Congratulations Interventionalists and Secular Nationalists

[شمله ور خراساني]

im glad shamlawar is back, i missed him lol

Hamid Karzai released me from Pol-e-Charkhi prison after being arrested under false accusations.

Karzai released political prisoners because he wants to please the opposition and invite them to a negotiation. But none of that will ever happen.

Now that I am about, I will go straight back to my "sangar" and continue with what I do best.

[Badlun]

I am reading your posts with keen interest and waiting for the coming ones.

For me its quite simple to define things and give each one its due place just doing justice with all.

I can be a US citizen which is my political afiliation. I am a Pashtun by blood, race, genes and may be socially and culturally. I am a Muslim by religion(faith-worship-morality). I can have double nationality being Afghan and American. If I am american then it wont be an impediment in my being Pashtun and Muslim. Similarly one can be pashtun and American or German, or Indian or Pakistani or Afghan at the same time. Thus the diaspora can remain loyal to their citizenship as well as to their blood, religion, culture and social norms.

I consider India to be a great power because of its democracy and capitalistic policies. Bangladesh is also progressing by leaps and bounds. Go to any american super market and majority of the products will be Indian or Bangladeshi if not chinese. bangladesh is also a democracy. I want to see Afghanistan a democracy like Bangladesh or India if not like USA. Even Afghanistan and Pakistan are now becoming democracies having parliamnets and elected president and public representatives. But we have to wipe out these violent extremists taliban and their allies for good.

[BarakzaiAbdali]

I am reading your posts with keen interest and waiting for the coming ones.

For me its quite simple to define things and give each one its due place just doing justice with all.

I can be a US citizen which is my political afiliation. I am a Pashtun by blood, race, genes and may be socially and culturally. I am a Muslim by religion(faith-worship-morality). I can have double nationality being Afghan and American. If I am american then it wont be an impediment in my being Pashtun and Muslim. Similarly one can be pashtun and American or German, or Indian or Pakistani or Afghan at the same time. Thus the diaspora can remain loyal to their citizenship as well as to their bllod, religion, culture and social norms.

I consider India to be a great power because of its democracy and capitalistic policies. Bangladesh is also progressing by leaps and bounds. Go to any american super market an dmajority of the prodycts will be Indian or Bangladeshi if not chinese. bangladesh is also a democracy. I want to see Afghanistan a democracy like Bangladesh or India if not like USA. Even Afghanistan and Pakistan are now becoming democracies having parliamnets and elected president and public representatives. But we have to wipe out these violent extremists taliban and their allies for good.

Certainly, one can be an Afghan American or an Isreali-Judeo American, or an Arab American, but there is a fine line that you have crossed but do not want to account for. That line is demarcated by fifth column citizenry. For instance, what do you say of John Q. Adams’ instructions for posterity regarding not dragging America into the bloody adventurism abroad that you seek to involve Bob, Tim, Steve, and Tom in? For that matter what of President Washington’s instructions. Why should any US citizen be obligated to send a single red cent to Afghanistan? The hearts and minds BS and building schools for men, women, and the like are not what the military was constructed to do. Our armed forces are either designed to be a broad sword and accomplish a lethal smash and withdrawal mission or to astutely stay out where America’s enemies seek to bog America down in a war of attrition.

If your beliefs on this issue are so strong, you, Toramana, and M16 ought to train, learn to drive tanks, access RPGs and fight your this war directly. Really, your interventionalism is not that much different than that of Rahm Emanuel’s or Alan Dershowitz’s in regard to American arms and money going to Israel. This sentiment is no different than our meddling into middle eastern affairs and green lighting King Abdullah to speak out against popular sentiment in Egypt. It earns us a national security threat in the form of millions that are willing to attack because of our interventionalism and policy.

Regarding the Taliban, you have had a difficult time countering Matthew Hoh and his well recognized Afghan study group as to who these individuals are. He was a marine commander and an academic that successfully killed many insurgents, but subsequently resigned when he realized. He is now head of the Afghan Study group:

http://www.thenation.com/article/157...-insider-talks

“Matthew Hoh has impeccable establishment credentials. From 2004 to 2007 he served first as a Defense Department civilian on a reconstruction team and then as a Marine company commander in Iraq. In 2009 he was the State Department’s senior representative in Afghanistan’s Zabul province and political officer in Nangarhar province, areas of fierce fighting against the Taliban insurgency. But in September 2009 he resigned his post to protest the war.”

Here is his assessment regarding the Taliban and who they are:

“History tells a different story. The conflict is very complex, multi-dimensional and goes back three decades. In 2001–02 we installed a government in Kabul headed by Karzai. In doing this, we backed one side in a long civil war—the more progressive-secular and urban camp, Tajiks, Uzbeks and Hazaras, and some Pashtuns and those who live in the north and west. But it excluded one-third of Afghans, the rural, religious, traditional camp, who are Pashtuns in the south and east—which include the Taliban—whose forerunners we backed in 1980s, against the Soviets.

So we create a government that rewards one side and excludes the other. So there are cracks in the political order we created. This gets much worse in 2005 or 2006, when we decided extend the government’s power into southern and eastern Pashtun areas. At the same time, various elements of the Taliban and other insurgent factions had strengthened and returned into parts of Afghanistan.The push went badly, since villagers rebelled, turning to the Taliban to get rid of the outsiders. And so the cycle began. We add more troops, which strengthens the Taliban and weakens support for the government. Suicide attacks, IEDs, military and civilian dead or wounded—all rise commensuratelywith each increase in foreign troop or Afghan government presence. We misunderstand many ofthecauses of support for the Taliban. They didn’t wear sandwich boards or hand out pamphlets to win people. They are the Pashtuns. Most don’t want to rule the country. They just want to get rid of the occupiers.”


So then, based on the above, what I would like you to admit is that

A) You are an interventionalist to the detriment of your adopted country. You seek to involve America, against the directives of its founders, in affairs that are going to cause blow back.
B) You are willing to subvert the rights of a massive portion of the Pashtun population to impose your world view on them. So you basically the mirror reflection of the same Islamists you seek to oust. They then have the right to fight you with as much ferocity as they seem fit.
C) You cannot state this is has anything to do with protecting your country against Al Qaeda at this point as Hoh goes on to say:

“Let’s start with why we’re there. The military and Bush and Obama administrations said it was to get rid of Al Qaeda and make the US and world safer. Yes, we have to fight them. But as for ousting them from Afghanistan? This is ridiculous. They’re currently not there! After we invaded and removed the Taliban government that sheltered them, bin Laden fled to Pakistan, Al Qaeda decentralized with a truly global presence and now has branches everywhere, even in Europe and America. They use local individuals or small cells that don’t require large safe havens to plan attacks, so why would they return? The CIA says only 50–100 are left in Afghanistan, which is a few more than the German police say are currently in Hamburg, let alone the 1,000–2,000 the State Department says are present in Iraq. Our efforts against Al Qaeda are not just ineffective; they don’t make sense. Worse, young Americans are fighting and dying in Afghanistan, while their families back home are being told their sacrifices are making us safer.”

I invite you to write Matthew and debate him as the head of the Afghan study group. Until then, I ask you to discuss whether your interventionalism amounts to treason against your adopted country per President Washington’s dictum:

My policy has been, and will continue to be, while I have the honor to remain in the administration of the government, to be upon friendly terms with, but independent of, all the nations of the earth. To share in the broils of none. To fulfill our own engagements. To supply the wants, and be carriers for them all: Being thoroughly convinced that it is our policy and interest to do so.

