OR: Doing Good Is a 2-Way Street
The U.S. press doesn't it discuss it very often or loudly (page 4) but the situation in Afghanistan is deteriorating rapidly to the point that the only area that the NATO-American forces control is the capital. Historically, the warlords in the country have a siege mentality of waiting foreign occupiers out (for example: Russia) and are in no hurry to pick a side between the muslim extremists (the Taliban) and the westerners who want to say they are in control of the country. But growing evidence of corruption, deceit, and lack of democratic progress should alarm Americans who think we will ultimately have democracy and capitalism in the country.
Historically, Afghanistan is not Iraq in the sense that religious fervor is not as strong as political control of land. A muslim cleric in Afghanistan is rarely a rallying cry for change or political aspirations. Control of land is held in families for generations and large independent armies (well outside of the control of the "national" government) patrol their areas much as knights did during the European feudal period. Cooperation based on a "what's in it for me" basis is more likely to occur between warlords with something to lose than with the national government because the only thing a warlord needs is protection and the threat against them is rarely their neighbor. Government offers of food, water, aid in return for laying down of arms for cooperation in a myriad of necessary ways (economic and political) are simply satire because no warlord believes the central government will be there 12 months from now.
Hamid Karzai, the current Afghanistan President (I thought presidents were "elected?") has such a strong negative image in Afghanistan that he can be of no use, but is praised by President Bush (the sort of elected U.S. one--J/K) as a leader for the future. But any chance that might have happened occured last December when Karzai said he thought Bin Laden would be caught "soon". (Who do you think protects Bin Laden?) Karzai keeps reiterating that democracy is possible in Afghanistan and in the same breath pushes back elections 3 more months. Afghani warlords know only power and manipulation, not rhetoric and indecisiveness. They can wait Karzai (as the political puppet of the Americans) out.
A couple weeks ago I had some nice interchanges with some servicemen serving in Iraq about "goodwill" done by them for the Iraqi people and similar works are being done in Iraq, As a fan of people doing good works (hopefully everyone is) I questioned them at the time about the idea that American soldiers weren't the right people to be doing these works. "Soldier" is not, IMHO, the normal job description of someone helping to fix up schools and orphanages. The soldiers I talked with in a very straightforward manner replied that they were trained for such work and indeed were better equipped for it than most aid workers.
Here is the problem and I mean no disrespect to the soldiers. When the overriding political situation (as we have in Afghanistan) is so poisonous, any good works are just temporary stop gap measures against the on-coming flood of shells and bullets when the current government is overthrown by whichever warlord gets there first when the NATO-American troops leave. The problem with Afghanistan is not that they don't have schools. The problem is that they don't value education.
Many people have the misconception that democracy is easy to do. The American Experiment, our society that we all value so highly, was not brought about without titanic struggles. Almost as soon as there was a "United States" people were at odds over what that should mean and what powers belonged to whom. The Civil War (80 years after we founded the Republic) may have settled the national government's right to control but even today the battle and struggle goes on (consider the gay marriage amendment). Democracy is not easy, requires years and years of development and struggle. Americans had at least one advantage in doing the experiment, as Englishmen they at least felt there was a tradition of the relationship between government and the individual. But Afghanistan has none of this and no reason to develop it.
It is a sad commentary when a political party like the Republicans find foreign policy so flexible that "nation-building," that abhorrent Clinton policy in Somalia can be so readily adopted for themselves in Afghanistan. Sad because the Republicans are noted as a party of conservative thought and slow change. But Afghanistan is a country of interest to them only in that it is not feeding terrorists to Europe and America for 9/11 type disasters.
The day will come when Americans feel safe once more. Afghanistan then becomes what? No strategic value... No political ties.... No significant resources to harvest....
As we already mentioned, the Afghan warlords are patient.