Betrayal: It's American as Apple Pie



Flag of the Empire of Mexico (1864 - 1867)

President Karzai meet Emperor Maximilian


EDITOR'S NOTE:   Hopefully President Karzai has set aside enough money to buy a retirement home in France . . . Emperor Maximilian wished he had.  I consider this article a public service warning to Mr. Karzai to watch his back.  Sometimes your allies are your worst enemies.


By Gary,

President Obama plans a troop reduction in Afghanistan that Pentagon and other administration officials say is expected to bring home about 10,000 personnel by the end of the year.

The president is expected to declare that successes in disrupting Al Qaeda's ability to stage attacks against the United States allow him to begin reducing troop levels.

Withdrawing 10,000 or so troops this year represents a steeper drawdown than Gen. David H. Petraeus and senior Pentagon officials preferred. The Pentagon had been hoping to limit the initial withdrawal to 3,000 to 4,000.

Emperor Maximilian of Mexico
Abandoned by his allies to die by firing squad.

The main military effort in Afghanistan is expected to shift over the next year from Helmand and Kandahar provinces in the south, where U.S. and Afghan forces have helped achieve fragile security gains over the last year, to the east, where the Taliban insurgency remains potent.

Taking out 10,000 troops over the next six months could create problems for the U.S.-led coalition in Afghanistan, especially if other countries, which now contribute about 40,000 troops.

Is there a Karzai retirement package?

One by one the allies of President Karzai are going home:  Canada, the United Kingdom, France, the USA and more.   Sooner or later he will have to depend on his "loyal" tribal allies to defend the nation against a massive guerrilla insurgency that could evolve into army against army conflicts.

That same situation did not work out well for Emperor Maximilian of Mexico.  Napoleon III installed Maximillian as Emperor in the 1860s.  He was kept in power by an army of 50,000 European soldiers from France, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Belgian Foreign Legion, a regiment of Egyptian-Sudanese and an Imperial Mexican Army of 20,000 men.

But the Emperor too faced a massive guerrilla insurgency that evolved into army to army battles.

U.S. Grant had General Philip Sheridan assemble 50,000 men in three corps.  He quickly occupied Texas coastal cities, spread inland, and began to patrol the U.S.-Mexico border. The Army's presence, U.S. political pressure, and the growing resistance of Benito Juárez induced the French to abandon their claims against Mexico and Napoleon III withdrew his troops in 1866.  Sheridan later admitted in his memoirs that he had supplied arms to Juárez's forces: "... supplied with arms and ammunition, which we left at convenient places on our side of the river to fall into their hands."


GENERAL WILLIAM EATON
Leader of our invasion force in the Barbary War.
The first war where we betrayed our own allies.

The French and other allies abandon the Emperor to his fate and leave Mexico.

Emperor Maximilian and two of his loyal Mexican Generals were captured and execuited by firing squad. 

Just as the last Afghan leader of Soviet occupied Afghanistan was killed by liberating forces.  Taliban soldiers came for the last Soviet President of Afghanistan on September 27, 1996. He was brutally castrated and his fingers were broken, before the Taliban dragged him to death behind a truck in the streets. His blood-soaked body was hanged in public in Aryana Square.

Betrayal  -  It's American as apple pie

There is nothing special in the American character that says we betray our allies any more than any other nation.  But betray them be do.  President Karzai needs to factor this into any out of nation retirement plans he might have.

BARBARY WAR:   To the shores of Tripoli goes the song.  The war, defeating the pirates, the song and the role of the Marines is all part of the great American myth.

The Barbary War was actually the total opposite of the myth.

We did not defeat the prirates.  In fact, Thomas Jefferson made peace with them and agreed to pay a $60,000 ransom to release hostages.  The land invasion force was commanded by former Army officer and self-appointed General, William Eaton, the Naval Agent to the Barbary States.  Not a Marine. 

