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Once More Fear Stalks the Streets of Kandahar
There is a little girl in the Meir Wais hospital with livid scars and dead skin across her face, an obscene map of brown and pink tissue. Then there is another girl, a beautiful child, Khorea Horay, grimacing in pain, her leg amputated, her life destroyed after her foot was torn to pieces. In another ward, two girls lie on their backs, a tent above their limbs. One has lost an arm, another – a 16-year-old – a leg.
Then there is the grim young man with the beard, also in the darkest pain, who looks at me with suspicion and puzzlement. He has a bullet wound in the abdomen, a great incision sutured up after the doctors found it infected. Two other young men, also bearded, cowled in brown "patu" shawls, sit beside this suffering warrior. They, too, stare at me as if I am a visitor from Mars. Perhaps that's what I am in Kandahar. Better to be a Martian than a Westerner in a city which in all but name has fallen to the Taliban.
The black turbans are everywhere. So are the blue burkhas which we Westerners confidently – stupidly – believed would vanish from Afghan society. But the Taliban insist they were not responsible for throwing acid in the face of the little girl in the second-floor ward at Meir Wais hospital. You know what she is thinking. You know what her parents are thinking. Who will marry this girl now, with her patchwork face of pain? Four men on a motorcycle threw acid at her and 13 of her friends on their way to school. Four were brought here, two dispatched immediately to the eye department. The Taliban deny any involvement. But they would, wouldn't they?
Khorea Horay is a victim of that other tormentor of southern Afghanistan, the forces of Western "civilisation" who dispense "collateral damage" to the poor and the illiterate of Kandahar province in their determination to bring "freedom" and "democracy" to the land that defeated both Alexander the Great and Ghengis Khan. The Americans air-raided her village of Shahrwali Kut in their battle against "terrorism"; a Taliban on a nearby hilltop appears to have fired a missile at Nato troops before our Western technology arrived to crush Khorea's village. "I looked downwards and my foot was in little pieces," she said. "They came from the sky and from the ground. It started in the afternoon and went on into the night." In all, 36 members of a wedding party were killed in Shahrwali Kut on 5 November. That's why she is one of the lucky ones. But luck is relative. Nato forces in southern Afghanistan have promised an inquiry. Needless to say, not a single Western soldier has visited Khorea's hospital ward to say sorry, even to offer a little compassion.
The two girls with amputations are very definitely victims of the Taliban. They were walking in the very centre of Kandahar when a suicide bomber exploded an oil tanker packed with explosives outside the council office which still – theoretically – belongs to the government. The target was Wali Karzai, governor of Kandahar, brother of President Hamid Karzai, a man still desperately denying that he is a local drugs warlord. He escaped. Six died. Of the 45 wounded brought to the Meir Wais hospital, almost all were women and children, many of them crushed by falling walls after the explosion.
The doctors lost only one of their patients, a senior police officer, while two bodies were brought to the hospital morgue, one of them a woman. The Taliban happily claimed responsibility for the bomb which tore their own people apart – and which allowed the Nato commander, US General David McKiernan, to pump out some familiar warspeak. "These cowardly acts reflect how dishonourable the insurgents truly are," he said. "No one can honestly say they are fighting for the people ...".
But who is "fighting for the people" of Kandahar? To its immense credit, the International Committee of the Red Cross is donating £1m a year to the Meir Wais hospital and 11 of its international staff are – incredibly – working full-time in Kandahar. Every other NGO has fled the Taliban city but the ICRC – in contact with "all parties", as the ubiquitous codicil goes – are dispensing medicines, surgical help and courage. They come from Switzerland, France, Ivory Coast, Hungary, New Zealand, Australia and other nations – and walk a tightrope in this terribly dangerous city. Anyone who still chastises the ICRC for its pusillanimous role in confronting the Nazi Holocaust of the Second World War should meet the brave men and women who work here.