George Washington, letter to Gouverneur Morris, December 22, 1795

Unforunately, the activity you and the Israeli and Arab interventionalists promote shall play out per what Washington warned would happen in his farewell address:

“So likewise, a passionate attachment of one nation for another produces a variety of evils. Sympathy for the favorite nation, facilitating the illusion of an imaginary common interest in cases where no real common interest exists, and infusing into one the enmities of the other, betrays the former into a participation in the quarrels and wars of the latter without adequate inducement or justification. It leads also to concessions to the favorite nation of privileges denied to others which is apt doubly to injure the nation making the concessions; by unnecessarily parting with what ought to have been retained, and by exciting jealousy, ill-will, and a disposition to retaliate, in the parties from whom equal privileges are withheld. And it gives to ambitious, corrupted, or deluded citizens (who devote themselves to the favorite nation), facility to betray or sacrifice the interests of their own country, without odium, sometimes even with popularity; gilding, with the appearances of a virtuous sense of obligation, a commendable deference for public opinion, or a laudable zeal for public good, the base or foolish compliances of ambition, corruption, or infatuation.”

- George Washington’s farewell address.

So per General Washington and his inheritors, Dr. Paul, father and son, and Michael Scheuer amongst other likeminded individuals, it matters not a lick or a wit how many Pakistani or Afghan men, women, or children go to school, play in mine free fields, or vote. None of these issues are our concern and as Washington warns you, we “injure our nation” by parting “unnecessarily with that which ought to be have been retained.

Finally, per what Matthew details above, buttressed by other figures, when you say “wipe out” you must also admit that you are advocating the ethnic cleansing of a large portion of the Pashtun population. Sadly, you are advocating that American troops be utilized for this purpose.

[BarakzaiAbdali]

Part 2: The man on the ground

Let us admit that the majority man on the ground is really not so much a Pan Islamist, Nationalist, or idealist as he must be a survivalist. Per the indicators, he is likely illiterate and is a product of a village culture that fuses traditional conservatism and the rural atmosphere. The concepts of secularism, Caliphate, communism are only on his mind when he is spoken to be adherents of these philosophies (which is seldom). When he is done talking to those of us that nurse idealist philosophies, he goes on his way thinking about where to sell his crop and who is impinging on his land etc. He has certain codes of conduct that he observes as best he can. However, despite the reputation of melmestia and pashtunwali, he will bend these customs or break them if it is to his benefit. *This is unless there is a concerted well known response that is communal, such as when the tribal folks that straddle the border burn the houses down of folks that break melmestia and nanawataay*. The cases of the Kasi fellow that fled to FATA and had killed a few CIA agents and the agencies subsequent capabilities of being able to buy him out of tribal protection coupled to Prince Turki Al Faisal’s great successes in being able to buy intelligence, as well as the current drone based campaigns show the developing reality of how observant the masses are toward faithfully executing these Pashtunwali codes. In this way, the majority man is really a part of “the masses.” He has his like minded citizen brothers abroad in rural America, Czech Republic, and other countries. His devotion to Islam is nearly equitable to the southern Bible belt American’s devotion to Baptist ideologies. He prays five times a day because the local muezzin has been announcing the call to prayer 5 times a day since time immemorial. Both the southern Baptist and the rural Pashtun claim a familiarity with their scriptures but often have a surface understanding of these texts. Some elements of Islamic law have permeated his day to day affairs (e.g. interest being abhorrent and not allowed, separation of the sexes, etc). In rural Afghanistan and KP, as well as FATA, which party he “votes” with is the one that provides him a tangible or clan based benefit. If his relative is running for provincial seat, the get out of the vote campaign has little to do with the issues that the candidate professes to run on, unless they clash severely with the local culture. This individual is Orwell’s horse character from 1984. As a collective, he is the strongest party and for this reason every other group seeks to enlist him in its cause or suppress him against resisting their cause.

This aforementioned group has some subgroups these are folks that have become devoted acolytes of Islam or secular nationalism. Examples of the former are men like Abdul Rasul Sayyaf, Mullah Omar Hotak, and Hekmetyar. Examples of the latter are locatable at places as prominent as Peshawar University or Kabul University or even as isolated as Malakand University. However, these groups of people are subdivided even further. For example, Abdul Rasul Sayaaf and Hekmetyaar are Islamists yet they fought against Mullah Omar at various points in their career. The same goes for the nationalists, there are the those who are lock, stock, and barrel willing to do anything for the cause and then there are other men who are far less willing to impose ideologies on their brethren and are nationalistic because they feel that their people are being used and abused. The latter view the Taliban more as misguided brothers than as expendable and killable commodities.

Then, there is the elite man. He may be a Khan or he may be from a Khanate family. He might be urbanized and secular or he might be ingrained in the tribal hierarchy. Specific names from this class are Achekzai, Karzai, Gilaini, Prince Seraj of America, Ghaffar Khan’s descendents, Zahir Shah’s family members, etc. These men have/had enough money and time to study ideas and the implementation and imposition thereof. They have spent time abroad in the West and acquired a taste for orientalism when viewing “his little brown brother in need of reform”. He is a feudal lord of sorts because that is what bought him his wealth in the first place. He is no Rockefeller or Bill Gates that worked himself into this class status. He is a Kuli Khan Khattak of sorts. This in no way means the sub family members are not meritocratic. After all, there are many impressive and university degreed people from this class of people. However, as a collective, whether it be Ashraf Ghani or Hamid Karzai or Zahir Shah, one fact remains true about this group: they left the masses to fuel and anti Russian insurrection while they sat comfortably watching from afar. They lived lives of luxury in the US and Europe and waited for that chance in which they could return and impose their hegemony again onto the masses, or become Orwell’s Pig relative to Orwell’s Horse. This in more ways than one, has led to the modern failed state of Afghanistan.

The issue here is that the motivated groups, the Pan Islamist, the Nationalist, the Secularist Nationalist, and the royalist all claim to be representative of that first group, the Survivalist, or at least want to impose upon him what they feel is best for him. So we ought to examine, out of these groups, do all of them represent a portion of the Survivalist’s personae? Does one of them align more closely with what he feels comfortable with? Is there evidence to support anyone of these groups assertions that they are closer to the ground level truth that the survivalist confronts day in and out? We can look at that next time now that we have defined the players in the game that live in Pashtunistan.

[Badlun]

Democracy is the best kind of government. It does not matter whetehr it is parliamentary, presendential or representative or direct or whatever. Its ar better than any other form like monorchy, dictatorship, Martial law, thoecracy, aristocracy etc.

Intervention is better than direct conquests and occupying countries as done by Arabs and Pashtuns in the past. Intervention for a better change is like education, bringing proper change in behaviour. This is also sharing experiences of democracy, development and modern education with those who dont know or dont practice these universal values. Why we preach and propagate our ideas and religions. Its to tell others that what we have is better than yours. This discussion is also intervening in some body else ideas and beleifs. You introduce your approach and it may be accepted or rejected by the recipient.

Self defence and deterrence is wise policy. We must crush all those who are against democracy, human rights and who are extremsts in a violent way. Do taliban dont plan and try to destroy USA if they can. Why not USA also does the same. If Taliban had the power of what USA has, they would have annihilated the USA thousand times. They are our enemies and we must crush our enemies. This is basic human instinct.

If USA has to be a super power of the world then she must launch strunggle against all evils which are dangers to human civilization like Taliban and Wahabi Alqaeda. Violent Wahabis, Ahle hadith, Salafis and others are worse than communism and if USA defeated communism why not violent extremism. This is the demand of the realism, balance of power and real politik. You cant preach these pacifistic ideas to Taliban why to the saviour of the humanity, the great USA, fighting the war of the whole humanity. This is not interventionism. This is struggle for a just cause. the struggle is not against Islam or Pashtunwali or a common Afghan but against the shame on the ace of humanity the so called Taliban and Al qaeda.

