The secret diplomatic cables from Kabul show an amazing picture of what is happening.
A key problem is the limited human capacity in most ministries and at the provincial and district level, Ambassador Eikenberry said. For example, the Minister of Agriculture is really only about one-two staff deep and he relies heavily on foreign advisors.It appears like the NATO forces are lost on another planet. They are trying to establish a working democracy. They are hoping that Karzai will be a Tacho Somoza - like Presidente, but Karzai appears far too incompetent, unable even to fake "democratic elections". The Americans are holding till a more competent gangster eventually emerges, so they can leave. Pic.: Afgan Jews. There are no Jews left in the Afgan goles.
Crosbie (Canada) agreed, citing the example of ANP literacy. We're never going to make them literate but can make them "literate enough." He cited two examples of progress: 1) in Kandahar, some police are starting to at least be able to read license plates when investigating cases; and 2) in a recent customs officer training, the officers at least acknowledged corruption exists and that it's wrong.
8 comments:
"[I]n a recent customs officer training, the officers at least acknowledged corruption exists and that it's wrong."
In other words, the Afghans are at the moral level of six year olds.
The problem is that, given this, you cannot allow Afghans to get in your way, but we do. Why do they even need "customs officers"? Does any of the $ ever even reach the government coffers? Either hire incorruptible foreigners to administer the customs system honestly or get rid of it completely. We have flooded a poor and uneducated country with "aid" and we marvel that they are unequipped to deal with it. Dumping tons of money into a corrupt system is like trying to put out a fire with gasoline. Very little makes its way to the intended recipients and even the part that does, does not buy us any love. So why bother?
K
The idea is to build a working state.
Why bother? I dont know. I think it would be better to let the most entreprising gangster take over the place and crown him king. But Americans are idealists. Th Biish were better empire builders.
Even the British never tried to rule Afghanistan - they realized that these people were incorrigible. They were content to control it's foreign policy only and they even gave that up after WWI because they were sick of being attacked.
I think Afghanistan will be a working state (in the sense that say Switzerland, another mountainous land is) when pigs learn to fly.
K
The only legitimate goals are to deny the Taliban access to the machinery of a state, and to destroy the source of much of the world's narcotic supply.
We all know how well the latter goal is going, and with respect to the former, they have just metastasised to Pak.
The rest of it is as you say.
Anon.
Hard to say how our support for the Afghan gov. is reducing narcotics when Karzai's brother is one of the key dealers. Also the military has agreed to look the other way in order to get the locals to love us.
I don't care who runs the machinery of the Afghan state, to the extent there is a recognizable state with recognizable machinery , as long as they do not sponsor or harbor external terrorists. I think we could make it clear to the Taliban that they can run around forcing men to wear beards and depriving their women of education as much as they like, but if one iota of terrorism is traced back to them then we will bomb all their mosques, madrasssas, etc. Also, it is a question of paying them more than bin Laden did, and bin Laden was not paying that much. We could buy the Taliban for considerably less than we are paying now to fight them and stop sending American boys to get their arms and legs blown off.
K
Yes, and they could throw in the whole poppy crop for a bit more.
If I could trust them, I would like it a lot.
Anon.
Afghanistan is capable of forming a functioning state the way the Taliban did, but it will never be Japan or Switzerland. After the US invaded, but before we managed to pretend to form a state, local warlords managed to collect taxes from the local population and collect taxes on goods traveling on major roads through their territories so it can be done with the population they already have.
Having said the above, I think Afghanistan should be divided into two countries, north & south, and the Salang Tunnel blown up to separate the two new countries. The North-South ethnic divide makes any attempt to form a nation in the territory assigned to the country of Afghanistan impossible and I think we should recognize that reality. Once Afghanistan is divided the northern half will fall into orbit around Russia and join the Commonwealth of Independent States while the southern half will simply become a Pashtun homeland. Once the Pashtuns have their own homeland we can wage war on them as our enemies. I would recommend bringing back Agent Orange (the defoliant, not the punk band) and using it to destroy crops in areas that refuse to be pacified.
Djingiz Khan had none of USA's difficulties in Afganistan.
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