A little girl is brought into the hospital in a green dress. "Isn't she beautiful?" Nola Henrya nurse from Australia asked us. "She fractured a bone, but it got infected. Now we will see if we can save her leg." Green-eyed, her tousled black hair falling over her face, the three-year-old sits on the cold concrete floor, eyeing us, half suspicious, half-mischievous, conscious of being the centre of our attention. They often arrive like this, too late for surgery or for cure. Many families arrive from the villages with children dying in their arms. "We are an uneducated people," an Afghan doctor told me with painful if unnecessary humility. "These people do not know what is wrong with their children and they wait till it's bad before they bring them here. By then, it is very bad." I look at one-year-old Nourallah. He is a skeletal creature as light as a pillow, his eyes glazing over at us within circles of skin.
And it is all too clear what is wrong with many of these children. They are dying of hunger. There is a mini-famine in the desolation of the deserts of Kandahar and Helmand. Malnutrition here is a kind of disease. So is fear. I talk to a young Afghan woman hospital worker, dressed in a burkha, educated in Pakistan, fluent in English. "I am afraid," she said. "We are all afraid. We all feel threatened. It's not just 'them' [she means the Taliban] but it's my own relatives, my aunt, my cousin. I do not tell them what I do. I just say I work in a hospital."
Across Kandahar, there is great anger. At the government's corruption, at the Nato occupation and their killings. Little is said of the Taliban. But who condemns those who are winning the war? Taliban officials now speak with near-courtesy of the Tadjiks and Uzbeks and Hazaras who were their sectarian enemies in the awful years of Taliban rule. "If they are against the occupation, they are all friends now," one of the wisest local residents said. There is a new vein of nationalism within the Taliban. "Twenty per cent of the population here are Shias and their mosques were turned into Sunni places of worship by the Taliban during their rule. But now the Shias are asking their mullahs what they should do if America attacks Iran, and their mullahs told them that if this happens, they should support the Islamic Republic and attack all American and Nato interests in Kandahar."
Beside the vast American airbase 20 miles away, a Nato metropolis adjacent to the most Islamist city in Afghanistan, the "international" airport sits in a slough of despond, its chain-smoking Afghan soldiers scarcely bothering to carry out security procedures on passengers, its echoing, empty departure lounges adorned with crude advertisements for tourist agencies that no longer exist and for an Afghan army which disappears from the roads after 4pm every day. I stood beside the runway yesterday, watching the armada of US air fleets roaring into the pale blue wintry sky, Russian-built transports and high-flying US reconnaissance jets and Kiowa helicopters and the softly landing Predators and Raptors, the hi-tech, broad-winged pilotless spotters and killers. The Predators look for the targets. The Raptors fire Hellfire missiles – manufacturers, Boeing and Lockheed Martin. One Raptor returned with its missiles still locked to its wings. Was its mission aborted over Pakistan? Or Helmand?
Another took off. Two minutes later – I could still just see it – at 1,500 feet, US personnel at Tampa, Florida, would have taken over its flight path. It was 11.30 in the morning, a computer guiding its progress at 2am US Eastern Standard Time. Does the guiding hand on the other side of the world have any idea of the political direction in which this machine is flying? Or of the people it threatens.
Barack Obama wants to send 7,000 more American troops to this disaster zone. Does he have the slightest idea what is going on in Afghanistan? For if he did, he would send 7,000 doctors.
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16 Comments so far
Show All'...and which allowed the Nato commander, US General David McKiernan, to pump out some familiar warspeak. "These cowardly acts reflect how dishonourable the insurgents truly are," he said. "No one can honestly say they are fighting for the people ...".'
If there is any form of war-making more cowardly and dishonorble than dropping ordinance on civilians from warplanes at 10,000 feet or from the hardened armament points under the wings of Predator drones controlled from miles away or from the other side of the world I have yet to hear of it. Whatever 'honor' there is to be found in war, and I argue it's illusory at best, it's in face to face combat with others who have the same chance of taking your life as you have of taking theirs. Everything else is just murder.
