[Kumo]

Terrorism..

[A_Muminah]

As-Salaamu 'Alaykum Wa Rahmatullaah,

Originally Posted by MossadConspiracy

you know, i understand that sentiment and i know you mean well by it but if you think about it, its very patronizing to the people of afghanistan when they are described like that. On the one hand, when they are described as wild mountain people who can never be conquered or ruled by foreigners, it means they are brave and resilient and so on. But on the other hand, the same description paints them as a bunch of barbarians living in mountains by standards that are somehow very different from those of other humans living in more civilized parts of the world. Its a double edged sword. I dont think afghans are unconquerable, and at the same time I also dont think they are outside of the fold of human civilization either.

You totally misread what Jamroll's point was.

well, if you look at Afghanistan's history, it was controlled by various different empires and nations through history, along with having periods of rule by local leaders, and that history is reflected in the demographics, languages, and religions of Afghanistan's people. Its alot like many other countries.

But anyway, if you look at the reasons that Muslims (not western media) give for the Afghan's supposedly unconquerable nature, the praise isnt exactly praise. The power of the Afghans and their ability to beat back any invasion is based on their own courage and religious fervor blah blah, but it also comes from mountain power, the ability to hide out in Afghanistan's mountains and valleys and cave systems. It comes from tribal and village power, the ability to mobilize afghans through local ties which are always more important than any central authority. And finally, from God and his angels directly involving themselves in wars on the side of the Afghans. Or rather on the side of the group of Afghans that the person describing them happens to support. But alot of other sources of power are not mentioned. According to that description, Afghan power isnt based on technology, industry, agriculture, intellect, military power, institutional power, financial power, or any of the other markers that we would normally associate with a successful or strong country. Its a romanticized vision of primitive but strong people, like the fremens from Dune or something. Western pop media sees afghanistan in a very different way, thats even less flattering

Anyway its not for me to be offended on behalf of afghanistanis, and i'm not, I'm just saying that one should take a second to consider the portrayal of afghans and whether it really is flattering, no matter how heroic it is.

And you still didnt get it.

Was-Salaamu 'Alaykum Wa Rahmatullaah

[roberto]

Originally Posted by ChotooMotoo

Are you talking about Afghanistan or America?

For your safety why don't you go and live in Afghanistan, apart from being safe there are other benefits
Fact Box

Every 30 minutes, an Afghan woman dies during childbirth
87 percent of Afghan women are illiterate
30 percent of girls have access to education in Afghanistan
1 in every 3 Afghan women experience physical, psychological or sexual violence
44 years is the average life expectancy rate for women in Afghanistan
70 to 80 percent of women face forced marriages in Afghanistan
Source: IRIN

[roberto]

Originally Posted by bluey

Subhanallah. This is so sad. The same thing is happening in Iraq - the cases of rape and innocent people being murdered.

Ah - the American Soldiers are so 'honourable' and whatever Bush decides for the Muslim Lands is for their best, isn't it? After all, they are the ones who are civilised and intelligent.

May Allah subhanna wa ta'ala make the Mumineen victorious and help those who are suffering. Ameen.

Yes, you are so right, if it wasn't for the odd American stepping out of line, everything in Afganistan would be just fine;look at the benefits


Fact Box

Every 30 minutes, an Afghan woman dies during childbirth
87 percent of Afghan women are illiterate
30 percent of girls have access to education in Afghanistan
1 in every 3 Afghan women experience physical, psychological or sexual violence
44 years is the average life expectancy rate for women in Afghanistan
70 to 80 percent of women face forced marriages in Afghanistan
Source: IRIN

Can I pay your fare

[A_Muminah]

Mr loser, you do realize Afghanistan just went through almost 3 decades of war after being invaded? Why dont you run off and start researching about how life in Afghanistan was before the wars. While you're at it check how US stopped sending aid to Afghanistan during the Taliban rule causing what you posted above.

How the heck do you expect a country to recover after war if the whole world ignored it, especially the 'super-powers' that gave it weapons to overthrow the Communists. But as soon as the Communists left, so did those people who no longer saw any interest or benefit in Afghanistan.

[roberto]

[quote=A_Muminah;12772]

Mr loser, you do realize Afghanistan just went through almost 3 decades of war after being invaded? Why dont you run off and start researching about how life in Afghanistan was before the wars. While you're at it check how US stopped sending aid to Afghanistan during the Taliban rule causing what you posted above.

Mr Loser,how very mature of you.

My post dealt with the situation as reported by IRIN, too bad if you want to study the past go ahead i've better things to do.