We had many theories like Monroe doctorine or others and instructions from our for fathers. But this should not stop us froma just struggle. The whole american nation knows that taliban is enemy of humanity and they must be either wiped out from the surface of the earth or be reformed.

[BarakzaiAbdali]

Democracy is the best kind of government. It does not matter whetehr it is parliamentary, presendential or representative or direct or whatever. Its ar better than any other form like monorchy, dictatorship, Martial law, thoecracy, aristocracy etc.

Intervention is better than direct conquests and occupying countries as done by Arabs and Pashtuns in the past. Intervention for a better change is like education, bringing proper change in behaviour. This is also sharing experiences of democracy, development and modern education with those who dont know or dont practice these universal values. Why we preach and propagate our ideas and religions. Its to tell others that what we have is better than yours. This discussion is also intervening in some body else ideas and beleifs. You introduce your approach and it may be accepted or rejected by the recipient.

Self defence and deterrence is wise policy. We must crush all those who are against democracy, human rights and who are extremsts in a violent way. Do taliban dont plan and try to destroy USA if they can. Why not USA also does the same. If Taliban had the power of what USA has, they would have annihilated the USA thousand times. They are our enemies and we must crush our enemies. This is basic human instinct.

If USA has to be a super power of the world then she must launch strunggle against all evils which are dangers to human civilization like Taliban and Wahabi Alqaeda. Violent Wahabis, Ahle hadith, Salafis and others are worse than communism and if USA defeated communism why not violent extremism. This is the demand of the realism, balance of power and real politik. You cant preach these pacifistic ideas to Taliban why to the saviour of the humanity, the great USA, fighting the war of the whole humanity. This is not interventionism. This is struggle for a just cause. the struggle is not against Islam or Pashtunwali or a common Afghan but against the shame on the ace of humanity the so called Taliban and Al qaeda.

We had many theories like Monroe doctorine or others and instructions from our for fathers. But this should not stop us froma just struggle. The whole american nation knows that taliban is enemy of humanity and they must be either wiped out from the surface of the earth or be reformed.

Interventionalism versus directly conquering, what kind of statement is that? What do you call 100s of bases in foreign countries? My colleague, that is called conquering and occupation. The issue is that you are the voice that will lead to our downfall here at home. For al intents and purposes, Afghanistan and Iraq are in the process of “being conquered.”

Multiple issues with what you write. In the words of St. Paul, enough of the milk and more of the meat:

1. You did not answer what separates your brand of interventionalism from that of Israeli Americans and Arab Americans that drag the US firepower into their internecine conflicts? You also did not answer Commander Hoh’s concerns regarding the significant contribution Pashtuns play to the Taliban in Afghanistan and whether what you promote constitutes ethnic cleansing. Remember, he is the head of the Afghan study group and both sides of the aisle revere home, from Holbrook to Karzai to antiwar activists. So tread carefully.

2. Contrary to your stance, the inconsistency of interventionalism has decreased, not increased the safety and security of the US. This is conclusive in the analysis of the Yemenese Printer bombs mailed to the US. The Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) actually succeeded despite the cat calls of the media to the contrary. Those devices cost about $100.00 to make. The response that the US has to take costs on the order of millions. The same goes for the Nigerian undergarment bomber. Hohs as much regarding Afghanistan and Al Qaeda above.

3. Expanding on 2, the adventures you have promoted with your line of thinking have produced inconsistent stances and contradictory results. For instance, why should any Afghan trust a superpower that has backed the Mubarak regime x 30 years? For that matter, why do we back the Al Saud house despite the rising costs of oil and the fact that our backing of it created the greatest threat to American national security, Osama Bin Ladin? Also, please answer why our Iraqi adventures have taken Iraqi society backwards from your stated goal of freedom and liberty for all, including the fairer sex?
http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/2...344341860.html

4. In regard to your national security issue, you fail, once again to rebut Commander Hoh in regard to the paucity of Al Qaeda now there and how our current strategy renders us less safe and playing by the Al Qaeda guide to war, walking right into a well planned war of attrition. Was it not Osama Bin Ladin himself who stated his intention to “plant the flag of AlQaeda far and wide” and to watch as we spread ourselves thin, fighting a war of attrition? A part of this relates to point 2 where the goal is to also wreck and railroad our economy through the adventurism you want the US to partake in. You appear to be abiding faithfully by that double pronged strategy of Mr. Bin Ladin’s.

5. You forget that democracy and womens rights are not things that can be loaded onto a CD or a jump drive and then transferred into the governance of Afghanistan or any other country for that matter. It appears that you have not studied how our own democracy evolved at all. You noted that womens rights took decades etc. Correction, it actually took centuries. Moreover, American democracy did not initiate in 1776. Rather it owes its birth to an event that took place in England in the 12th century when English nobles made King John cede powers and sign the Magna Carta at Runny Mede. I refer you to the Mubarak regime and the Nour Al Maliki government as examples of your preferred model of running the show. Which outcomes do you prefer?

6. Democracy does not guarantee stability. The clash of the world’s two greatest democracies, the union and the confederacy more than prove this point. Moreover, Pakistan is a democracy as is Bengledesh, and they have not seen the fruits you promise. You will retort that this has to do with corruption and their inability to abide by a perfect capitalistic and democratic system. Once again, this is a claim reminiscient of the Pan Islamist attitude that the reason why Islamic Shariah law fails is that it does not adhere to perfect shariah law. If such is the case, that you are in the same idealistic mode of thinking as an Islamist, then the people have a right to chose their idealism, even if it does not accord to your wishes.

7. You appear to not have read the history of Salem, Massachussetts, a key site in the early founding, Massachussetts Bay Colony. Have you heard of the Puritans? They were the early founding community that practiced strict “pure” Christianity and exercised a theocratic state model. They were like the Taliban of early America and Salem was their Kandahar. They burned women alive for being witches and instigated the famous Salem Witch Trials. They even dug up the bones of dead women and boiled them in oil. However, they were left alone and subsequently, descendents like Nathaniel Hawthorne, author of the House of The Seven Gables and The Scarlet Letter wrote text upon text that served as apologetics for his forefather’s actions (his great grand father was the head of the magistrate of the Puritan council that initiated the trials). The point is, when the society was left alone, it took about 100 years or so, but it progressed all on its own.

8. Regarding the Monroe doctrine, the comments of JQ Adams, and Washington, you have not sufficiently shown that their dictums are any less wise or useful today. If such men could devise the constitution we hold dear, that had advanced mechanisms like ratification at hand to respond to the times, what justification do you have to drop some of their dictums and replace their wishes for the union with your own?

9. Purity of cause: Once again ala 3 above, what proof do you have that our ruling elites’ motives are as holy as you claim (i.e. to spread goodwill and democracy?). Did we do so in Vietnam? Why is that a free Vietnam today a viable trade partner for the US and far more stable than the Korean war zone we continue to be a part of? You cannot provide a single example of American interventionalism or Western interventionalism in the east that has yielded the results you want.

10. About pacificism: No one is advocating this. As I stated, the military is a broad sword. If we utilize it, we should utilize it to crushing and lethal effect when we really need to. If the US is convinced that it must pursue its current course of affairs, this still does not you milking our treasury for nation building and sending American boys to ethnically cleanse your own people in your place. Instead, the American military might can guarantee a brutal retaliation with a rapid hit and run sequence. It need not gather a coalition of the willing nor does it need the permission of any country. America has an arsenal that can decimate all comers. Take a look at our nearest competitor and how far behind it is militarily:

http://original.antiwar.com/justin/2...a-paper-tiger/


11. In the pashtun/women thread you deride intellectuals who argue against the natural and uninterrupted progression of human rights and dignity as well as the concurrent evolution of governmental and political systems. So on the one hand you say to the Taliban and the Salafists: I will plug my ears and cleanse you ethnically and then on the other hand you tell the moderates: Stop with the intellectualism. All you do is justify Osama Bin Ladin’s war charter which claims that folks like you are aggressive in your goals for the Muslim world. Moreover, what you want to hoist on the people is not what they appear to want per the massive University of Maryland poll that showed Muslim countries, including Afghanistan want an element of shariah in their law systems. So if that is the case, you merely give justification to their insurgency and their struggles to free themselves of your yolk “by any means necessary” to quote Malcolm X.

