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The Wrong Occupation
In Kabul, Afghanistan’s beleaguered capitol city, a young woman befriended me during December of 2010. She was eager to talk about her views, help us better understand the history of her country, and form lasting relationships. Now, she is too frightened to return a phone call from visiting westerners. The last time I saw her, during the spring of 2011, she was extremely anxious because, weeks earlier, U.S. Joint Special Operations Commandos (JSOC) had arrested her brother-in-law. The family has no idea how to find him. Once, someone working for the International Commission of the Red Cross called the family to say that he was still alive and in the custody of the International Security Assistance Forces, (ISAF). Numerous families in Afghanistan experience similar misery and fear after night raids that effectively “disappear” family members who are held incommunicado and sometimes turned over to Afghan National Police or the dreaded National Directorate of Security, (NDS).
An October 22, 2011 New York Times report about the findings of UN researchers who interviewed 324 Afghans detained by security forces, found that half of those who were in detention sites run by the NDS told of torture which included beatings, twisting of genitals, stress positions, suspension, and threatened sexual assault. Of the 324 interviewed, 89 had been handed over to the Afghan intelligence service or the police by U.S./NATO international military forces.
Even though high commanders in the ranks of the U.S. JSOC acknowledge that 50% of the time the night raids and drone attacks “get” the wrong person, (Washington Post, September 3, 2011), the U.S. war planners have steadily escalated reliance on these tactics.
Consider the killing of three brothers in the Nemati family who lived in the Sayyidabad village in Afghanistan’s Wardak province. Ismail, age 25, and Buranullah, age 23, had returned from their studies in Kabul to celebrate the start of Ramadan with their family in August of 2010. With their brother Faridullah, age 17, they went to the family guest room to study for exams. They were joined by their younger brother, Wahidullah, age 13.
An initial U.S. military press release on August 12th, 2010, indicated that U.S. forces had captured an important Taliban figure nearby and had taken fire from the Nemati home where they believed Taliban fighters were being hosted as guests. Indeed, two Taliban fighters had stopped at the home two days earlier, asking for food. Fearful of repercussions if they didn’t feed them, the family had given them food.
According to a report from McClatchy News, (August 20, 2010), the youngest brother, Wahidullah, said that American soldiers burst through the guest room door around 1:30 a.m. and started firing. As Buranullah and Faridullah lay bleeding to death, Ismail tried to speak with the soldiers in English. Wahidullah said Ismail was still alive as the assault force led him out of the room, but he wasn’t sure whether all three brothers had been hit during the initial shooting.
Photographs, which the family provided and the U.S. military verified, show three distinct bloodstains on the floor where the U.S. forces shot the brothers.
Later, U.S. military forces admitted that they had no evidence that the man they captured, nearby, was actually a Taliban fighter, and they weren’t able to produce a weapon in the Nemati family compound.
McClatchy News interviewed a friend of Ismail Nemati: "He was not Taliban," Omid Ali, 21, said in broken English about his school friend. "I want to say to President Obama: Afghanistan doesn't have hostility towards foreign forces, but, these mistakes, that is how they will be defeated in Afghanistan." Another student asked why the U.S. would kill innocent people and young people who are the future of the nation.
Our friend Hakim, coordinator of the Afghan Youth Peace Volunteers, writing in the imagined voice of a 10 year old girl from Kandahar, sent us these lines, reflecting on 10 years of U.S./NATO warfare in Afghanistan:
Who says this must be so?
Who cares that this is so?
I shudder that the raids and bombs
have made us less than human.
I wish to go to our deserted schools
to understand why we are like this.
I used to dream of spaces,
blue skies and gentler people.
I heard mother through her burqa
pleading please ‘Stop!’
‘Stop the money. Stop the killing.
Stop.’
Another local explosion,
more international lies.
Our global problem is that
guns impose greater force
than common sense
or vision, which tells me
that my mother’s world is crashing.
