What happens when an evil people terrorise a nation

[snooper2]

A car bomb destroyed an Internet Cafe and tore through a bus carrying handicapped children in Peshawar on May 16, 2009



Toronto Rally Against Taliban Atrocities



Feeling the love of Islamism: Children wade through the ruins of their Swat Valley school, blown up by the Taliban in January



Children in training for the Taliban



Woman being beaten for not wearing her burka



Govt school blasted with explosives at Saidu Sharif, Swat Valley on 17 Jan 2009



No haircut for you, says a Taliban poster on display at a barber shop in Matta Tehsil



A Sikh activist shout slogans against the Taliban and Pakistan in Jammu, India, Friday, May 8, 2009. Various organizations in the city have given a call for a strike Friday to protest Taliban atrocities against Sikhs in Pakistan's northwest region.






The Taliban has reportedly killed a traditional dancing girl in Pakistan, underlining its growing power in the the North-West Frontier Province.
Shabana’s bullet-riden body was found slumped on the ground in the centre of Mingora’s Green Square, strewn with money, CD recordings of her performances and photographs from her albums.
A Taliban leader later appeared on FM radio to admit the killing and warn the militant organisation would not tolerate any ‘un-Islamic vices’.



A shocking video of Taliban militants flogging a 17-year-old girl has emerged, causing public outcry in Pakistan. Two men pin the girl to the ground while she is flogged by a third, and dozens of people look on as she screams

[cali]

1. No doubt the Taliban are a despicable group of fanatics but

if you're trying to say that that's reason enough for us to stay in Afghanistan, I strongly disagree.

[snooper2]

5. I think it's essential we give these people a chance

nt

[cali]

9. if you mean continuing the war. that has not and will not improve

anything.

[YouTakeTheSkyway]

23. I question your assertion

While there are undoubtedly many problems in today's Afghanistan, to say nothing has been improved is a bit unfair. Take, for instance, women's access to education, which is up considerably.

[anigbrowl]

20. But Cali, the sad fact is that those same fanatics already took over Afghanistan once

and sadly, a lot of the blame for that has to lie with the USA, which armed and financed opposition to the Russian occupation without much discrimination, and then effectively left them in charge after the USSR withdrew from Afghanistan.

Not only did this result in a really, really bad internal situation in Afghanistan, to the point that of allowing it to become a staging ground for Osama bin laden's activities, it handed the hawkish government in Pakistan an irregular proxy force with which to harrass India over the disputed territory of Jammu and Kashmir, which almost provided a ccasus belli for what would have been a devastating ground war between two nuclear powers with immature political institutions.

Observe this map:



Historically, the Taliban have moved freely through the North West Frontier province (NWFP on the map, to the left of the shaded area) and up into the Northern territories and Baluchistan, although lately more of the news has been about the tribal areas near the western edge of that map as we've pressured Pakistan into suppressing the Taliban there.

Over the years, Pakistan's hawks have been happy to use the tribal people of that area to try and split off at least the western part of Jammu and Kashmir, an area over which India maintains a somewhat tenuous hold - not least because it's strategically uncomfortable for Pakistan to have their capital, Islamabad, so close to a border along which India can mass troops if it pleases. Afghanistan has served the Pakistani hard right as a strategic supply line/fallback for those military efforts, which can be staged from outside Pakistani territory allowing the hawks deniability.

Some more background on this conflict: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insurgency_in_Jammu_and_Kashmir

In short, the roots of teh reason we are in Afghanistan go back to the 1948 partition of British India and the subsequent acquisition of nuclear weapons by both countries. Unless we stabilize Afghanistan, there will always be strategic reasons for Pakistan to maintain a huge military presence in its Northern Territory - ostensibly to guard against insurgency from Afghanistan, but with the unspoken function of acting as one side of a pincer movement to annex Kashmir from India.

[YouTakeTheSkyway]

22. It's one of many reasons to stay in Afghanistan, others include

denying al-Qaeda a safe haven and keeping our word to our allies there.

[mike_c]

2. this OP is a new low point in warmongering propaganda....

Evil people, huh? Terrorizing a nation?

This post is utterly clueless about the history of the Taliban and the REASONS they were in power in Afghanistan. But from a half-witless media addled American perspective it's easier to dismiss them as simply "evil people."

We have always been at war with Eastasia!