12. You may say you build schools in Afghanistan and orphanages. So
what? My advocacy for you is to enlist in our armed forces and ask to be a front line shooter and to not leave Afghanistan. For that matter, why not gather your like minded folks and leave the rest of us out of your goals for the region. You can form a lashkar to counter the Taliban and the two groups can fight it out. You have not provided a justification of why Tim, Bob, Steve, and Tom ought to fight your war for you. For that matter, the American health care system is in shambles and needs money… why should we spend a dime on your efforts that you should fund from your own pockets when we have our own problems to fix? It appears that you ignore President Washington regarding the misuse of our national resources and sending them abroad to our detriment here.

13. Your comparison of Communism and fighting an Islamic insurgency makes no sense. In the former situation we had nation states to fight. In the latter situation, our actions abroad (eg. Providing tear gas to Mubarak to use on his own people and backing the Saudi regime) have created our own mess.

The bottom line is that you are in a losing situation in Afghanistan. You need to strap on your gun and go fight the war at the front line. Once you find Omar and Fazlullah, you can have at him. However, you have provided no evidence whatsoever that our interference in Afghanistan or Iraq had yielded the desired national security results or strengthened our economy.

[faye]

b.a. is that speech by john quincy adams, satire?

[Badlun]

Interventionalism versus directly conquering, what kind of statement is that? What do you call 100s of bases in foreign countries? My colleague, that is called conquering and occupation. The issue is that you are the voice that will lead to our downfall here at home. For al intents and purposes, Afghanistan and Iraq are in the process of “being conquered.”

Intervention is that Karzai and Maliki are the rulers with their parliaments and cabinet of ministers with local laws. Conquests is what Arabs did starting from Makkah and Madina and occupied the whole today Arab world with their own rulers, laws, culture, religion and language. USA ha snot made Afghanistan and Iraq their states and have not imposed their religion , language and culture on them. They are far better than those Arabs. Today they have power but they dont do what Arabd did.

Multiple issues with what you write. In the words of St. Paul, enough of the milk and more of the meat:

1. You did not answer what separates your brand of interventionalism from that of Israeli Americans and Arab Americans that drag the US firepower into their internecine conflicts? You also did not answer Commander Hoh’s concerns regarding the significant contribution Pashtuns play to the Taliban in Afghanistan and whether what you promote constitutes ethnic cleansing. Remember, he is the head of the Afghan study group and both sides of the aisle revere home, from Holbrook to Karzai to antiwar activists. So tread carefully.

USA has the idea of democracy and modern education and we should grad her in our own affairs to seek their guidance, assistance , aid and experience.Pashtuns do support Taliban and majority of terrorists are Pashtuns. This must be discouraged.

2. Contrary to your stance, the inconsistency of interventionalism has decreased, not increased the safety and security of the US. This is conclusive in the analysis of the Yemenese Printer bombs mailed to the US. The Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) actually succeeded despite the cat calls of the media to the contrary. Those devices cost about $100.00 to make. The response that the US has to take costs on the order of millions. The same goes for the Nigerian undergarment bomber. Hohs as much regarding Afghanistan and Al Qaeda above.

Inspite of all the sacrifices and losses Afghanistan and Iraq of today is far better than the Afghanistan of Taliban and the Iraq of saddam or Alqaeda. If we did not have the monsters of Alqaeda, Salafism, wahabism and Taliban then we would have better success. We have our own problems too and we are not here for ever. We havr to go back one day home as we are not Arabd conquering for ever. Thus the apparent failures will be there but in the long run success will be ours. Terrorist do inhuman acts like putting bombs in human populations and bulidings. We try to save civilians otherwise its not difficult to wipe out the terrorists in one go.

3. Expanding on 2, the adventures you have promoted with your line of thinking have produced inconsistent stances and contradictory results. For instance, why should any Afghan trust a superpower that has backed the Mubarak regime x 30 years? For that matter, why do we back the Al Saud house despite the rising costs of oil and the fact that our backing of it created the greatest threat to American national security, Osama Bin Ladin? Also, please answer why our Iraqi adventures have taken Iraqi society backwards from your stated goal of freedom and liberty for all, including the fairer sex?
http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/2...344341860.html


National interest is supreme in international relations. Ideology comes second. If Mubarak serves us we shall support him but if not then we will withdraw our support. But our support will be always for democracy if there is to make a choice between the two.There are some pit falls in our foreign policy no doubt like supportiung Saudi or not having proper public diplomacy which can be improved upon.
4. In regard to your national security issue, you fail, once again to rebut Commander Hoh in regard to the paucity of Al Qaeda now there and how our current strategy renders us less safe and playing by the Al Qaeda guide to war, walking right into a well planned war of attrition. Was it not Osama Bin Ladin himself who stated his intention to “plant the flag of AlQaeda far and wide” and to watch as we spread ourselves thin, fighting a war of attrition? A part of this relates to point 2 where the goal is to also wreck and railroad our economy through the adventurism you want the US to partake in. You appear to be abiding faithfully by that double pronged strategy of Mr. Bin Ladin’s.
Hoh is one person but our policy ha sthe backing of the Congress, the think tanks and once we have totalopposition from all, we will re think our policy.Its a war which can be won or lost , if we win the democracy wins if not the evil wins, which will be misfortune of the humanity.
5. You forget that democracy and womens rights are not things that can be loaded onto a CD or a jump drive and then transferred into the governance of Afghanistan or any other country for that matter. It appears that you have not studied how our own democracy evolved at all. You noted that womens rights took decades etc. Correction, it actually took centuries. Moreover, American democracy did not initiate in 1776. Rather it owes its birth to an event that took place in England in the 12th century when English nobles made King John cede powers and sign the Magna Carta at Runny Mede. I refer you to the Mubarak regime and the Nour Al Maliki government as examples of your preferred model of running the show. Which outcomes do you prefer?
Women rights, democracy etc will not be imposed like loading a CD but ny gradual process, by education and by motivation. We have now a parliament and the progress is satisfactory.
6. Democracy does not guarantee stability. The clash of the world’s two greatest democracies, the union and the confederacy more than prove this point. Moreover, Pakistan is a democracy as is Bengledesh, and they have not seen the fruits you promise. You will retort that this has to do with corruption and their inability to abide by a perfect capitalistic and democratic system. Once again, this is a claim reminiscient of the Pan Islamist attitude that the reason why Islamic Shariah law fails is that it does not adhere to perfect shariah law. If such is the case, that you are in the same idealistic mode of thinking as an Islamist, then the people have a right to chose their idealism, even if it does not accord to your wishes.
Pakistan, Bangladesh being democracies in making are still far better than the autocratic dictatorial regimes and the terrorism of taliban. 10 is always better than 0 if we dont have a 100.Time will show that these countries will become full democracies.Corruption and all other evils will be eradiacted with the pasage of time. We see democracie snow in many countries but we never saw a pure Islamic country in the past 1400 years. And sharia can be there in family laws and being part of religion but cant become a full system becaus eit is not a complete code of life.
7. You appear to not have read the history of Salem, Massachussetts, a key site in the early founding, Massachussetts Bay Colony. Have you heard of the Puritans? They were the early founding community that practiced strict “pure” Christianity and exercised a theocratic state model. They were like the Taliban of early America and Salem was their Kandahar. They burned women alive for being witches and instigated the famous Salem Witch Trials. They even dug up the bones of dead women and boiled them in oil. However, they were left alone and subsequently, descendents like Nathaniel Hawthorne, author of the House of The Seven Gables and The Scarlet Letter wrote text upon text that served as apologetics for his forefather’s actions (his great grand father was the head of the magistrate of the Puritan council that initiated the trials). The point is, when the society was left alone, it took about 100 years or so, but it progressed all on its own.