If Afghans are ever to rebuild their world, we in the United States must stop afflicting them with U.S. strategies to control their resources, use their land for geopolitical influence, and perpetuate violence as a justification for maintaining 200 U.S./NATO forward operating bases, three major bases, an ever expanding U.S. Embassy designed to become the largest in the world, and three major prisons as well as an unspecified number of detention sites.
“Wars are always futile and counterproductive,” says Dr. Jack Nelson-Pallmeyer, a professor and peace activist in Minneapolis, MN. “We attack other people and they attack us back and then we pour money into our military, accelerating our financial decline.”
We’re living in an exciting and hope-charged time as people worldwide are stretching their wings, testing their capacities to confront greed and disparities in political power between haves and have-nots. Many have marched against the Afghan Occupation, against a dictatorship of night raids and shootings, disappearances and checkpoints, a dictatorship- never mind the fraudulently elected local government or how it won its scant power - of the ultimate "have" nation over a nation that has never had less. Protesters’ demands are criticized in the press as being vague and all-encompassing. But I hope the occupiers of town squares and plazas continue sensing and communicating the vastness of the problem while retaining their inspiring power to change it. Many who are led to protest in the U.S. may understandably want tax reform, better jobs, higher salaries and more lucrative "occupations" for people. But we have an opportunity to ask even more important questions by seeking work that is truly useful, as well as production of goods and services that won't serve military causes and won't be used for war, destruction, and bloodshed.
A statement from the Las Vegas Catholic Worker gathering, issued on the tenth anniversary of the U.S. war in Afghanistan, called on U.S. people to convert our war-based economy to one centered on serving the common good, alleviating poverty and protecting the environment. "As we hear the cry of the suffering and the poor of our country and world," the statement says, "we demand that all resources being squandered for weapons and war be instead spent to meet urgent human needs."
"Occupy Together" efforts proliferating across the world may yet help young friends in Afghanistan find reasons for hope. Innocent youngsters may not be forced to feel that their world is crashing.
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25 Comments so far
Show All"Many who are led to protest in the U.S. may understandably want tax reform, better jobs, higher salaries and more lucrative "occupations" for people. But we have an opportunity to ask even more important questions by seeking work that is truly useful, as well as production of goods and services that won't serve military causes and won't be used for war, destruction, and bloodshed."
The great thing about all these protests and the thing that makes them very difficult for the entrenched powers to attack -- or even understand -- is that they do not have a specific demand or goal. And they certainly do not have a single "leader", who would be easy to "take out."
The people who are out there protesting are all over the place in their goals and aspirations, but all the protests seem to share one thing: they are all about the fundamental lack of fairness in the current system.
True democracy is the only thing that will even allow people to even ask the "really important" questions.
Oct2011 in DC is about ending corporatism and militarism. Human needs not corporate greed! check out their website.
SocJustice4all, yes, Oct2011 was certainly, as you say, "about ending corporatism and militarism", but it was also about addressing the deeply disguised EMPIRE that is the causal cancer lying beneath the surface of all the 'symptom problems' like; vast economic inequality, 'corporate' looting, 'militarist' wars abroad, destruction of the environment, etc, etc,
In fact, if I remember correctly the Oct2011 organizer, Kevin Zeese, directly indicted this disguised and sometimes unmentioned, but key factor of EMPIRE, and noted that the word Empire should be repeatedly used attack this hidden disease of Empire, in his opening remarks of the Oct2011 movement --- as shown in the following video:
http://october2011.org/blogs/organizer?page=4
Thank you, SocJustice4all, for taking the time and interest in watching Kevin emphasize that using the word Empire scares the hell out of the hidden empire that is behind many of our most serious problems, like "Militarism" and "Corporatism".
