Kennedy: “I do. With changes in policy and perhaps with personnel I think it can. If it doesn’t make those changes, the chances of winning it would not be very good.”
Frieman then writes that what Kennedy understood is that it's all about America's Afghan [Vietnamese] partners. The interview took place on September 2nd, 1963. He suggests Obama follow Kennedy's example and pay more attention to the Afghan Government.
....
Kennedy's example. A couple of months later, on November 1st, 1963 Kennedy murdered his Vietnamese partners. Or let them be murdered, and encouraged the people who murdered them. In Imperial politics, there's no functional difference.
Incidentally, one of the things the Americans disliked about Diem was his corrupt brother. Karzai's corrupt brother has been in the news recently.
If I thought more of Friedman and American subtlety, I would say this column is an oblique warning that the Americans are going to depose and/or kill Karzai if he doesn't shape up.
However, Occam's razor would suggest that Friedman is merely an idiot. Or Alden Pyle. It is fairly common for Americans not to know their own history, or to know only the nicer sounding parts of it. And the way the American media works, if Thomas Friedman were smarter or more insightful in certain ways, he wouldn't be the rich man he is today.
Regardless, if I were Hamid Karzai, I'd be watching my back.
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