Those puritans are no more theree and the same will happen to these Talibans and salafis.

8. Regarding the Monroe doctrine, the comments of JQ Adams, and Washington, you have not sufficiently shown that their dictums are any less wise or useful today. If such men could devise the constitution we hold dear, that had advanced mechanisms like ratification at hand to respond to the times, what justification do you have to drop some of their dictums and replace their wishes for the union with your own?

We should learn from the past and our past leaders but all times have their own realities thats why we have our congress and elected reps who will decide as per demand of the situation

9. Purity of cause: Once again ala 3 above, what proof do you have that our ruling elites’ motives are as holy as you claim (i.e. to spread goodwill and democracy?). Did we do so in Vietnam? Why is that a free Vietnam today a viable trade partner for the US and far more stable than the Korean war zone we continue to be a part of? You cannot provide a single example of American interventionalism or Western interventionalism in the east that has yielded the results you want.

At that time we had cold war and we had to fight those wars. Now Vietnam is a friend and partner. Now our enemy is Violent Muslim extremism and we should defeat them as we defeated communism.

10. About pacificism: No one is advocating this. As I stated, the military is a broad sword. If we utilize it, we should utilize it to crushing and lethal effect when we really need to. If the US is convinced that it must pursue its current course of affairs, this still does not you milking our treasury for nation building and sending American boys to ethnically cleanse your own people in your place. Instead, the American military might can guarantee a brutal retaliation with a rapid hit and run sequence. It need not gather a coalition of the willing nor does it need the permission of any country. America has an arsenal that can decimate all comers. Take a look at our nearest competitor and how far behind it is militarily:
Pantagon knows better their war policies under the guidance of the satte department, presidency and the congress

http://original.antiwar.com/justin/2...a-paper-tiger/


11. In the pashtun/women thread you deride intellectuals who argue against the natural and uninterrupted progression of human rights and dignity as well as the concurrent evolution of governmental and political systems. So on the one hand you say to the Taliban and the Salafists: I will plug my ears and cleanse you ethnically and then on the other hand you tell the moderates: Stop with the intellectualism. All you do is justify Osama Bin Ladin’s war charter which claims that folks like you are aggressive in your goals for the Muslim world. Moreover, what you want to hoist on the people is not what they appear to want per the massive University of Maryland poll that showed Muslim countries, including Afghanistan want an element of shariah in their law systems. So if that is the case, you merely give justification to their insurgency and their struggles to free themselves of your yolk “by any means necessary” to quote Malcolm X.

An element of sharia yes as family laws but not Taliban rule where Mullah willd ecide our fate not a parliamnet.

12. You may say you build schools in Afghanistan and orphanages. So
what? My advocacy for you is to enlist in our armed forces and ask to be a front line shooter and to not leave Afghanistan. For that matter, why not gather your like minded folks and leave the rest of us out of your goals for the region. You can form a lashkar to counter the Taliban and the two groups can fight it out. You have not provided a justification of why Tim, Bob, Steve, and Tom ought to fight your war for you. For that matter, the American health care system is in shambles and needs money… why should we spend a dime on your efforts that you should fund from your own pockets when we have our own problems to fix? It appears that you ignore President Washington regarding the misuse of our national resources and sending them abroad to our detriment here.

We are fighting the war by professionals and this is appreciable that inspite o our domestic problems still we go for causes of entire humanity. This is the majesty of a super power.

13. Your comparison of Communism and fighting an Islamic insurgency makes no sense. In the former situation we had nation states to fight. In the latter situation, our actions abroad (eg. Providing tear gas to Mubarak to use on his own people and backing the Saudi regime) have created our own mess.
We had no nation state but an ideology the communism. Today also we have an ideology the violent islamic extremism.
The bottom line is that you are in a losing situation in Afghanistan. You need to strap on your gun and go fight the war at the front line. Once you find Omar and Fazlullah, you can have at him. However, you have provided no evidence whatsoever that our interference in Afghanistan or Iraq had yielded the desired national security results or strengthened our economy.

We are winning. Afghans are winning. Iraqis already won. We hav eour parliaments, elected governments and peace willbe soon our destiny.

My brief response is in bold
For further details please see my post
http://www.pashtunforums.com/creativ...pashtuns-4364/

[BarakzaiAbdali]

We are winning. Afghans are winning. Iraqis already won. We hav eour parliaments, elected governments and peace willbe soon our destiny.

My brief response is in bold
For further details please see my post
http://www.pashtunforums.com/creativ...pashtuns-4364/

Im traveling, but will answer you more in full.

I hope Toramana and others are reading your responses though. Toramana, this is exactly what I am talking about. Your intentions may be good, but you have to understand that folks like Osho represent the opposite side of the coin (i.e. if Islamists are the heads then they are the tails).

However, Osho, a brief response is this:

1. Brutality: Once again, you appear to not be a student of history. You impose your wants and needs over the data as opposed to letting the data lead you as it would any scientist. Take a look at Iran in the 1950s and read up on Operation Ajax. This resulted in the overturning of a secular and democratic government by Kermit Roosevelt of the CIA alongside his British companions. This in turn led to the installation of Shah Pahlavi and years of brutality. Many people today forget that the Iranian regime is a response and a blowback to that brutal overthrow of the democractically elected and secular President Muhammad Mossadegh.

Vietnam is a viable partner today because they succeeded in HALTING our interventionalism.

Moreover, the data seems to indicate that the Afghan civilians view Taliban attacks as what they are, a consequence of US interventionalism. So it appears that the man on the ground has more common sense than you. After all, if a Chinese army invaded Alabama tomorrow and the Baptist fundamentalists fought for God and country, they would likely attack Chinese agents wherever they could be found. Remove the instigating stimuli and you remove the effect.

2. Two wrongs do not make a right: If you view the throngs of Arab legions that spread Islam as Imperialists, so be it. However, that has no bearing on promoting an alternate imperialism.

Also, you confuse cause and effect. If you read the biography of Abdul Salam Zaeef that the security experts around the world are now reading to grasp the Taliban's role in all this he himself also harkens back to the "idyllic" days of Zahir Shah. It appears that the mullah class you so loathe rarely comes out of the wood work except when interventionalism occurs. If Zahir Shah were in power, and had the Russians not invaded, it appears that Zaeef, like the masses would not have responded to Zia's calls to mobilize the Pashtuns.

3. Furthermore, the polling by U&M does not appear to endorse what you say, where the masses of the Muslim countries desire nominal Islam in the home. They actually were asked if it ough to be codified into their government.

"These surveys do however suggest that there is a kind of internal clash of civilizations or at least some tension of civilizations. For example while large majorities support the principle that will of the people should be the basis of authority for government; majorities also support the notion that shari'a should be the basis for government and that a group of Islamic scholars should be able to vet laws."

http://www.publicpolicy.umd.edu/sppu...0and%20America

4. You are way off when it comes to governmental safety and the better future for America. Saddam it appears was actually a stop cock in the flow of insurgents from the subcontinet and central asia to the levant. Now, that conveyer belt is in full force and will affect American interests negatively. Furthermore, the Iraqi government is more in bed with Iran than ever before ala Moqtada Al Sadr and Al Maliki.