How the heck do you expect a country to recover after war if the whole world ignored it, especially the 'super-powers' that gave it weapons to overthrow the Communists. But as soon as the Communists left, so did those people who no longer saw any interest or benefit in Afghanistan

As to more recent aid take a look at these figure and then at the difficulties of delivery
Afghanistan: Overseas Aid
Miss McIntosh: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development if he will make a statement on delivery of humanitarian aid in Afghanistan. [149531]

Mr. Malik: According to the United Nations Office for Humanitarian Affairs (UN OCHA)(1), the following has been contributed to the humanitarian effort in Afghanistan over the last three years:

US $
2004
162,366,273

2005
79,906,460

2006
153,181,425



Prior to 2003, the majority of DFID aid to Afghanistan was focused on immediate reconstruction and humanitarian needs. In 2003-04, the focus shifted to long- term developmental programmes in support of the government of Afghanistan.

DFID still retains some limited capacity to respond to humanitarian crises. For example, in 2006-07 the UK committed the following humanitarian aid to Afghanistan: £1 million for drought mitigation; £1.2 million to support HALO Trust's de-mining programme; and £30,000 to provide food and other essential items like soap and blankets for 3,000 internally displaced families in Helmand.

Security concerns present difficulties for NGOs and development workers wishing to operate in some areas, particularly the south. This is why the presence of NATO forces, and British troops in Helmand, are essential to create the conditions in which humanitarian aid can be delivered more effectively. The vast majority of Afghans want to see a peaceful, prosperous, democratic country. We will continue to support them.

AFGHANISTAN: WFP suspends food aid deliveries after attack

Photo: Masoud Popalzai/IRIN
From January 2006 to December 2008, at a cost of US$372 million, WFP plans to distribute 520,000 metric tonnes of food aid to 6.6 million vulnerable Afghans
KABUL, 10 September 2007 (IRIN) - The UN World Food Programme (WFP) has temporarily withheld movement of food in southwestern Afghanistan after a convoy delivering food aid to Afghan deportees from Iran was attacked, WFP told IRIN.

A 14-truck WFP convoy, which was carrying 500 tonnes of food, and was escorted by over 110 armed police, came under fire on the Herat-Nimruz highway in Farah Province, southwestern Afghanistan, on 8 September.

At least four police officers and 10 assailants were killed in the fighting, Gulam Dastgheer Azad, the governor of Nimruz, said.

All trucks were commercially hired by the UN food agency, but none displayed UN markings.

“My own view is that the attackers are primarily thieves more than those with political motivations,” Rick Carsino, WFP representative in Afghanistan, told IRIN in Kabul.

This is not the first time unidentified armed men have attacked and looted food aid trucks in the restive southern provinces of Afghanistan: According to WFP, over 25 incidents of attacks on food aid convoys have happened so far in 2007.

[A_Muminah]

Of course these people are gonna get attacked now seeing as to how they are seen as occupiers. I doubt anyone would have been harmed if they had send humanitarian aid there without the intention of killing their brothers. If an army goes in a country with the will to kill one's neighbors, I think they would probably be pissed and rather not accept your hand-outs. Where were they when the Soviets finished bombing and the warlords starting kidnapping little boys and raping women for their pleasure? Where were they when people's properties were being stolen left and right? Where were the country did not have a government or any sort of laws of the land? Where were they when more than half the country lived as refugees? These people decided to come into Afghanistan not because they are humanitarian and want to help the people who need it the most but for their own interests. Did anyone before 2001 even know where Afghanistan was located?

All these countries are supposedly committing millions and millions of dollars of Aid to Afghanistan, but what exactly is the point if they hand you bread and then stab you in the back? I think over the passed 6 years, the people of Afghanistan have become tired of false promises and made-up plans that seem to be going nowhere.

[ChotooMotoo]

Originally Posted by roberto

For your safety why don't you go and live in Afghanistan, apart from being safe there are other benefits

My comment was that the male mentality of being sex obsessed is no different in Afghanistan than in America. I think you pretty well proved my point.

[Variable]

Originally Posted by A_Muminah

Of course these people are gonna get attacked now seeing as to how they are seen as occupiers. I doubt anyone would have been harmed if they had send humanitarian aid there without the intention of killing their brothers.

It wasn't an army, they were talking about the WFP - an NGO that's been working in Afghanistan for years. They'd been there all through the Soviet conflict and the civil war. It was in fact, under the Taliban the flow of aid was stymied due to increased danger to the organizations' personnel. That and widespread human rights violations by the Taliban were making it difficult to get authorization for any UN involvement in the country.

If an army goes in a country with the will to kill one's neighbors, I think they would probably be pissed and rather not accept your hand-outs. Where were they when the Soviets finished bombing and the warlords starting kidnapping little boys and raping women for their pleasure? Where were they when people's properties were being stolen left and right? Where were the country did not have a government or any sort of laws of the land? Where were they when more than half the country lived as refugees? These people decided to come into Afghanistan not because they are humanitarian and want to help the people who need it the most but for their own interests. Did anyone before 2001 even know where Afghanistan was located?

Would it have been better if the Western soldiers were sent in after the Soviets left? They skimped out on aid for sure, but however ignoble of them for that, the United States isn't a charity organization and doesn't pretend to be. They went in only after the Taliban demonstrated that they were sheltering people who were willing and able to carry out massive attacks on targets in the US. - And actually did so.

