WIJDON

Afghanistan will be holding their presidential election on August 20, 2009. Taliban leader Mullah Omar has called on a boycott of these elections and approximately 41 candidates are running for the place of President. 

Is there even a point to the elections? All bets are on Hamid Karzai being re-elected. There is really no point of even describing the other candidates stances and who they are. The whole government of Afghanistan is corrupt, the warlords are in power, Karzai's pick for his VP's are both corrupt individuals that have killed hundreds of Afghans. This corrupt group will somehow win. Sadly, of most of the candidates this group would probably be the best selection. They already have control, they can at least maintain the status quo. Other candidates are either no named candidates, which in Afghanistan mean they are not even a choice, or they are promoters of religious extremists, or have no clue as what to do. All these people, the current administration, the corrupt people in Afghanistan are raping the country of its dignity, value, history, land, and overall people. The war in Afghanistan is going to continue and most likely the US and NATO will have to leave, it has already been about 8 years and no real progress (yes a puppet government has been established) but nothing that will last when the US and NATO leave. All we can hope for is a peaceful election and no bloodshed.

Since the US has bombed certain parts of Afghanistan and killed many civilians there have been many protests. These protests are too late. These protests for corrective action for the US military to improve their future actions is too late. Protests work when you actually have someone listening to you. The Afghan community didn't even set up their protest in a way to have many supporters. Only about 40 or less people protested on the streets of Fremont, which is home to the largest population of Afghans outside of Afghanistan. 

Not once did Hamid Karzai come to visit Fremont. Not once did officials hold a meeting with Afghan Americans to discuss opinions about Afghanistan. Not once did Afghans in America have a voice in the war. 

I think this is a problem for Afghans and Americans. We need to communicate, we need to interact, we need to support one another for the greater good. Until that is done, we will never have a real solution to the problems of Afghanistan.

http://thestar.blogs.com/.a/6a00d8341bf8f353ef01156faa13a9970b-320wi

So recently a "new" Islamic, Shiite Law, was passed and signed by President Hamid Karzai. This law states that Shiite women are not to leave the house without the permission of their husband, father or brother unless it is for education, business, or something similar. This law also calls for a man to be able to sleep with his wife every 4th night and she must have a positive attitude and tend to his sexual desires unless she is ill, on her period, or some other reasons. This law goes into much detail and the Shiite clerics stated that Parliament nor the president is able to test the law or amend it or anything. The US as well as the rest of the western world are very upset and this is not the direction they wanted Afghanistan to be headed towards. 

Personally, I see much fault with all of this. I do not support the law that has been passed but the fact that this law has become a law doesn't mean that it never existed prior to this. Shiites, the minority in the Sunni dominated country, are considered by many outsiders to be more "progressive" than the majority Sunni Pashtuns in this generation but Sunni's believe Shiites are too extreme. Realistically all religions have their extremists and their moderates as well as their disbelievers. Throughout history  Hazaras have been either servants, murdered, raped, or treated as second class citizens in Afghanistan. This is not right, but which minority doesn't face discrimination in any country. The fact that Afghanistan used to be a secular government and after the US invasion the name changed to the ISLAMIC REPUBLIC OF AFGHANISTAN causes more of an emphasis on the religion. Religious countries have religious laws. I believe that this law does violate women's rights (no matter what type of woman). I am upset that no one can really do anything about this. No one can overturn the law and it was blindly signed by our "ally" Hamid Karzai. Women will never be liberated if we continue to allow such laws to be passed. The Sunni believe that the Shiite are more harsh on their women than they are. The Hazara, which are predominately Shiite are highly influenced by Iran, a Shiite country, and the fact that a law like this passed in Sunni dominated Afghanistan shows the influence of Shiites in the government. Iran has a hand in all of Afghanistan's affairs. We can't pick and choose who are allies are because the people will always think of the "ally" as a servant of a foreign force. 

Hillary Clinton, should not wear a chadar (scarf) when she meets with anyone. She is an American, not a Muslim from that country. To me, I understand she wants to respect their culture, but at the same time she must be very firm with these "leaders".  President Obama should not have bowed or even visited the Saudi family. Angela Merkel can is upset but powerless. 

Afghanistan is being handled all wrong. We need younger Afghans, that can speak to these Afghan "leaders" to slowly gain support for their Western ideas. Religion should not be discussed at all. Education should be promoted, religion should not be included in this and slowly the people will move a bit away from the ideas. I don't see this country going in the "right" direction for another several decades, or generations, or until someone from within the people is strong enough to fight all the clerics, traitors, warlords, foreigners, and have the support of the people.