5. Your other essays appear to also show severely low aptitude for having read up on historical events. You gloss over hinduvatu in India, you forget the Chechen insurrection, and you completely ignore the Uighar dilemma. The issue with Pashtuns and "terrorism" is, as is similar in those events, a response to an outside invader. You can try and explain this off as a battle to reverse generations of Arabism, but once again, that in no way justifies incursions by modern imperial powers.

Here is an excellent essay where Michael hands down predicts the Mumbai attacks per the date on the article (fascinating foresight):
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/JI20Df02.html

and a followup to the attacks:

http://indiatoday.intoday.in/site/St...n+America.html

6. About Egypt, you expose a double standard here. You allow for your wants to superimpose over what is best for America. There is no evidence you have provided that imposing measures on Egypt or supporting Israel do anything to buttress American interests. I think Dr. Scheuer appears to once again, rebut you and is far more credentialed then you are to take on such matters.:

He appears to be effectively turn the tables on you and Toramana regarding the usage of the term Islamo Fascist. I would appreciate it if you debated him, as he was head of the CIA alec station and in charge of hunting and killing Osama Bin Ladin. He gave 2 presidents 6 chances to do so.

http://non-intervention.com/827/tuni...from-the-west/

Tunisia, Egypt, and Yemen: Moving toward Islam and away from the West

Published: January 30, 2011
The bankruptcy of America’s ideological and unrealistic educational system — especially its universities — has seldom been on better display than during this period of unrest in the Muslim world. For the most part, the well-educated folks offering analysis on television seem befuddled that anyone could think that the mass protests in Tunisia, Egypt, and Yemen have anything remotely to do with religion. No, say they, the unrest is the result of poverty, oppression, and a dozen other things, but it has nothing to do with Islam.

Well, no. While the immediate spark for events in Tunisia, Egypt, and Yemen came from poverty, oppression, etc, the ultimate cause is the unIslamic nature of the dictatorial governments that long have ruled the three states in question. Each regime has used the rhetoric of Islam in public statements and the methodology of European Fascism as its instrument of government. On this point the Neoconservatives were absolutely right: The Muslim world is rife with Islamofascists. What the Necons deliberately failed to add to this truism is that the Islamofascists are not found among the mujahedin, but rather man the Arab regimes that Washington, many of its Western allies, and Israel have supported for several decades.

Thus the uprisings now occurring are anti-fascist, but they are a nowhere near pro-democracy, at least in the Western sense. The international media’s propensity — especially strong in the BBC and CNN — for finding what it lusts to find is on prominent display as they seek out protesters in Cairo and elsewhere who speak English, are middle-class professionals, and wax eloquent with admiration for the West. Having found this “evidence” the media then extrapolate from what must be regarded as a rather small sample and declare that Americans are watching “We the people” movements on the Arab streets. (We have seen this absurd species of extrapolation frequently in recent years when U.S.-led military coalitions have success in one small- or medium-sized Iraqi or Afghan village and it is portrayed by the media as a nationwide trend.)
From Chris Matthews to Katie Couric to General Wesley Clark flows the nonsense they were trained to believe at university: The triumph of secularism, democracy, and globalization are inevitable and those that stand in the way are anachronistic expendables. General Clark, on Saturday, went so far as to tell FOX viewers that after Mubarak leaves Egypt there will be “some kind of an election” — presumably with Western observers — and that an international commission must be established to investigate the Egyptian government’s corruption.

In other words, the U.S. and Western interventionism that has supported Islamofascists for 50 years should now be revved up to intervene to teach our unwashed Arab brothers how to vote, be honest, and allow power to be passed from the dictator Mubarak to an unIslamic, unrepresentative, and tiny group of secularized Muslims who shave, admire Jefferson, and have little truck with that Islam stuff.

From Matthews on the left, to Clark on the right, to Press Secretary Robert Gibbs in the ever-hopeful-if-reality-defying heart of the Obama-Clinton fantasy world, the answer to a problem that has been partially wrought by U.S. and Western intervention on the side of tyranny is more and more intervention to again deny power to the majority. We should all be wondering how long the United States can survive the handiwork of the professors who “educated” this generation of U.S. leaders to be certain of the blessed inevitability of universal, pagan, and non-violent Westernization of the entire globe, a sort of a leftist, atheist, libertine Khalifate.

What seems lost in the wishing-makes-it-so fog of this “analysis” is the fact that nearly one-hundred percent of the Tunisians, Egyptians, and Yemenis we see on the street — indeed, all except the Westernized handful Matthews, Couric, and Clark want power passed to — are Muslim believers who not only want to improve their living and political conditions, but likewise want Islam to play a far larger role in governance, a role they believe will be lead to far less oppressive regimes. It is absolutely true that the Tunisian, Egyptian, and Yemeni dictators are hated by their peoples from imposing brutal repression, but they are also hated for limiting the role of Islam in government and their persecution of those Islamic scholars, preachers, and militants who have struggled to defend their faith. (Parenthetically, the government of our Republic under both parties long has used taxpayer funds to intervene in Tunisia, Egypt, and Yemen to encourage regime stability and so has facilitated both varieties of oppression. This may limit the pro-U.S. sentiment of any successor regime in these three states.)

At day’s end it is unclear whether Egypt’s Mubarak or Yemen’s Salih will fall, or whether the new Tunisian regime will be anything other than a more efficient dictatorship than the one it replaced. Fascist regimes, after all, have protected themselves by systematically disarming their citizenry and have little concern for anything save holding onto power. (NB: On the last point, they are like the two U.S. political parties.)

The Islamofascist regimes also know that the pro-democracy bark of Washington and its NATO allies is likely to be far worse than their bite because the existence of the regimes is necessary for the survival of Israel. It is the vigorously brutal oppression of the Mubaraks, Abdullahs (Jordan and Saudi Arabia), and Bashirs of the Arab world that controls borders contiguous with Israel and keeps a lid on hundreds of millions of Muslims who seethe with a desire to exact wide and lethal retribution for what they see as Israel’s theft, on-going occupation, and unfolding annexation of Muslim land.

[ScimitarXEdge]

The problem with posts that often tout "Pro-America" or "Pro democracy" sentiments is they have a very scant basis on reality and only aimed at creating an empty but mythologized portrayal of either.

The fact is this such things end up being just empty propaganda; certain individuals have recently even openly endorsed the use of propaganda, perhaps out of ignorance of it's meaning; but one cannot rule out that propaganda is being embraced deliberately in the agenda to control and manipulate the perceptions of the world.

Looking at the meaning of Propaganda, it insinuates the use deliberate fallacy and distortion in an attempt either to make their own agenda appear favorable or make other things seem unfavorable. Thus propaganda can only be understood as willful support and pandering of corruption.

While it's true Democracy is the best form of government it's not true that America is a democracy; America is a Capitalist Plutocracy with Industrial technocratic institution to support it.

All Democracy means is empowerment of the people, where the peoples needs and interests are take precedence. This is a direct voluntary involvement.

This cannot describe America or any capitalist, marxist, socialist, communist based social organization on any level.

The reason is simple, none of these societies operate on direct participation; everything is ratified by a manufactured power structure, and such a power structure is manufactured by who have interfered with the resources of the population, those who have utilized such a power structure are only those who have taken control and monopolize resources and have imposed institutions which exploit, manipulate and divert them to disrupt the life of the people.

Thus the habitat and conditions of society are aimed at complying to a specific status quo; and peoples lives, education, occupation, sustenance and lifestyle become distorted to be fashioned around such conditions. This is similar to how experiments with Rats in which the habitat of rats become artificially manipulated and rat behavior thus becomes altered to be formed around this artificial habitat, the needs and instincts of the rat have become warped or redirected, this is the same that has happened in the so called American and Imperialist "Democracies"

In truth they're democracy only in words, not in reality.

