How do you stop the Taliban when they don't care? One of the Yahoo headlines this morning was "Teams of gunman launch attacks in Pakistan, killing 39". They took place in Lahore, Pakistan's second largest city, in its largest province, Punjab.
Imagine reading that teams of gunman killed 39 in L.A. That's what it would be like. Imagine reading that 39 were killed, that all the attackers were killed, but knowing there were many more of them out there, around, in the Hollywood hills, or Pasadena, or Santa Monica, planning, recruiting, and waiting to do it again. Another 39, or by their hopes, hopefully more.
Authorities quoted in the article said that none of the attackers had any illusion or interest in having their lives extended by one more day.
And how do you fight that? I think you try to understand it first. But how does one do that when it all seems so senseless?
A logical first question would be 'What are they fighting and so willingly dying...for?' It's not because, best as I can tell, the government of Pakistan is oppressing them, denying them personal rights or liberties or basic guarantees of fairness or equal protection or any of those things which meet our western definitions of liberty and equality. They are Muslim, we all know. So is 95% of Pakistan! So it's not like they are denied rights to practice their religion. That's not why they're dying.
With no other worries or wants, would these same people be offing themselves?..you know, just because they want to, because maybe they believe something tantalizingly good is awaiting them in the afterlife? Honestly, I can't be sure, not having talked or supped or walked with a single Taliban. But I doubt it. In a purely analytical exercise of attempting through deduction to understand the Taliban, I would draw a line through that one.
Afghanistan and the badlands of Pakistan have for centuries, say again, for centuries been tribal, with tribes only cooperating markedly with one another when threatened by an invader, whether Alexander the Great, the USSR, the Americans, or now, jointly, the Americans and Pakistan, and, if you want, throw in NATO in there as well. So, is it a state they want? To be sure, an Islamic state, under Sharia law? They haven't wanted a state over those many centuries - why do they want one now so badly they are willing to volunteer so readily for an early death? And once again, I don't think it's just a suicidal nature that lets them kill themselves with such Monty Pythonesque ease.
So, I don't think they want a nation so badly. They just haven't over the centuries and it makes no sense why all of the sudden they want one now. Even when the Taliban were officially in charge of Afghanistan prior to 9/11, they, like the current government, controlled Kabul and some other more populated areas, but the hinter areas were controlled by warlords. You passed or you didn't based on their whim, their turnpike fee, their levy, their tariff, their law, whatever. The Taliban were, to be sure, the dominant warlord, if you think of them that way. They were the baddest of the bad asses around, with the most numbers, the most guns. And various things, frankly, and coarsely, my apologies, pissed them off, like women's ankles, girls' schools, literacy in general, a too-short beard, and certainly anyone who challenged them, the latter getting you a certain death sentence, on the center line, in the soccer stadium, with all watching and hopefully learning from others' mistakes.
I feel quite comfortable in thinking that such was then and would be now more than a sufficient accomplishment for them to stop killing themselves; but shy of that, I wonder if anything would be.
There is a CarFax commercial on now, where the used-car salesman says to the interested buyer, "What can I do to put you in this car today?" To which the buyer replies, "Show me the CarFax." And the salesman says, "Anything else?"
I don't know if there's "anything else" that the Taliban would find satisfactory shy of their opportunity and, but possibly for the U.S., enviable prospects of reacquiring their status as baddest of the bad asses in Afghanistan. It's essentially tribal thinking, just on a large enough scale that it seems geopolitical. The geography involved is just large enough. Mostly, the Taliban are geopolitical because they successfully gave shelter and succor to another group of bad asses who successfully brought down two landmark buildings right here in America, and have launched a lot of other fateful strikes around the world. I don't think we fear that the Taliban might play its strong tribal hand, as people from that part of the world have done for centuries, and come out on top. The fear of the Taliban is a fear of an improved lot for Al Qaeda, and what that might portend. And it's a general revulsion and repugnance at a dual-use soccer stadium.
America is faced with a decision whether she has the treasure and, even, the ability, by force of arms and a compelling alternative dialectic which is democracy, to make Afghanistan and the tribal regions of Pakistan something they have never been - ever. We are pretty good, here. Pretty capable. Critically in debt, and yet every year able to achieve a domestic product that keeps other people and other nations buying that debt. We are, have become, to both our credit and detriment, that new company, critically in debt, but wonderfully promising and compelling such that its stock price just continues to rise. But can America invest her capital in remaking Afghanistan into something it never remotely has been? Or do we have the tools now, which we didn't before 9/11, or weren't effectively using, to keep a watchful eye on Afghanistan, and bomb the livin' bejeeziz out of it, or areas of it, if we see the areas once again being host to Al Qaeda and like groups?
In answering the question for yourself, I would counsel against thinking America, in her current fiscal straits, can take on another guaranteed-to-be-long-term project of unknowable cost other than it's huge. If the value of the dollar falls too much further, you will see a fulsome effort on the part of an increasing number of countries to dump the dollar as their reserve currency. If you are not a soldier, or a member of a military family, then your life more than likely has been rather remote from adverse affects which could be tied to the decisions to fight in Iraq and Afghanistan to date. It won't be if the world drops the dollar as its reserve currency. In assessing the threat of Al Qaeda, the treat of another 9/11, and what to do about it, assess the threat of America launching into an economic downturn which takes literally decades to crawl out of, and whether your answer on what to do about Al Qaeda reduces or increases that risk. Because I guarantee you that President Obama and his advisers are working through that question right now. It's General McChrystal's job to think like a soldier, Obama's to think like a national leader, and not of just any country, but the richest and most influential country on this earth...for now.
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