Don't get me wrong... do I think they've handled the situation there well? No. They've killed scores of innocent people with casual use of air power (seperately but interestingly the Taliban too was derided for indiscriminate mass attacks on fellow Afghans). I don't even think they should have invaded. Responded in a serious way yes, but not occupied. At the same time, I'm glad that the US has since stepped up it's aid contributions. They now are the highest contributing donor to Afghanistan many times over. I mean they'd better be right?

In any case, shooting up anything that appears 'Western' - like a WFP food convoy - is universal bad form.

[A_Muminah]

You do realize how the Taliban came to power, yes? It was due to the lawlessness of the land. There was a several year gap between when the Soviets pulled-out and when the Taliban came to power. Could nothing have been done during that period? Why was Afghanistan needed to overthrow the Communists and as soon as the battle was finished, the totally destroyed country was forgotten? Afghanistan was a country rich in agriculture and wealth before they fought America's battle of interests. How much could the WFP possibly do? Why were all these countries supporting Afghanistan up until that point?

[Variable]

Originally Posted by A_Muminah

You do realize how the Taliban came to power, yes? It was due to the lawlessness of the land. There was a several year gap between when the Soviets pulled-out and when the Taliban came to power. Could nothing have been done during that period? Why was Afghanistan needed to overthrow the Communists and as soon as the battle was finished, the totally destroyed country was forgotten? Afghanistan was a country rich in agriculture and wealth before they fought America's battle of interests. How much could the WFP possibly do? Why were all these countries supporting Afghanistan up until that point?

Would you have preferred that the Americans got directly involved immediately after the Soviets were expelled? The country almost immediately devolved into various states of civil war. Aid stuff typically doesn't work out so well during active conflicts like that - what happened in Somalia is a good example of that. It also set a big precedent in American foreign policy for the rest of the decade. In any case, there was more aid flowing into the country before the Taliban took over, because it actually became less secure for those organizations once they did.

And by describing the Soviet-Afghan conflict as "America's battle of interest" you make it sound as though they were responsible for it. They weren't. They supported them due to their strategic interests in that conflict, but they weren't responsible for it. They got involved after they were attacked by a group who was hosted and sheltered by the Taliban.

While we can fault the Americans for not providing more aid to Afghanistan after the Soviet conflict, it doesn't somehow make them responsible for the problems caused in the country, and doesn't make WFP convoys now deserving of being shot at. In this case, the main people who are being hurt by that are the Afghans that would have recieved that help.

[ChotooMotoo]

The Americans paid money and provided weapons had over fist for the Afghans to rid themselves of the Russians. The Afghans requested this aid. Afghanistan is it's own sovereign nation, and it's the peoples responsibility to take care of eachother once the Russians left. Everyone is all up in arms about how the United States interferes with other nations affairs, deciding how the country should be managed. After the Soviets left, the USA did something totally unique in it's history of world affairs.

The United States left you alone to take care of yourselves.

You complain that they left you alone, and now everyone is complaining that they are again involved in the country. I bet if the USA had been more proactive after the Soviets left, there would have been a lot of complaining about that too. Maybe it would have been better if the USA had not gotten invovled at all. Maybe it would have been better if they had never given any support to rid Afghanistan of the horrible Soviets. Maybe they should have just butted out completely. In that case people would have found something else to be upset about.

Maybe it's human nature. We just can't be content with what we have, or accept that we make our own problems and should therefore find our own solutions. It's much easier to expect someone else to do it for us, and then get upset when they don't do things the way we like.

But, if you still insist that the USA should have done more to manage the affairs of Afghanistan, maybe you should read up on the history of Central and South America. If you saw the mess we've made there in the last 200 years, maybe you would be happy with the minimal involvement of the USA in the affairs of Afghanistan.

[A_Muminah]

As-Salaamu 'Alaykum Wa Rahmatullaah,

It probably just is human nature but the fact that the US sort of led the whole fight against the Soviets by providing weapons just made the people feel confident that the world will also be there for the reconstruction of the country. This thought is natural as they thought 'The US will obvsiously help us with reconstruction and to bring a stable economy since they are helping us in the defeat of the Soviets'. Was it wrong for them to think that?

I think if the US had stayed out of the situation and allowed Afghanistan to handle its own business (whether they lost or won), I doubt it would have been as heated as the topic is now. Now, the Afghans feel betrayed for being used to help overthrow a threat to the world and were never really paid back for their service since their country was left in ruins because of it. If the US had not been involved, Afghanistan's government would have probably held a grudge against NATO. I personally, wouldnt have held anything against the US if they had not been involved.

Was-Salaamu 'Alaykum Wa Rahamtullaah.

[roberto]

Originally Posted by ChotooMotoo

My comment was that the male mentality of being sex obsessed is no different in Afghanistan than in America. I think you pretty well proved my point.

What on earth do you mean by that?