But getting back to the meaning of democracy, the only requirement is "empowering of people"; as long as that is fulfilled then democracy can be related with anything. Even Theocracy.

But how do we define what is empowering people; people's attributes are fundamental and they have specific faculties which relate to their ecosystem and evolutionary development that fashioned their drives. So anything which fulfills this will be empowering people.

The basis of Islam's law is to put it very casually "human nature"; it aims at fulfilling and directing to the needs that human beings intrinsically drive towards in their proper context context. Right there , it embodies Democracy as it corresponds to the attributes which enable people to fulfill these faculties.

Islam and the Islamic system of life is True Democracy, which shows that unnatural systems like Capitalism are interference with democracy and are forms of enslavement as they oppose, inhibit or divert the natural drives of people. The capitalist system of N. America or Europe only survives by diverting and pacifying people with made up illusions and thus keeping people pursuing after it's manufactured and detrimental standards. Such a state of existence is self destructive and we see this in the world around us by economy, lifestyle and state of the Environment. the purpose of Empowerment is to preserve life, but if something is destructive it cannot empower.

This is how we can know the ideas of American system or Capitalist system are simply a deception/illusion and are are not democracy; the reason many people have immigrated to these cultures is precisely because of the enslavement which resulted due to disrupting/interferring with their natural way of life and imposed imposed dependence by the capitalist institutions. That's what creates this illusion that they are democracy and in consequence leads people to falsely believe that they're being fulfilled by it.

The events in Afghanistan and Iraq are evident proof that they are really operating a nefarious agenda and have not done anything meritable, even acccording to their standards; Even at their most "beneficient" they're trying to institute a corrupt capitalist based technocracy and further entrench a dysfunctional way of life which they had already instigated in Afghanistan's turmoil, but instead of having warring Afghans, they will have pacified them for exploitation. In Afghanistan it is widely proven they have used Radioactive Contamination as a weapon, such tactics will have crippling affects on children; and yet people who are claiming they have brought so much progress in Afghanistan is both being deceptive and in denial. You cannot better yourself when your society's health and well being are being completely compromised; what will result is a state of perpetual dependence on imperial exploitation. Iraq's entire infrastructure is being used parasitically by Imperial powers, almost all of it's cultuire and self sufficiency has been destroyed and their normal way of life completely destablized. On top of it millions of Iraqis are slaughtered, both in the direct way, and in the proxy war and more over in the sectarian divide and rule schemes manipulated by U.S. Interests, promoting and diverting one element of society against another. The ideas of progress are all lies; and the claim they have come as "Messiahs" to these people is also a deliberate falsehood, what they have really brought is destitution and robbing them of the sanctity of their land and people.

[Badlun]

My ideas on democracy and US presence have been explained in the other above quoted topics

I have a very simple question here
is todays iraq better than that of Sadams and if we dont have NATO and Karzai in Afghanistan then who will rule us Taliban! Are you ready for that.

And if Islam as a political and economic system is better than capitalism, why it was ever implemented in the last 1400 years or where it is implemented today?Why it is not attractive to the humanity even to the Muslims to be implemented and prmpulgated. Why we have the whole development in the world of capitalism and not in the world of Islam-
Islam is just a religion for your spiritual and moral needs and has nothing to do with culture, politics or economy.

[fzpz]

Osho, i think you have good intentions. I agree with some or most of what you say. You certainly like to eulogize concepts that you do not fully grasp. Before i move on to the gist of all this, i'd like to point out that Iraq IS A WORSE place than that of Saddam. That much is obvious. Moving on to your notion of 'Islam', if one pays attention to the cries of the people on the ground, they want 'real' Islam, or more Islam in their everyday lives. Tinpot dictators and propped up 'democracies' don't change the fact that without external 'support' none of the people in power throughout the muslim world (barring a few) would be alive, they'd be hung najibullah style.

There were recent polls done that essentially showed that people want more democracy and more Islam for a government. People don't see the paradigm between those two that others do. Democracy simply means a vague concept/illusion of people electing their 'legitimate' leaders. No one is disagreeing with democracy. In fact a more free and democracy society would likely lead to even more Islam in their lives/worlds as people would freely vote for that. The crux of the matter is when you try to horse-feed foreign concepts on to the people on the back of 'invaders' and their violent methods no one is going to take you seriously. that is the reality. You, i, and most on here have extricated themselves from their societies. Our harping, especially on matters of governance and THEIR LIVES, isn't going to make a damned difference on the ground. Telling a people (behind a host of invaders) that they should change their world view is a spit in their faces. I'll leave it up to you to ponder about what that means to an honorable society. They have their own realities, and they see things differently. After all it is the democratic way.

My read on your pov is that you think this is simply a matter of 'religion' or religiosity. I'd beg to differ. The americans could be muslim, the afghans could be some other, they both could be muslim or other, and you'd still have this situation. It's about changing the other through violent (but veiled) methods and the other having or wanting none of it.

[ScimitarXEdge]

The problem with these questions is the premises and measuring system being used to evaluate the questions. While we contrast Saddam with U.S. presence, it ignores that Saddam's power structure is a product of U.S. Involvement in the Middle East. erica gave Saddam weapons of mass destruction and started funding and propagating Saddam's military in a stalwart against Iranian Revolution against the Shah and to reclaim American economic exploitation of the Gulf region. So the problems caused by Saddam were controlled by the American Involvement. Similarly after Saddam, millions of Iraqis are dead, a sectarian war ensued; which was spear headed by American CIA products, Al-Qaeda. It is an old imperialist divide and rule scheme. Not to mention the economic exploitation of America of Iraq's resources. We're fooled by things like "economic growth" when really who gets rich are American corporations based in Iraq, even then Iraq's infrastructure is more or elss dead except the stuff American's want to exploit and it's not gained much. It shows the Capitalist system is failing. Even in America. My point is America's international involvement has done more destruction than benefit. We really can't compare Saddam with post Saddam era.

I think it's false to say that the Taliban will take over; it seems the propaganda tactic in Afghanistan is to label everything Taliban that is against the Imperialist/Capitalist Interests. This doesn't mean that there should be no concern; but honestly, if anything has helped the Taliban it's NATO/U.S./Imperial Intrusion. The Taliban now are more galvanized, now they have Iranians and Pakistanis giving significant funding and weapons. In 2001 Taliban were slowly falling apart, no money, no weapons, Pakistan was broke so it couldn't continue funding the Taliban. Now America gives Pakistan money and it's gone straight to the Taliban Movement itself, and America knows this. It makes one wonder if really Taliban The Movement (not the normal people fighting American invasion) are really just an extension of Imperialism to justify the actions of Imperialism. It would explain why Taliban never care who gets hurt in a Suicide attack. But I won't entertain conspiracy theories; only what is obvious and in plain sight.


Islam is a superior system; naturally and it in fact does deal with politics, economics, social order. Anyone who actually studies Islamic History will see that there was an entire Legal System, political system, diplomatic order that the Muslims had in injunction with Islaam. And it did work many times during the last 1,400 years. The Abbasid Era, The era of Sher Shah Suri, the Ghorid, Andalusia, just to name a few. Islam has rules about weights, measures and balances, about interest, these are things dealing with economic equity, they're enshrined as legal standards not merely moral rules. Rules about penal code, social rights and social organization. Those who know Islamic Literature knows the claim of it being just "spiritual and moral"; but even then what does Spiritual and Moral even mean? Morality is simply rules and values that govern the standards and values of society, they were the original political and social laws. Spiritual is merely a sense a type of consciousness, and in that Everything must be Spiriitual we need a higher consciousness and purpose to understand the relevance and function of Laws.

