Please! EVERYONE IN THE WORLD SHOULD READ THIS NOW!!!
Mr.Soupass
it better than I ever could. I warn you though, it makes for worrying
reading.
Dear Friends,
The following was sent to me by my friend Tamim Ansary. Tamim is an
Afghani-American writer. He is also one of the most brilliant people I
know in this life. When he writes, I read. When he talks, I listen.
Here is his take on Afghanistan and the whole mess we are in.
-Gary T.
Dear Gary and whoever else is on this email thread:
I've been hearing a lot of talk about "bombing Afghanistan back to the
Stone Age." Ronn Owens, on KGO Talk Radio today, allowed that this
would mean killing innocent people, people who had nothing to do with
this atrocity, but "we're at war, we have to accept colateral damage.
What else can we do?" Minutes later I heard some TV pundit discussing
whether we "have the belly to do what must be done."
And I thought about the issues being raised especially hard because I
am from Afghanistan, and even though I've lived here (the US) for 35
years I've never lost track of what's going on there. So I want to
tell anyone who will listen how it all looks from where I'm standing.
I speak as one who hates the Taliban and Osama Bin Laden. There is no
doubt in my mind that these people were responsible for the atrocity
in New York. I agree that something must be done about those monsters.
But the Taliban and Ben Laden are not Afghanistan. They're not even
the government of Afghanistan. The Taliban are a cult of ignorant
psychotics who took over Afghanistan in 1997. Bin Laden is a political
criminal with a plan. When you think Taliban, think Nazis. When you
think Bin Laden, think Hitler. And when you think "the people of
Afghanistan" think "the Jews in the concentration camps." It's not
only that the Afghan people had nothing to do with this atrocity. They
were the first victims of the perpetrators. They would exult if
someone would come in there, take out the Taliban and clear out the
rats nest of international thugs holed up in their country.
Some say, why don't the Afghans rise up and overthrow the Taliban? The
answer is, they're starved, exhausted, hurt, incapacitated, suffering.
A few years ago, the United Nations estimated that there are 500,000
disabled orphans in Afghanistan--a country with no economy, no food.
There are millions of widows. And the Taliban has been burying these
widows alive in mass graves. The soil is littered with land mines, the
farms were all destroyed by the Soviets. These are a few of the
reasons why the Afghan people have not overthrown the Taliban.
We come now to the question of bombing Afghanistan back to the Stone
Age. Trouble is, that's been done. The Soviets took care of it
already. Make the Afghans suffer? They're already suffering. Level
their houses? Done. Turn their schools into piles of rubble? Done.
Eradicate their hospitals? Done. Destroy their infrastructure? Cut
them off from medicine and health care? Too late. Someone already did
all that. New bombs would only stir the rubble of earlier bombs. Would
they at least get the Taliban? Not likely. In today's Afghanistan,
only the Taliban eat, only they have the means to move around. They'd
slip away and hide. Maybe the bombs would get some of those disabled
orphans, they don't move too fast, they don't even have wheelchairs.
But flying over Kabul and dropping bombs wouldn't really be a strike
against the criminals who did this horrific thing. Actually it would
only be making common cause with the Taliban--by raping once again the
people they've been raping all this time.
So what else is there? What can be done, then? Let me now speak with
true fear and trembling. The only way to get Bin Laden is to go in
there with ground troops. When people speak of "having the belly to do
what needs to be done" they're thinking in terms of having the belly
to kill as many as needed. Having the belly to overcome any moral
qualms about killing innocent people. Let's pull our heads out of the
sand. What's actually on the table is Americans dying. And not just
because some Americans would die fighting their way through
Afghanistan to Bin Laden's hideout. It's much bigger than that folks.
Because to get any troops to Afghanistan, we'd have to go through
Pakistan. Would they let us? Not likely. The conquest of Pakistan
would have to be first. Will other Muslim nations just stand by? You
see where I'm going. We're flirting with a world war between Islam and
the West.
And guess what: that's Bin Laden's program. That's exactly what he
wants. That's why he did this. Read his speeches and statements. It's
all right there. He really believes Islam would beat the west. It
might seem ridiculous, but he figures if he can polarize the world
into Islam and the West, he's got a billion soldiers. If the west
wreaks a holocaust in those lands, that's a billion people with
nothing left to lose, that's even better from Bin Laden's point of
view. He's probably wrong, in the end the west would win, whatever
that would mean, but the war would last for years and millions would
die, not just theirs but ours. Who has the belly for that? Bin Laden
does. Anyone else?