But, but...we are winning the war on terror, aren't we?. Afghanistan, a country of proud people who have suffered so much in the past 30 years or so, just tragic. It has been invaded and occupied countless times over the centuries, never truly successfully though - at least not that I am aware of. I do not know what the answer is or what the way forward for Afghanistan is. No matter what, people will continue to die from conflict or want, or be tragically wounded. Just a gawdawful mess - Afghanistan may have had a slim chance if all of the assets weren't pulled out in 2002 to get ready for the absolutely needless and illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq.
Where would #44 find 7,000 doctors? Maybe Fidel can help out.
I think the best plan would be to stop bombing and leave the people in peace to recover.
The Taliban will moderate after the turmoil abates and schoolgirls can enjoy life as the Lord provided.
The Taliban did not allow women and girls to attend school let alone let them out of their homes without a male "maharram" family escort. There's no way they'll moderate that if they come back to power (which I hope does not happen). The Taliban are funded by Pakistan. Until Pakistan is held accountable and forced to end their support of the Taliban, ordinary Afghans will continue to suffer.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB227/index.htm
DCBeltway1
That nsarchive link only shows information up to November 7 2001. A lot has happened since then, like elections in Pakistan for instance. With all the opium money why would the Resistance to the occupation need money from Pakistan now?
Robert Fisk always gets the job done, doesn't he. He once got beaten up, not too long ago, and goes back.
Why is the US in Afghanistan?
My thoughts exactly,Tirebiter and well put.War has become an armchair activity for the U.S. (apart from the poor rubes on the ground).
And, oh we bombed a few wedding parties. Ooops!!
Sioux Rose
Robert Fisk has a remarkable way of taking the reader to the scene of what he's describing, and how poignant it is. Whenever I think of the budget being dedicated to building more weapons, I think of these children who walked under a sky that rained down bullets and tears. Sometimes it feels almost impossible to share life on a planet with persons who continue to invest in these things, and in order to justify such such tools of destruction, they use trained, intelligent minds to come up with bogus nonsense that turns a lot of people against persons who have never done a thing to harm those who are on hair-trigger to use their large inventory of senseless weapons. EVERY master teacher has come to the earth plane to teach peace. Most have shared very basic suggestions about how to overcome anger, hatred, and dark passions in the interest that ALL may live. There is NO excuse for these weapons this late in mankind's "game."
Let's lay back the emotions and cut to the chase. What's your solution?
Let's lay back the emotions and cut to the chase. What's your solution?
Fisk closes with, "Barack Obama wants to send 7,000 more American troops to this disaster zone. Does he have the slightest idea what is going on in Afghanistan? For if he did, he would send 7,000 doctors".
Good idea about sending doctors, medical people, instead of troops, but from what I've read a number of times, Obama's spoken of wanting to send more than 7,000 more U.S. troops; believing to recall that the number he's mentioned or said to have mentioned, sometimes anyway, is 10,000 or 15,000 more troops. Make'em all doctors and Afghanistan will have even more than 7,000.
Fisk accuses the Taliban of having thrown acid into the face of a young Afghan girl, and others, hate-mongerers against the Taliban have also said this, but I've not seen any proof of this; just accusations that aren't supported except with the fact that the Taliban have been oppressive towards women's rights, those of Afghan women anyway. In this, and in other flames of Fisk's against the Taliban, it's as if he's perhaps intending to beat the war drums, trying to drum up support for the U.S. and NATO war of totally criminal aggression there, only, and also "as if", hoping the U.S. and NATO will stop these crimes and then work on defeating the Taliban, who never attacked or threatened the West in any way; and who also offered to extradite Usama Bin Ladin, but the govt this was offered to be done with and which I've read to have been Pakistan refused, while the Bush-Cheney cabal surely knew of this, given the strong but otherwise very secret ties between the two govts and the U.S. CIA and Pakistani ISI.