If it appears that Capitalism appeals more and people are drawn to Capitalism; then this is an illusion. People did not go to Capitalism because it was better; but because capitalism had destroyed all the natural ways of life for people and artificially imposed institutions which made everyone dependant to it; so people started thinking that they can only get what they need from Capitalism. Also when you mention developments; capitalism didnt really make any developments, it just destroyed nature and ecosystem. Really even while we use computer we didnt actually need the computer, it's just because we must use it in context to institutions imposed on us. Really the merits of Capitalism are just an illusion. Islam works with nature, so that's why it's real and superior.

Look at Egypt right now they're rejecting Capitalism and same in Yemen and are now wanting Islam back; clearly the tide is changing and people are realizing Islam was right all along.

[ScimitarXEdge]

Much like BarakzaiAbdali wrora said; even if you feel Islam is a form of "Arab Imperialism" as many people attempt to portray wrongfully, something which I feel is ludicrous and a complete misuse of terminology.; this does not justify serving other Imperialism, in this case the actual correct useage of the term in respects to European/North Americans.


Similarly even if we suppose Islam isn't a utopia and isn't perfect, this does not mean supporting Imperialism/Capitalism which is very corrupt.

[BarakzaiAbdali]

My ideas on democracy and US presence have been explained in the other above quoted topics

I have a very simple question here
is todays iraq better than that of Sadams and if we dont have NATO and Karzai in Afghanistan then who will rule us Taliban! Are you ready for that.

And if Islam as a political and economic system is better than capitalism, why it was ever implemented in the last 1400 years or where it is implemented today?Why it is not attractive to the humanity even to the Muslims to be implemented and prmpulgated. Why we have the whole development in the world of capitalism and not in the world of Islam-
Islam is just a religion for your spiritual and moral needs and has nothing to do with culture, politics or economy.

Osho,

There are a few recurring themes that show chinks in the intellectual armor or cracks in the dam if you will. So the original posting here was about the failed outcome of Nationalist policies and goals ala Karzai. The proof is in the pudding and you have not been able to answer a single point in the original post.

1. I am happy you have written so voluminously here because you have provided those of us that do not agree with you an ample amount of evidence against your cause and divided your house. Here is an example: Your former cheerleader of the cause was Toramana. His central argument was generally based on the principle that Pashtuns, in their natural environs are more prone to secularism than "terrorism" as you call it, or hints if defensive Islamism per Pashtunwali as we we call it. Even if you backtrack on this to reconcile your views and speak with one voice, your former words exist here in print that show you A) agree that Pashtuns are heavily behind Islamist causes and that B) this trait must be forcefully extracted from them. I will let you and Toramana sort out this glaring contradiction because you undo the thrust of his arguments, backed by Miss Taj Andersen, that the Pashtuns of Pashtunistan want Karzai, Achekzai, etc to save them versus the emerging narrative that your views provide evidence for which is that Pashtuns, as a whole, need to be reformed and forcibly changed in their ways (i.e. massive interventionalism). He also undoes the thrust of your central arguments.

2. Despite the inadvertant differences in between you and others in 1, the automaton nature of the nationalist stump speech is very interesting. I am happy that I came to this forum and learned a bit more about the ANP party and the Afghan Mellat Party. It is scary how indoctrinated some of you are. Its almost like an evolved belief system. In general the arguments, from person to person are the same and not very well researched or supported with evidence. They tend to be as such:

A. Democracy is the best form of government: OK, lets assume this. Why do you believe this? Is it because of the US economic success? Is the issue more complex perhaps if the latter is what you think? Is US economic success tied to other issues? Has democracy been in flux even here in the US? Regarding Bengaldesh and Pakistan, despite your statement that they are far better as they are versus under autocracy, you have little proof for that assertion as the Pakistani economy is in shambles. Is this statement based on some survey you found that measures happiness in the populace? Furthermore, what of academic professor and military historian Andrew Bacevich's writings that indicate that our government has more and more drifted toward what is called the imperial presidency, i.e. unprecedented consolidation of governmental power? You also ignore the post Lincon and pre Lincoln US and how the supremecy of a centralized government versus a federation of states has affected economic development.

B. Capitalism: Once again, you attempt to simplify and assign traits that are anticapistalistic to systems you disagree with. The basic tenant of economic competition is no more banned in Islam than it is in a secular democratic US. In fact, various modes of competitive marketing are also inhibited by general morality in the US. For instance, prostitution, per ethnical concerns, is banned except in places like Nevada. The same goes for marijuana and heroin usage. The ultimate outcome of free market competition, monopolization, is also to be broken up. Certainly, when it comes to issues like interest banking or allowing various industries like alcohol consumption to flourish, Islam will not permit such free market endeavors. However, you attempt to equate communism views on free market and autocratic views on free market and Islam, which is foolish and has no basis. Islam does not promote bail outs nor does it ban survival of the fittest when it comes to competition.

Furthermore, what of imperial Rome and the Ottoman Empire? In their own time standards they had economic successes. In fact many an empire has risen and fallen and provided vast wealth to its populace. I have yet to see a study that says, in isolation, the US economic system has provided the most wealth to the average citizen across time. You might allude to the standard of living as being superb, which is fair. However, even then, that is a consequence of technological progress. In imperial Rome, the denizens where far better off then the Germanic people they chose to conquer, etc.

Finally, the oversimplification you put forth ignores whether that economic/capitalistic success occurs in a vacuum (which it does not).

C. Your over simplification of both democracy and its values or demerits as well as capitalism and its values and demerits does no justice for the supporters of such systems. You equate a form of government and an economic modality a value system, yet in their purest forms, they do not endorse or comment on humanistic values.

D. So in order to deal with C, you introduce secular humanism into the mix believing that it is a control mechanism on democracy and capitalism. Once again though, a part of that secular humanism that you espouse is diametrically in opposition to what America's founders espoused. In fact, I would venture to say that an overwhelming number of our elected officials today are not secular humanists. As examples, I would refer you to the the clashes on the environment and our support of tyrannies all around the world. For that matter, Bush believed that God directed his hand in Iraq... so you are a loss for evidence.

E. You ignore history and its deep and profound lessons. These lessons however, were not lost on JQ Adams or Washington. You have provided little to no evidence that their guidance in such matters would either negatively affect democracy here at home, capitalism here at home, or accord with secular humanism. Your usual statements, when you take the defensive position are: Our parliament is great (hogwash per the original post on this thread), Iraq is better off (not so per the evidence and Saddam was our creation), the Taliban are evil (thats an opinion and ignores their stabilizing effect and their being far less corrupt than the corrent regime).

3. So in summary, the automaton refrain in the Nationalist's anthem is: Democracy for all (at the barrell of a gun), capitalism for the masses (yet devoid of the key capitalist ingredient of meritocracy because all the current nationalist leaders are feudals themselves and passed on leadership to their sons as per Asfandyar Wali, Gilanai, Achekzai, etc), Islam in the home and secular humanist values (yet they supported Najib and the communists who appeared to not support either one of these).

4. Yet the chorus singers (i.e. the Nationalist such as yourself) are as ideologically driven as the Islamists you so very much hate. Both of you lack extensive evidence to support your views as to which if you offers humanity a better deal, but the latter group, per my discussions on Ahmad Shah Abdali and your own essays are more in line with the natural order of what the Pashtun masses want. This being case, they have every right to utilize any and all means to destroy your hegemony if you choose to put the yolk on them.

5. You still have not a shred of proof that our adventurism has made America more secure (it has not because the AQ leadership has no desire to attack us on the mainland when they can hit us abroad in record numbers) nor has it enhanced our economic future.