Best luck and love to Occupy, Oct2011, and all who support this revolution,
Alan MacDonald
Liberty & justice
over
violent/Vichy
empire
An excellent and most incisive article by Ms. Kelly concerning the pernicious influence of the United States military in Afghanistan. Last week while at a parking lot in a mall I saw a black man about 65 or 70 approach me while wearing a military cap. At first I thought that it said Vietnam Veteran. Instead it said Desert Storm. I called out to him and said that it looks like the U.S. has once again invaded and occupied a sovereign country and is dropping 500 lb. bombs on its citizens for no justifiable reason whatsoever. He said that is not true as the U.S. is killing terrorists. He simply would not believe that the United States is slaughtering innocent people overseas for the most specious of reasons. The irony is that a black man during the Vietnam conflict would have been expressing serious doubt about the United States being in that country and killing many innocent Vietnamese people while a black man today believes that it is somehow all right for a black [or at least half black] American president to wage war some forty years later against another under developed country for the same intellectually and morally bankrupt reasons.
Ms. Kelly is certainly right that it would be very useful if more people would speak out against the U.S. presence in Afghanistan. On October 21, 1967 an estimated 50,000 demonstrators, formed by MOBE [Natiuonal Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam] led by Abbie Hoffman, marched on the Pentagon in protest against the U.S. presence in Vietnam. It is way past the point that at least that number, if not much more, also gather around the Pentagon to protest what another Democratic president is wrongfully and immorally doing to yet another under developed country.
"When the rich wage war, it's the poor who die."-Jean-Paul Satre
"The slightest acquaintance with history shows that powerful republics are the most warlike and unscrupulous of nations."-Ambrose Bierce from Warlike America
"Nationalism is an infantile disease. It is the measles of mankind."-Attributed to Albert Einstein
"In all wars the object is to protect or to seize money, property, and power, and there will always be wars as long as Capital rules and oppresses people."-Ernst Friedrich, War Against War [1924]
ERROLL: Great Post.
Kathy Kelly, you are a marvel... standing in at the true Ground Zero to keep a genuine record of (if not reckoning) what the War of Illusion cum Terror, is wreaking in its wake. You are making us feel the human element, not that which can be cleaned up with the antiseptic of "collateral damage." Only courageous, morally-empowered, rare souls like you dare tell the world The Truth about what's underway, what with so massive a media-industrial-War state managing perception, in such vast and sundry ways.
What the Occupy Wall St movement is axiomatically aimed at is an anti-war society and social order, for most realize that predatory governments, sworn to accessing the resources of "host" nations, will be forced to use Force of Arms to secure their goals. Therefore war, in pursuit of resources, becomes inevitable. Yet to keep this deceit operational, each invaded zone is portrayed as an enemy, generally ones that promote a threat to the US (and its imperial allies). How else to convince (thus far enough )citizens & soldiers to get onboard?
Truth is being sent from these protests, like messages carried on the winds to places and minds formallly closed off to their possibility.
The element of Air is that which is gifted to humanity, and intended for the evolution of mass consciousness. After all, air is the medium through which an unbearable battery of sounds telegraph 24/7... and its more subtle dimensions do not require the technological infrastructure to fulfill the same purpose. Even on the "dream plane" many will connect with the OWS movement, and find their consciousness beginning to shift ... it's as if millions woke from their sleep to take what had been, for the dream of (massive) deception that it's been... and begin, one by one, to envision OTHER.
Thank you Kathy. BAN WAR FOREVER
Kathy, I really like what I think, hope, and suspect is your ironic play on words, with the word 'Occupy' and Occupation.
If you mean, as I hope you do, that there is an ironic, critical, and essential need for us in the US to think about the connection between the 'Occupy' movements in America and the Occupations that abuse American military power in being deceitfully misused to have an impact on average people in the global Empire's war zones, then you are touching on a very crucial topic for we, the 99% of Americans, to deeply understand --- and confront.