Tamim Ansary
--
Please dont take this the wrong way
K Gough
between the west and Islam HAS started, and as unfortunate as that may be,
there is an obligation on the part of the USA and our allies to prevail in
this war. At stake is the freedom and life that was earned at such bitter
and high cost in wars dating back at least 225 years.
So, it becomes incumbent upon the USA and our allies to execute and win this
conflict in the most expeditious and humane way possible. Unfortunately,
there will be significant loss of life and (in the short term) liberty.
Once the conflict has been won, the challenge of the future begins.
I have considered how post-war situations have been managed in the past, and
in my estimation, the most humane and successful post-war efforts were those
undertaken by the USA after WWII. The Marshall Plan in Japan produced the
world's most innovative industry and a true world trading power. We may not
agree with all Japanese business methods, but those are not cause for a
shooting war. Japanese products have set world standards for quality in
automotive, electronics, and other fields.
Once the shooting war is over and won, the USA and our allies must establish
an army of occupation for a huge portion of the Middle East, to include, at
minimum, Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, Syria, Israel, Lebanon, and Jordan. The
region must be governed under the principles of democracy and in a humane
manner. The object of the occupation is not to inflict punishment, but to
create a responsible set of governments for the long term. The object is
that these new governments will flourish as responsible members of the world
community, so a serious investment in education, infrastructure, and
self-governmental development must be made.
Remember, the political boundaries of the Middle East are not of long
tenure. They were established by the British after World War I and revised
in the 1940's. Prior to those times the region was populated mostly by
nomadic tribes with little or no understanding of the world outside their
own experiences. The Brits failed in their mission then. We must now
dismantle, re-establish, and manage the governments in the Middle East to
allow the people in that region to become responsible world citizens.
I, for one, would be willing to pay a couple of extra dollars per gallon at
the gas pump to help finance this effort. I hope that all Americans will
consider this idea and take steps to ensure its implementation. The result
will be a world in which different religions and cultures can coexist with
the common goal of Peace as their primary goal.
Kenneth H. Gough
"Mr.Soupass" <hild...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:iKRo7.35120$BS1.4...@news20.bellglobal.com...
Andy
Terrorism is rife throughout the world. It does need to be combated, but
surely in a way that is not to the detriment of vast numbers of innocent
people. This IS a war, but, can't we learn from previous wars. Carpet
bombing of cities in England and Germany in World War II served little
purpose but to inflict as much harm on as many innocents as possible. Is
this really the way forward in this current crisis? Strategic military
action should be targeted as best as possible at the Taliban and other
terrorist-promoting organisations, and not indiscriminately at the majority
of innocent Afghanistan citizens.
On the subject of terrorism, wasn't the Oklahoma bombing perpetrated by an
American citizen? I understand that there are many 'patriotic' armed groups
in the States, some of whom may have had connections with this particular
terrorist. As a humble citizen of one of the USA's allies, I'd like to know
if American citizens would find it acceptable to commence missile launches
and mass bombing raids on parts of their own country to cleanse their own
land of such terrorist organisations?
Andy
"K Gough" <kgo...@localnet.com> wrote in message
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K Gough
post war reconstruction in world history? The Marshall Plan. Let's learn
from it. It meets all of your criteria in that it worked to the vast
ADVANTAGE of millions of Japanese citizens and possibly the greater world.
But in order to get to the point where the Marshall plan could be
instituted, there had to be, first, a war victory, and second, a benevolent
occupation. What part of the Marshall plan do you see as bigoted? Had Hitler
or Tojo been the victors in WWII, I'm sure they would also have instituted
their own brands of reconstruction. You would probably today be a German
speaker and pledge allegiance to the current Fuhrer rather than the.
Remember America did not start this war. By my count the innocent death
scorecard reads Osama:7,000 -- America: 300. President Bush has given the
Taliban and other terrorists ample opportunity to bring an end to the
bombing, but the response is one of utter defiance. Maybe the innocents in
Afghanistan should look to their own government to stop the bombing. (Oh...
wait, they would be shot in the back of the head and skinned at the football
stadium for that.)
As for your ridiculous comment about American terrorist groups, I believe we
should take whatever steps are necessary to eradicate them. My bet is that
they are holed up in their bunkers just like Osama and will not come out
until their personal coast is clear. I also assume that you take similar
umbrage at the UK's and Canada's participation in the current conflict.
Maybe you would feel more at home in the Middle East where you would be free
to........................................ uh................I can't think
of much you would be free to do there.
Ken
"Andy" <soo...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
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