It's not only the Pakistani govt that has aided the Taliban; the U.S. provided funds and training through the Pakistani govt. This is according to, both, what I've read, and what we can certainly believe based on criminal U.S. conduct international; f.e., the Salvador Option, remember that example, and plenty more like enough to it?! Another example is the U.S.A.'s secret doings in Rwanda and including in relation to the assassination of the president of that country, as well as the president of a neighbouring country; the U.S., as well as UN "peacekeeping" forces having been criminally involved in much or else all of these crimes and the large genocide there in 1994. The sort of things Western msm "news" media has of course kept censored, or helped to keep censored.
Sounds like Fisk is, in part, beating war drums again; a little like he did against the Hizbollah in Lebanon in 2006, too. Perhaps more than only "a little" like that example. Maybe he's still disappointed, say, that Britain never won or could win in Afghanistan, when Britain tried; and that no other foreign forces have ever won there, either. Maybe he has a grudge over this failed history for the West. Ya never know; he's Brit, and, I believe anyway, Christian, some kind of one anyway; not one much at all like Jesus, but one who, I guess anyway, is member of some church called Christian, the most heinous, murdering, ... peoples on Earth, historically, but not ended yet is this history, very evidently not.
The only real bitch he illustrates having against the Taliban in this article is their oppression of Afghan women's rights, and that's not an issue to launch wars about; it's an issue to take up diplomatically, much like when the Taliban agreed to work with the U.N. to eradicate poppy cultivation for the purpose of curbing heroin trafficking, and which the Taliban extremely succeeded in doing.
An article by John Pilger and perhaps of last January was about an interview he had with an Afghan woman and on both the Taliban, and the Afghan war and drug lords the U.S. and NATO have put into power since Sept. 2001. She described the former as considerably, or else very, much worse, but also condemned the Taliban for ... not their lack of providing civil security for women, for they did this, but for their oppression of women's rights to education, etc. Other than for that oppression, women could safely walk about Taliban-controlled society there; no crimes against them were permitted or tolerated. So it's a question of [talking] with them in order to get them to agree to the UN Charter of Human Rights; although it's a hypocritical thing for the West to do, since barely any of our govts [respect] this Charter, well, someone should still talk to the Taliban about curbing the oppression against women.
Better they win, than the West win there! The Taliban have at least demonstrated the will and energy to honourably work with the U.N.
How about you people starting to illustrate such honourability?
Want to condemn the Taliban? Try the following for consideration.
"Would You Kill Jefferson Davis?", by Barry Nolan
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2008/11/20-1
See if that helps to drive any real [thinking] on your parts. Maybe we'll get lucky and you'll begin to illustrate some [real] [thinking].
Anyone worshipping Fisk like some people who commented in this page evidently seem to do is an idolator worshipping false gods. He did fine reporting at the start of the present war on Iraq, but doesn't always do what is critically considerable as proper reporting; his bigotry, or whatever his problem is, comes through in some of his articles.
Mike as someone who talks to Afghans all the time...my husband and Afghan in-laws and the Afghan American community they all hate the Taliban and fear them. They don't think its possible to negoiate with them as the Taliban breaks thier promises and they don't want Afghanistan to be ruled by them. They want a secure Afghanistan where people have freedoms. They also hate the Afghan War Lords. They miss the days of King Zahir Shah as in their minds this was the best time in recent memory in Afghanistan.
DCBeltway1
Nostalia for a golden age can sustain people when things are tough, but does anyone really think there could ever be a return to something like the King Zahir Shah era?
Furthermore, and on the young Taliban girl whose face was disfigured with acid, even if [a] Taliban did this, then this does not mean that the Taliban, overall, support such acts; they may have a rule against brutality or such brutalities against Afghan women, while some individuals among the Taliban broke the rules.
Happens [all the time], that is, very often, among Americans of the USA, Europeans, and so on! You have groups of considerable numbers and they have rules against violence, but on paper only for some members, who break the rules. Happens all the time with U.S. police forces; it's happening with some Canadian police forces; etcetera.
West better be careful, for it has a long history of Euro-... bigotries, racism, slavery, and so on.