I almost feel as though this is a lost cause for the US. We still can succeed but we need to change our tactics and become more heavy handed. All the new "wannabe" presidents in Afghanistan are not worth it. None have the potential to control the country. Karzai hasn't been able and he is America's favorite of them all. I hope one day we succeed and have Afghanistan a friend again but with this type of "democracy" in the country it will never be a successful state. Laws are being passed that violate basic human rights, women are considered property, and clerics have full power in the government as well as warlords while the President blindly signs a bill and later fully supports it. 

4/4/09

President Barack Obama has recently stated that his goal in Afghanistan is to add more troops to help control the insurgence. His idea of adding more troops is one that is no different from President Bush II. The sad thing about this entire idea is that Americans believed Obama would take troops out of Iraq and bring them home not put them back in another war. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton also had a conference in The Hague about dealing with Afghanistan. I personally didn't believe they were getting anywhere. In fact, China's representative stated that it would be a failure to the Afghan people to pull out of the war, which is true. This war is being fought wrong. 

 The fact that the world is putting Afghanistan and Pakistan together is one that I both understand and yet hope people understand the difference in the two. The Afghan/Pakistan border doesn't really exist. You have more than 6 million Afghans on the Pakistani side and the rest of Afghanistan in Afghanistan. On the other side of the border is one's uncle, cousin, brother, father, anything. The border may be there but in all actuality it is not there. 

I think that as an American, we don't understand history. The Soviet Union supposedly sent over over 200,000 troops and they fell to their knees and for a decade after leaving the country they fought to just keep their country together. Putin has warned the US in the past to stay away from Afghanistan. One must also understand that at that time, the Soviet's had an advantage over the US too. They were closer to Afghanistan, they had more troops, they had good weapons, and they were not able to do anything. America is further, have fewer troops, and are losing this war no matter what. 

 It is time to change tactics completely. With Barack Obama as president the world, including Afghanistan, is giving the US a chance to show their new attitude. But we have no difference from the previous administration. What we need to do is arrest and put on trial the warlords that are in power. These warlords have done nothing but kill, steal, lie and continue to do so with America in Afghanistan. Everyone from Rabbani, Faim, Shirzai, all of them need to be put on trial, charged with their crimes and executed when found guilty within a few weeks. This is not the type of country that you can allow these men to sit in jail for the rest of their lives, the execution will give justice to the Afghan people who have been raped, murdered, robbed, beaten, or had a loved one go through this. If any of these men were to die in an actual war by mistake or intention they will be considered a martyr like almost everyone else including the criminal warlord that many love like Massoud. Becoming a martyr is easy when it is believed that if you kill innocent people along with a few targets you will go to heaven and have all your desires met. These ideas come from the type of influence that America should force out, typically from Iran, Pakistan, and all other countries with their hands in Afghan affairs. Afghanistan is a place where America will and can become weak. The "rest of the world" will be helping and counting on this and will support the insurgents by supplying money, arms, and anything else to make Afghanistan bleed just like we did when we wanted the Soviets to become weak. 

We need to make friends with the people of Afghanistan, the women, the children and some of the moderate or liberal Taliban. The Taliban have no real leadership besides the old Mullah Omar, who is stuck in his ways. We need the next voice of this group. A voice we can influence to be modern and a voice that can control the Taliban. Someone with a good family background, a modern way of thinking, someone that allows women to be educated and a bit more free, someone who is open to the US still and this person may need to be created by the US. Someone in there twenties, or so. We should take many of the young people and bring them to the west to be educated, to interact and see how people live abroad. There are so many ways to go about this besides adding more troops, like adding more fuel to the fire. 

America is a superpower and can use their nuclear weapons if things got to rough, but we never will because having nuclear weapons means nothing if you can't use them. We are still living with the shame of killing so many in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I doubt any country will use it unless complete desperation hits, with bad leadership. Overall we need to change our tactics and I don't think that with Obama's proposed plan we have changed. 

01/30/09

                 The United States has been in Afghanistan for over a decade and still have not set a time line in place of when they estimate the accomplishment of their goals in the country. With President Barack Obama seeking to send in an additional 30,000 troops to the war ravaged country and military leaders making unrealistic, alienating, sadistic and questionable comments on how to manage the countries insurgents as well as improve the country, the US as well as NATO will be looking for a great loss in the country.

               The United Nations stated in recent news that the opium production in Afghanistan will decrease this year in the world's largest opium producing country. The UN also stated that the opium production has been a financial source for the Taliban. The opium production is primarily taking place in southern Afghanistan.

               Over the weekend a Taliban leader named Mullah Mohamad Rasul warned President Barack Obama that if there is more troops being deployed in Afghanistan that the insurgency will rise too. Mullah Rasul stated on Al-Jazeera that "the whole nation is ready for the fight" this clear warning of the potential loss of Afghanistan is widely ignored. President Obama currently has about 36,000 troops in Afghanistan and would like that number to be about 66,000 troops.

