From: Lee Corbin (lcorbin@tsoft.com)
Date: Mon Feb 17 2003 - 22:50:03 MST
Ramez writes
> From: Dehede011@aol.com [mailto:Dehede011@aol.com]
> > Having rid the Afghanistan of the Taliban you seem to
> > be taking on the additional burden of supporting them.
> > Even a little thought will show that your analysis is
> > faulty.
> Afghanistan has a history of instability and chaos that goes back 30
> years... From a purely selfish standpoint we don't want to allow such
> a thing to happen again. We want there to be a democratic, affluent,
> stable society in Afghanistan, because societies like that create fewer
> terrorists.
I agree, but you are proposing to *change* the culture of an
entire nation. This sounds distantly familiar: a century ago
it was believed that war and poverty could be abolished by
educating people properly.
> So, you would think we would create a policy that would encourage such
> a society to come into existence. Now, so far we've spent around $15
> Billion on the war in Afghanistan, and continue to spend around $1.8
> Billion a month there on military deployment. By contrast, we've
> spent between $200 and $300 million on reconstruction and peace
> keeping. To me this seems quite short sighted. It focuses resources
> on the immediate crisis without investing in preventing the next
> crisis.
The problem with dumping money on third-world countries
is shown by the messes that the World Bank and the IMF
create every time that they try to do so. The nations
of Africa (for one) are worse off than if they'd been
left alone. And that stands to reason when you think
of the money going to corrupt politicians or disrupting
incipient wealth producing aspects of the economy.
It's easy to wave one's hands and say "schools, infrastructure,
and investment", but, as the old saying goes, you can't teach
someone how to fish by throwing a fishing pole his way, especially
if he'd rather do something else, like fight other tribes.
> Currently the UN has a peace keeping force that patrols Kabul, the
> capital of Afghanistan. There are exactly 0 US personnel in this
> peace keeping force. Hamid Karzai, the president of Afghanistan, has
> repeatedly asked for a larger peace keeping force that can patrol the
> entire country and help reign in the warlords. His requests have been
> denied. He has also asked for US assistance in training an Afghan
> police force and Afghan military that would be under the control of
> the democratically elected government. The US has denied these
> requests as well.
This is a *tough* question! If you help a country too much,
even in fighting its rebels or its wars, it becomes dependent.
It does not develop the ability on its own, which is absolutely
crucial. I don't know; perhaps what you do is give them just
enough money to prevent them from being utterly defeated?
> Frankly, Afghanistan is on a course for anarchy. Only strong
> investment in rebuilding and stabilizing that country will prevent
> that. And no one, and especially not the US, seems to be willing to
> make that investment.
It may be that wiser heads than yours or mine have deemed it
impossible. It's likely that at this stage of Afghan history
the choice is either anarchy or cruel despotism.
> With this kind a track record, I simply don't trust the
> US to do the right thing in Iraq.
But the U.S. did do the right thing after World War II?
If so, then let's see what's different: the fact that there
was a massive totalitarian enemy is one thing, but then, as
you point out, the practical enemy of the U.S. is terrorism,
so that's probably not the crucial difference.
I think that the crucial difference is that Japan and Germany
were already extremely developed nations, and had the talent
to assimilate the habits of democracy. Surely you don't
suppose that Afghanistan is as capable as they were.
Lee
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