In this post-nation-state world of the 21st century, our former country has been captured, and is controlled, by a disguised corporate/financial/militarist EMPIRE, which hides behind the facade of its 'bought and owned' TWO-Party 'Vichy' sham of faux-democratic government --- just as the 20th century, wannabe global empire of the Nazi Empire tried to hide behind its crude single-party Vichy facade in France c. 1940.
And I'm hoping that you mean to imply that we 99% of 'ordinary Americans' have a responsibility, not only to confront this camouflaged global Empire hiding in the burning kitchen of our own former democracy and oppressing the 99% "at home" through vast economic inequality, Wall Street looting, political deceit, domestic spying and lying, environmental destruction, and all the other oppressions that are vented on we 99% non-elite Americans ourselves, BUT that you are also implying that we have a responsibility to confront the same global Empire, which is perverting and abusing the super-power military forces, formerly and commonly known as the U.S. military, to "unleash hell" (as the fictional Maximus in the 2000 film, “Gladiator”, said of the Roman Army) on other people “abroad” in what the global Empire views as merely 'territories' of their, the 1%'s, controlled and 'owned' world.
Yes, Kathy, if this is what you are implying, through the word analogy of Occupy in our own former country “at home”, and our responsibility as 'ordinary (and empathetic) Americans, for what this hidden global EMPIRE is doing “abroad” then you, like Hannah Arendt presciently warned of all earlier Empires, clearly understand that “Empire abroad entails tyranny at home.”
Best luck and love to Occupy (the Empire),
Alan MacDonald
Liberty, democracy, and Multitude
over
violent/Vichy
empire
[BTW, Kathy, my reference to the fictional Roman General Maximus in the film “Gladiator”, who turned against the Empire for which he and his military had been “unleashing hell” on people in the territories, is not unlike the reality of some American Generals and Admirals, who have questioned, and in some 'media-buried' cases apparently resisted, the role of 'American' military power in being controlled and abused for imperial, rather than patriotic, purposes. This aspect of some high ranking military staff questioning (or resisting) the abuse of a military for defense of a country that they pledged to defend --- and instead being used for purposes defined by a visible or disguised Empire is a potentially hopeful aspect of principled resistance to the control of Empire over former Republics, such as both the Roman Republic and the German Republic. “Revolts of the Generals” is an aspect of the reality of even military 'people' recognizing, resisting, and confronting Empire that has taken over people's governments throughout history.]
Perhaps a modern day Spartacus will rise up among the Afghans to lead a revolt against the Empire.
Less likely a slave from the oil territories than a General from within the Empire --- who has the courage to reject Empire, turns "Against Empire", and helps the Multitude (99% of people) confront the hidden cancerous tumor of the Empire.
But like the real history of confronting Empires, any wishful thinking of some (including my own ramblings here) that the coming leader will be a conquering military figure using the violence of the sword against Empire, will more hopefully be like the figure who confronted the real Roman Empire with peace and love.
Best,
Alan
Liberty & democracy
over
violent/Vichy
empire
Yes, that worked so well for Spartacus.
We're talking the graveyard of Empires here. Afghans know they will have the last laugh--in a hundred years they will still be there. Do you really think America is going to last another hundred years? The Empire is crumbling, and Afghanistan gets another knotch. OCCUPY stands together with the people of Afghanistan, and against the imperical tyranny of the western NATO powers. War is the tool of the 1%.
downtownwalker,
Exactly. We are in the end stages now where the elite, despite knowing full well that further squeezing the people for continued war profiteering barbarity will provoke revolution, just cannot stop being murderers for money.
The OWS movement is well aware of this. Indeed, they are a product of the big squeeze. They are also smart enough to know that a daily reminder of our incredibly cruel and unjust system may just be enough to delegitimize and destroy it before it destroys the last vestige of humanity along with itself.
OWS is an EXISTENTIAL movement for the USA and the world. If this doesn't work, the abyss is before us.
OWS IS OUR LAST HOPE.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Tj8UlxhfJLw
Another excellent post by Kelly.