              NATO's commander Gen. John Craddock of the U.S. has stated in a letter to Gen. Egon Ramms, German, that “it was no longer necessary to produce intelligence or other evidence that each particular drug trafficker or narcotics facility in Afghanistan meets the criteria of being a military objective,” this was printed in the Der Spiegel Magazine. NATO has commented that no such orders have been given to any troops and many have declined to comment.

              Currently the Afghan presidential election has been delayed to August 20 instead of the original date in May. President Hamid Karzai was elected in 2004 and has been considered a puppet of the United States is now having relations with Russia and wants to put pressure on the Obama administration in order to have the US cater to his needs.

 I see the US making all the wrong moves and they have no one telling them how their actions will play out. Sending more troops to Afghanistan is one of the worst things that the US can do as of now. When the Soviet entered Afghanistan with over a few hundred thousand soldiers nothing but loss took place for the superpower had to retreat with its tail in between its legs. Russia currently understands the entire situation and has warned the US of certain actions in Afghanistan. The Taliban is no more, the fact that reports of Taliban is still rampant is the ignorance of the people in charge at the moment. The Taliban was created to provide peace and stability to the country. No opium was traded, the Taliban brought security but did not go any further in bringing education, construction, and so on to the country. They did not take or were not able to take the extra step. But the people of Afghanistan that fight foreigners in their land is the Pashtuns. During the war with the Soviets, America were friends of the dominant tribe and created the name Mujaheddin, the holy warriors. This term used by Ronald Reagan was the term Americans used when describing the people that made the Soviet bleed and drop to its knees. America was wise in making friends with the dominant Pashtun tribe then but now has alienated the people. The 2004 election of Hamid Karzai was peaceful because the Pashtuns still assumed that America was a good and fair ally to them. President Hamid Karzai is a traitor to the United States by communicating with different governments for his sole interests. Hamid Karzai is considered to be a handpicked president by the US but Afghan people accepted him because America is considered a great country and an ally in the past. But today Karzai is protected by foreign soldiers of fortune because no Afghan likes him. What ruler is protected by foreign soldiers. Once he is done with his presidency he can not stay in the country, he will have to live somewhere abroad because no one is happy with him. He was someone no one knew or cared for. In Afghanistan, no one cares what you know, but care for who you are. They ask "you are the son of who?" family lineage is one of the most important things even to the Afghan Americans. Pashtuns have ruled the country for as long as history has allowed them and for the past 300 years every legitimate king has been from the south; Kandahar. The people America put in power and worked with to "find" Al-Queda were all of minority parties, traitors and sell outs. Marshall Faim, General Dostam, and so on are all warlords that raped, tortured, and stole the country. These particular people were traitors for a long time not only to their home country of Afghanistan but to their supposed ally in the worldly nations. They would take bribes from the US, Russia, Iran, Pakistan and so on. Currently they are doing the same. Hamid Karzai becoming friendly with Russia is a direct slap in the face of the US. His family is to blame for a lot of the drug trade and shame on NATO and the US if they can not control the opium trade in Afghanistan. Everyday people are growing opium because that is the easiest way to make a living but the 40 countries that are occupying Afghanistan should be able to control the growth and not all of the growers are helping the Taliban. American needs to re-establish their relationship with the Pashtuns while the Obama administration is given time to establish their character to the Pashtuns. This is the time to make the correct decisions. Russia and Iran are currently trying to help the "construction" of the country. They are focusing on the correct way to win the heart of the people. Mullah Rasul has clearly mentioned that the "people" are ready to fight if they are not listened to. Russia and Iran who has interests in the country are clearly doing what they understand of the country, making ties with the Pashtuns while the US is considering full on war and abandoning efforts of reconstruction. With a general making comments as shooting people without establishing their guilt is shameful. These comments are not going to be taken likely and he should be taken off the task of Afghanistan. No one has the right of license to kill. If so then America's image will further deteriorate similar to when the photos were released from Guantanamo Bay and the torture reports being released. Afghanistan is difficult to understand to an outsider. But Afghanistan is manageable. Allying with the Pashtuns is key, not alienating them. The Pashtun people have always fought all the wars and have won all the wars they fought unlike the people that are considered to be sell outs and traitors in their own native land. Once America decides to communicate with the Pashtuns and make an effort to have peace everything will be easier. Afghans are currently turning to outside help to wage a full on war with the US if the US foreign policy continues to do as they have been doing and they will have a list of allies to help fight the US. Potential enemies like Russia, Pakistan, China and Iran are all on the list who will support Afghan insurgents but I am asking the US to change its approach and the future will be brighter for the US and Afghanistan. America still has a lot of supporters in Afghanistan and is the greatest country in the world. With the new administration the world is waiting for the new tone that will be set for foreign policy. We need to make a stand for what is right for everyone.

 Photo

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