In our first overseas war we betrayed our first allies.   Eaton had been granted permission from the United States government to back the claim of Hamet Karamanli. Hamet Karamanli was the rightful heir to the throne of Tripoli and had been deposed by his brother Yussif Karamanli. Upon his return to the area, Eaton sought out Hamet Karamanli who was in exile in Egypt. Upon locating him, Eaton made a proposal to reinstate him on the throne. The exile agreed to Eaton's plan.

With the help of Hamet Karamanli, they recruited about 500 Arab, Greek and Berber mercenaries. Eaton named himself general and commander-in-chief of the combined force.  General Eaton now led his army on a 500-mile trek across the Libyan desert.

After the successful Battle of Derne, a peace treaty was signed without the knowledge of Eaton.  Eaton was ordered to return to Egypt with Hamet.  Eaton was angered by what he called a 'sell-out' of the Americans fighting and our allies.  Hamet returned to Egypt without a throne and our mercenaries allies were never fully paid.

INDIAN WARS:   The massive number of betrayals and broken treaties with the Native Americans is almost beyond count.  Even when Indians fought at the side of American forces they were betrayed, their people killed and land stolen.


  Battle of Manila (1899)  -  Filipino soldiers dead in a trench.  The people of the Philippines
were under the impression they were the allies of Americans who were there to
libertate them.  They were wrong.

PHILIPPINE WAR:   Commodore Dewey transported Emilio Aguinaldo, a Filipino leader who had led rebellion against Spanish rule in the Philippines in 1896, to the Philippines from exile in Hong Kong to rally more Filipinos against the Spanish colonial government.  By June, U.S. and Filipino forces had taken control of most of the islands.  On 12 June, Aguinaldo proclaimed the independence of the Philippines.

American forces captured the city of Manila from the Spanish.  This battle marked the end of Filipino-American collaboration, as the American action of preventing Filipino forces from entering the captured city of Manila was deeply resented by the Filipinos. This later led to the Philippine–American War.

In 1898, President McKinley issued a Proclamation of Benevolent Assimilation.   But the Filipinos did not feel like being benevolently assimilated.  The rusulting war lasted for three years costing thousands of lives.


POLISH WAR CEMETERY AT MONTE CASSINO
An entire Polish Army Corps fought side-by-side with
the allies in Italy.  They were betrayed by their "friends".

POLAND:   At the insistence of the Soviet Union, Poland's borders were redrawn following the decisions made at the Tehran Conference of 1943. The Polish government was not invited to the talks and was to be notified of their outcome. 

FDR and Churchill had no problem stabbing Poland in the back and giving away 50% of the territory of another nation.  In fact, photos show a very happy FDR.  He had no problem sleeping at night after what he did.

Over 200,000 troops of the Polish Armed Forces in the West were fighting at the side of the Allies in Italy, the Middle East and France.

Not only were huge amounts of Poland given away to the Soviets but Poland itself was abandoned to the Communists.

The reward of the Poles for fighting at our side was betrayal.

BAY OF PIGS:   John Kennedy sent an invasion fleet to Cuba and then abandoned the brave anti-Communists to be killed on the beaches without the support needed to win.

SOUTH VIETNAM:   After President Nixon resigned due to the Watergate scandal Congress cut financial aid to South Vietnam. The U.S. midterm elections in 1974 brought in a new Congress dominated by Democrats who were even more determined to confront the president on the war. Congress immediately voted in restrictions on funding and military activities to be phased in through 1975 and to culminate in a total cutoff of funding in 1976.

The betrayal of South Vietnam was bi-partisan.  The Republican President and the Democrat Congress not only did nothing to help our friends when faced with renewed attacks by Communists, but American leaders went out of their way to undermine South Vietnam.

According to the Hanoi government, more than 200,000 South Vietnamese government officials, military officers, and soldiers were sent to "reeducation camps", where torture, disease and malnutrition were widespread.


President Karzai we support you, but watch your back.


THE BETRAYAL OF SOUTH VIETNAM
South Vietnam lost 850,000 dead in the war against Communism.  Their reward
for standing tall with us was to be abandoned by both the Congress, the President
and have they money cut off.