Rethinking It

Former BushOilCo Arbusto consultant cum installed American Presidential Puppet of Afghanistan, Hamid Karzai, isn't particularly pleased with where America has left his country.

The drug market has exploded as poppy fields are replanted, sections of the country are still lawless, some areas are coming under serious violent challenge from the Taleban, who we supposedly routed, and things just aren't looking good. The government teeters with extremist candidates, and it doesn't help that, while America was going to war with Iraq, we cut our aid funding to Afghanistan and stripped out UN programs in the country.

And it may have to do with America's utter dismal attempt at capturing Bin Laden. This year we've observed the 4th anniversary of the attacks of 9/11, and we still have no definitive knowledge of the fate of Osama Bin Laden.

And so Karzai is displeased.

Violence largely blamed on the Taleban has claimed at least 1,000 lives this year - the worst toll since 2001. He said there had to be a focus on "the sources of terrorism" where extremists get their training and inspiration.

Many Afghans will interpret that as meaning neighbouring Pakistan, from where militants often launch attacks. Pakistan, meanwhile, has offered to build a fence along the border with Afghanistan to prevent the movement of militants.

In an interview with the BBC, Mr Karzai said the US military strategy since the fall of the Taleban had not failed, in spite of the recent increase in violence.

But he warned: "We and the international community and the coalition must sit down and reconsider and rethink whether the approach to the defeat of terrorism that we have taken is the right one."

Mr Karzai then said: "I believe we have to go to the sources of it, where terrorists are trained, where terrorists are prompted up."

...
Mr Karzai also said he wished the international community had given more aid money for reconstruction over the past three-and-a-half years. President Karzai said he was grateful for what Afghanistan had received, but said it could have been spent more effectively.

This could have been done, he said, "through more Afghan ownership, with more calculated application and in areas where Afghans thought best - for example, road building, electricity, agriculture".

Hm. So it looks more and more like the Bush response to crisis, whether he's built that crisis or is simply reining President during one, the effect is the same: buerocratic political PR without ANY responsible results.

Thanks for your reaction to Katrina Mr. President: your attempt to make America as great a place to live as Afghanistan.