[Go2Peace]

8. Yep, propaganda it is

[YouTakeTheSkyway]

24. That was rather rude, but with that said...

who are you to say that the original poster "is utterly clueless about the history of the Taliban"? And does knowing the history of the Taliban somehow change the fact that they're extremely brutal?

[mike_c]

37. this is a waste of time...

...but the OP is creating an impression of generalized and random brutality that is mostly inappropriate to the situation. The Taliban is a mostly Pashtun tribal movement whose actions reflect both generations of tribal strife-- that have virtually nothing to do with ideology-- and the rush of institutions into the power vacuum that resulted when U.S. support for the mujaheddin warlords collapsed after the dissolution of the Soviet Union. In other words, the Taliban are not an imposed force on Afghan civil life so much as a homegrown movement that many of them embraced as an antidote to the de facto civil war of the warlords. It must be emphasized that it's a tribal movement, so it FITS with the tribal worldview of "Afghans," most of whom have little or no national identity.

The point is that there are reasons the Taliban influence rose among Pashtuns and non-Pashtuns alike. The OP seeks to demonize them, but only by judging them by our standards in our social context-- i.e. by obfuscating those reasons or ignoring them.

I'm in between classes and have to run, but that's a start. The Taliban are not boogie men.

[Cerridwen]

3. It would appear, that when such happens,

the US sends its military to "blow up" the people of a nation (what's a little collateral damage in the grand scheme of saving them from evil?) to protect them from the evil people.

I think other tactics might be more effective, but I've been told I'm a "drooling peacenik."

[NightWatcher]

4. should we send in troops anywhere assholes/criminals are present?

I'm sorry that the Taliban beats/kills women or children or other religious groups, but is it our duty to be the world's Protector?

Shit happens all over the planet (some has happened here too). Are we supposed to "fix" everything? Why not feed our hungry children first?

We are still very young as a country and the idea that we need to stick ourselves between tribes that have been in dispute since before Columbus took his boat ride is insane to me.

[snooper2]

6. no it's not our duty to be the World protector

World is capatalized by the way...

But since we have been there for eight years already at this point we must try to help rebuild and stabilize the country. And, the comment "Why not feed our hungry children first?" is beyond stupid. Comparing the hunger and poverty in America versus Afghanistan is ridiculous.

[NightWatcher]

7. I'd have no problem with a massive infrastructure campaign there (and here)

instead of spending a million per soldier per year, I'd rather spend a few billion to rebuild their homes, schools, communities. "Hearts and minds" would be won over for generations if we did that everywhere we went, but that is not what we are doing there, we are escalating a war.


...grammar and capitalization police, really?

[YouTakeTheSkyway]

26. You can build them, but if the Taliban will simply blow them up in a month, what's the point?

Security has to come first.

[YouTakeTheSkyway]

25. I don't think anyone's arguing that that's the only reason for us to be in Afghanistan.

[snooper2]

10. dropped to second page quick..

guess folks don't want to see the horrors citizens of Afghanistan are confronted with....

[mike_c]

13. you mean like this one...?

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Wow862NBf6g/SYTHtazHBCI/AAAAAAAAA_o/PGISPvje8G4/s400/Afghan+Protest

An Afghan village elder rages and points his walking stick, as he berates US soldiers who have come to pay money for repairing of the homes which were destroyed during the recent US raids in Inzeri village of Tagab Valley in Kapisa province north of Kabul, Afghanistan, Tuesday, Jan. 27, 2009. An angry Afghan man with a thick black beard and one eye ranted wildly at the U.S. officials, shouting about how their raid had killed 16 civilians in his village. An Afghan elder cried out in grief that his son and four grandsons were killed.

[YouTakeTheSkyway]

27. You point this out because you sincerely believe it's similar to, say, when...

the Taliban intentionally target a market full of civilians? Or what? What's you reasoning here?

[mike_c]

36. yes, it is identical....

The taliban bomb or whatever, the U.S. sends rifle companies or fires missiles from drone warships. Either way, Afghans die. There is no difference from the perspective of the terrorized.

[Fumesucker]

11. They retire to a life of ease and comfort..

And get on TV a lot to promote their propaganda..

[JackRiddler]

12. The Afghans most hurt by the Taliban are not asking for US military intervention.

You should be ashamed of your neocon propaganda.

