COMING DISTRACTIONS

Afghanistan will be heating up militarily as the weather does. Congressman
John McHugh, returning from a trip there with Hillary Clinton and Evan
Bayh, said that everyone they talked to warned "that when the snows melt
in the passes, it will bring a new onslaught from al Qaeda and the Taliban . . .
one that directly threatens not just the Karzai presidency, but threatens
Afghanistan itself, and logically, it follows, threatens our investment in
blood and treasure."

Is the threat being overstated? To answer that, we need to look at the
history, the demographics, the economy, the religion, and the politics of
the region. As to history, the British invaded Kabul in 1839 and set up
a puppet Shah who wasn't accepted by the natives. The Brits then were
forced to withdraw through the mountains, in winter. Their 16,000
troops were steadily whittled down in ambushes. Only one of them, a
doctor, survived. I am indebted to Maureen Dowd for this story. As she
pointed out, "The lesson is that Afghanistan is a no man's land that can't
be tamed by gringos. The British Empire, on which the sun never set,
never succeeded in accupying Afghanistan."

Dowd talked to a Brit who has written extensively on Afghanistan. He
told her: "The Afghans are extraordinary fighters, tough and resourceful
and cruel, and they know their business inside out. On their territory,
they're unbeatable. They love fighting and dealing with invaders. It's
almost a game to them. . . Eventually, I suppose, we'll get out of Iraq and
pretend it's a success when it's just a mess . . . Afghanistan is slightly
different. You cannot ever win. When you consider the Russians put in
more than 100,000 troops and couldn't do it. There is only one way to
deal with the Afghans, and that's to buy them." (The latter, by the way,
is how we got, and keep, the help of the Northern Alliance warlords
against the Taliban. They are still on our payroll, though they are also
reaping millions from the opium and heroin trade, protection rackets,
corrupt police, and on and on.)

This is one reason I want us to make nice with Iran and negotiate their
help against the Taliban. They did it before. They have tried several
times to patch things up with us. We have always rebuffed them on
the grounds they support "terrorists," meaning Hamas and Hezbollah.
To the Muslim world, Hamas and Hezbollah are legitimate freedom
fighters helping the Palestinians resist the illegal, immoral, and
illegitimate Israeli occupation of their homeland, which we support .
If we would use our best efforts (which we have never done) to get a
just and lasting peace in Palestine, that would be the end of Hamas
and Hezbollah. They would be out of work, and Iran would no longer
see a need to support them, and we could join forces with Iran in helping
the Shia majority clean up in Iraq, as well as the fight against the Taliban in
Afghanistan.

I plan to write further on the demographics, economy, and politics in
Afghanistan, and how the Taliban is taking control of the dominant
ethnic group there. Unless we get a lot more help than we have there
now, and more understanding of what's going on, we are building sand
castles against an incoming tide, milking a dry cow (farmers understand that), kicking a dead horse, or whatever other expression of futility you can think of.
Have a nice day!

jgoodwin004@centurytel.net