Bush people happy with situation in Iraq? U.S. out of Afghanistan now?
Jim Ingalls notes that in Afghanistan, "If the US weakened the warlords, they’d be precipitating their own departure. I can guarantee that, if there wasn’t the warlord problem a lot fewer Afghans would support the US presence."
Ingalls's post and dialogue with Rahul Mahajan is well worth reading for Americans concerned with the proper position to take as activists in relation to our presence in Afghanistan. Based on Ingalls, it appears that calling for immediate withdrawal of U.S. troops from the country would be counter to the wishes of everyone but the warlords and reactionaries. Rather we should be supporting "the secular anti-fundamentalist democratic alternative in Afghanistan," calling for an end to U.S. support of warlords and demanding immediate and thorough implementation of their disarmament, and promoting a process of justice and reconciliation. I might add that we should also emphasize the right of Afghans to reject U.S. troop presence in favor of something less partisan like multinational troops under U.N. auspices.
On the matter of specific ways to support progressive forces in Afghanistan, RAWA lists some of their needs here and here.
Also, the Defence Committee for Malalai Joya (referring to the young female parliamentary member who spoke out against the warlords in the Loya Jirga of December 2003) that Ingalls links to asks people to express their concern for the security of Joya and her family to the following groups:
United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA)
Mr. Manoel de Almeida e Silva
Spokesman/Director of Office of Communication and Public Information
Tel. (+39-0831) 24 6123
Mobile: (+93-70) 282 168
Fax: (+39-0831) 24 6069 AND (+1-212) 963 2669
Email: spokesman-unama@un.org
Mail address: UNAMA, OCPI, PO Box 1428, Islamabad, Pakistan
ISAF (International Security Assistance Force)
Army Club, opposite Ministry of Civil Aviation, Kabul
E-mail: isafcimic@hotmail.com
Constitution Commission
Fax. 0093-20-210267
E-mail: asasiqanoon@hotmail.com
Something similar may be going on in our current target of the Orwellian War on Terror. I haven't seen anyone else suggest this so perhaps I'm going out on a limb with this but it seems to me that some of the arrogance and incompetence that seem so apparent in the way the Bush Administration is handling the occupation of Iraq could, in part, be calculated and intentional. The failure to spend reconstruction money, the horrific violence that characterizes daily life in Iraq, and the use of ethnically based militias all provide rational for the continuation of a U.S. presence in the country. The Sistani-led portions of the Shi'a seem to find the U.S. necessary to preserve their power in government. The downside for Bush is that U.S. troops dying makes for bad press but with the media apparently devoting less attention to Iraq these days and the shift towards keeping troops hunkered down in their bases more, these problems seem manageable. Worse for Bush is that the military has been tied down in Iraq ever since the invasion, limiting the administration's freedom to act elsewhere.
Ingalls's post and dialogue with Rahul Mahajan is well worth reading for Americans concerned with the proper position to take as activists in relation to our presence in Afghanistan. Based on Ingalls, it appears that calling for immediate withdrawal of U.S. troops from the country would be counter to the wishes of everyone but the warlords and reactionaries. Rather we should be supporting "the secular anti-fundamentalist democratic alternative in Afghanistan," calling for an end to U.S. support of warlords and demanding immediate and thorough implementation of their disarmament, and promoting a process of justice and reconciliation. I might add that we should also emphasize the right of Afghans to reject U.S. troop presence in favor of something less partisan like multinational troops under U.N. auspices.
On the matter of specific ways to support progressive forces in Afghanistan, RAWA lists some of their needs here and here.
Also, the Defence Committee for Malalai Joya (referring to the young female parliamentary member who spoke out against the warlords in the Loya Jirga of December 2003) that Ingalls links to asks people to express their concern for the security of Joya and her family to the following groups:
United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA)
Mr. Manoel de Almeida e Silva
Spokesman/Director of Office of Communication and Public Information
Tel. (+39-0831) 24 6123
Mobile: (+93-70) 282 168
Fax: (+39-0831) 24 6069 AND (+1-212) 963 2669
Email: spokesman-unama@un.org
Mail address: UNAMA, OCPI, PO Box 1428, Islamabad, Pakistan
ISAF (International Security Assistance Force)
Army Club, opposite Ministry of Civil Aviation, Kabul
E-mail: isafcimic@hotmail.com
Constitution Commission
Fax. 0093-20-210267
E-mail: asasiqanoon@hotmail.com
Something similar may be going on in our current target of the Orwellian War on Terror. I haven't seen anyone else suggest this so perhaps I'm going out on a limb with this but it seems to me that some of the arrogance and incompetence that seem so apparent in the way the Bush Administration is handling the occupation of Iraq could, in part, be calculated and intentional. The failure to spend reconstruction money, the horrific violence that characterizes daily life in Iraq, and the use of ethnically based militias all provide rational for the continuation of a U.S. presence in the country. The Sistani-led portions of the Shi'a seem to find the U.S. necessary to preserve their power in government. The downside for Bush is that U.S. troops dying makes for bad press but with the media apparently devoting less attention to Iraq these days and the shift towards keeping troops hunkered down in their bases more, these problems seem manageable. Worse for Bush is that the military has been tied down in Iraq ever since the invasion, limiting the administration's freedom to act elsewhere.
posted by Steve Fake at 5/19/2005 07:17:00 PM
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