace talks going with the Taliban so we can remove our troops from both Iraq and Afghanistan. That would be a first step towards peace in the Mideast and might even help stop World War III before it starts.

The national radio programs I am thinking of contacting are Democracy Now with Amy Goodman and Alex Jones of Prison Planet. Locally both Flashpoints and Guns and Butter at KPFA might be receptive to breaking the biggest story to date of 2009.

You most likely have your own network of contacts so feel free to forward this information to them in your own words and in your own style in order to get an interview with Christoph Horstel in front of an American audience.