Many of the warlords with whom the NATO force collaborates are responsible for the same kinds of atrocities.

Here are some of the statements on http://www.rawa.org/index.php

RAWA is the oldest political/social organization of Afghan women struggling for peace, freedom, democracy and women's rights in fundamentalism-blighted Afghanistan since 1977.

Let's rise against the war crimes of U.S. and its fundamentalist lackeys!
http://www.rawa.org/rawa/2009/05/07/lets-rise-against-the-war-crimes-of-us-and-its-fundamentalist-lackeys.html

Neither the US nor Jehadies and Taliban,
Long Live the Struggle of Independent and Democratic Forces of Afghanistan!
RAWA's statement on the 7th anniversary of the US invasion of Afghanistan
October 7, 2008
http://www.rawa.org/events/sevenyear_e.htm


Follow link for video:

http://www.commondreams.org/video/2009/12/03-0

Published on Thursday, December 3, 2009 by Grit TV
A Voice from RAWA: Zoya on Afghanistan

Barack Obama announced on Tuesday that the US would be sending 30,000 additional troops to Afghanistan. (No word on how many private contractors would be accompanying them.) He did not explicitly use the Afghan women as justification, but many politicians have, claiming that we cannot leave the women to their fate. Zoya is a member of the Foreign Affairs Committee of RAWA, the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan, and she joined us to talk about what would really be best for the women - and all the people - of Afghanistan. Zoya is a pseudonym and her face is obscured to protect her identity.

[snooper2]

16. RAWA is a good organization

But I'm sorry, women in Afghanistan are not going to have any progress via peaceful means.

I wish I could find a non-biased/corrupt poll of what the average Afghan on the street thinks based on demography.

[JackRiddler]

17. If so, why didn't Obama consult with them?

Do you have any evidence that the long and supposedly thoughtful cabinet meetings on Afghan policy consulted with RAWA, or considered their views, or met with or heard reports from any group of Afghanis or NWOs not directly working with the US government or the Karzai regime?

[YouTakeTheSkyway]

28. Quite frankly, I know people who were doing similar work in Iraq

Had their positions been made policy, the sectarian violence would probably still be raging.

[anonymous171]

14. Repeat after me: THE TALIBAN POSE NO THREAT TO AMERICA

Therefore we should not be fighting them. Fuck progressive imperialists. Get off the internet and fight your own goddamn cursades!

[Sebastian Doyle]

15. +100,000

[Political Heretic]

19. Took me a long time to get this, re: "progressive imperialists"

It's the right term. The notion that all violence is justified if we can some how dress it up in the rags of "we're fighting for THEM!"

[YouTakeTheSkyway]

29. Providing a safe haven for al-Qaeda = a threat to America.

And if the Pakistani al-Qaeda were to overrun the government there, that would also pose a serious threat.

[anonymous171]

30. Every country in the middle east is probably guilty of that

[YouTakeTheSkyway]

31. al-Qaeda has a presence in many countries, however, it doesn't operate as openly or freely

as it did in Afghanistan.

[anonymous171]

32. Al-qaeda is a criminal organization, like the mafia.

It should be brought down through international law enforcement cooperation.

[YouTakeTheSkyway]

33. Seriously? You're comparing the guys who will pilot a passenger jet into your buildings

to the guys who will break your knees with a baseball bat?

[anonymous171]

34. Terrorism, when commited by non-state actors, is a crime

And should be enforced as such. You don't send the military in to do the police's job. Imagine if Mexico invaded the west coast in order to "smoke out" the minutemen. That's pretty much what we are doing in Afghanistan. It's fucking overkill and a waste of time.

[YouTakeTheSkyway]

35. The Minutemen and al-Qaeda are the same?

[mike_c]

40. operative word: "did"-- past tense....

There are few, if any, al-Qaeda left in Afghanistan. The president's own national security adviser admits that.

[mike_c]

39. you have just endorsed the Bush doctrine of preemptive war....

Congratulations. You're a neoconservative.

[mike_c]

38. +1

[Political Heretic]

18. The answer is, that nation resorts to terror and criminality of its own.

Just like the US has done.

[kctim]

21. What happens?

A small minority of people ignore the facts in order to support their own personal beliefs, and score political points back home?

[QC]

41. Don't forget about them throwing the babies out of the incubators. n/t