Afghan Tribe Vows to Fight Taliban, for U.S. Aid

[kpete]

Source: New York Times

Afghan Tribe Vows to Fight Taliban, for U.S. Aid

JALALABAD, Afghanistan — The leaders of one of the largest Pashtun tribes in a Taliban stronghold said Wednesday that they had agreed to support the American-backed government, battle insurgents and burn down the home of any Afghan who harbored Taliban guerrillas.

Shinwari tribal elders meeting this week in Jalalabad, Afghanistan, established harsh penalties against Taliban sympathizers.

Elders from the Shinwari tribe, which represents about 400,000 people in southeastern Afghanistan, also pledged to send at least one military-age male in each family to the Afghan Army or the police in the event of a Taliban attack.

In exchange for their support, American commanders agreed to channel $1 million in development projects directly to the tribal leaders and bypass the local Afghan government, which is widely seen as corrupt.

“The Taliban have been trying to destroy our tribe, and they are taking money from us, and they are taking our sons to fight,” said Malik Niaz, a Shinwari elder. “If they defy us now, we will defeat them.”

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/28/world/asia/28tribe.html?ref=world

[HeresyLives]

1. Money talks. n/t

[Bigmack]

2. That's working smarter... not harder!

Finally! Something other than the sledge-hammer approach.

A variation on the old "Let's you and him fight!" ... we just add "and we'll pay you to do it."

As long as we remember that they are not our buddies/allies/colonists.

[change_notfinetuning]

3. War - our biggest export. Only I thought exports are supposed to bring us

money, not cost us money.