As Erroll commented, its way past the time for a march on the pentagon. And yes, there needs to be many more than 50k. There needs to be a massive occupation in order to grab and hold it. This is the heart if the beast that needs to be stopped. That anyone be more concerned about anything else than this Thug of Thugs, reeking havoc, death and destruction across the globe and in our name is beyond me. It should be Priority One.
The 99% have drafted a Declaration that ought to be published as its own item here at CD so I don't have to spam every article with the URL as I'm now going to do, https://sites.google.com/site/the99percentdeclaration/
karlof1, thanks for the link, but aren't you or they getting the cart before the horse?
The first order of any declaration is not to "petition the existing system of Government for a redress of grievances", but rather after living under an array of such grievances for far too long to simply declare that:
"when in the course of human events a people have lived under a system of visible or disguised EMPIRE for too long, it is time for a new system of the people ...... " [add documentation of grievances and justifications for leaving and/or confronting the Empire (visible or disguised etc. etc.)]
Alan MacDonald
Sanford, Maine (formerly Concord. Ma.)
Liberty, democracy, and Multitude
over
violent/Vichy
empire
Hi Alan,
I was somewhat surprised by the Declaration's format, but not its content so much. That they've decided to work within the existing system has pluses and minuses. IMO, the two of us are far more radical and have a better grasp of history than the group that produced the Declaration, although we must recall that it was drafted via consensus as that's the 99%'s method. I really do hope CD will publish the Declaration and thus provide the proper context that will allow all of us an opportunity to comment on it. I'm still in the process of forming my own critique and will write it up later. I had hoped that a document similar to the US Declaration of Independence would be produced showing the numerous parallels between that list of grievences and recent USG behavior in order to rally the People while proving the Justness of the 99%/OWSTR's cause. Would you entertain the idea of being a delegate?
karlof2, thanks for the clarification.
I had doubted that you would start with the petitioning of this un-government (system of Empire).
Nice to see that you too are starting with the real / revolutionary posture of confronting the Empire, whether Red Coated and visible, or disguised with dual 'Vichy' parties, and simply declaring independence from such.
Best,
Alan
On October 19th a 90 minute online interactive Tele-Forum conversation with two of the organizers of OWS was held. What I heard from “a few thoughtful, committed citizens [who will] change the world [for]: Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has” is that they are building a movement grounded in personal responsibility that is understood as a duty and privilege.
OWS organizer, Sandra Nurse said, “The people went to sleep, but we woke up and we can no longer be complacent. OWS is the catalyst to a shift in consciousness and evolution. It’s about our oneness. 99% are together and we want the 1% to join us.”
"But you don't know what it is, Do you, Mister Jones? And you know something is happening, But you don't know what it is. Do you, Mister Jones?" –Bob Dylan
-"Mr. Jones, OWS and The Second American Revolution" @ http://www.wearewideawake.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2210&Itemid=252
Eileen, very interesting that the 'leaders' of OWS had such a Tele-conference, as you said -- and posted a link.
I found several web-sites that had the exact same interesting info of OWS, Mr. Jones, the Second American Revolution, plus a great video interview in NYC with Chris Hedges, etc, as your own site --- but not way to the access the audio recording of said tele-conference.
How about a link to the actual recording of what "Sandra Nurse" and the other OWS 'leader' had to say, listen, and interact with the other non-leaders of this horizontally organized, non-hierarchical, and organic 99% of us?
So far, I've found only many, many of copies of what's on your web-site, but no real access to this Tele-Conference.
BTW, Eileen, the First American Revolution was "Against Empire". Did this Tele-Conference of OWS 'leaders' think that the second would be also?
Best luck and love to Occupy,
Alan MacDonald
Liberty, democracy, and Multitude
over
violent/Vichy
empire
The Obama administration is most pro-war administration we have seen in many years even for a country as violent as the United States. He has so many wars going on it is difficult to keep up with them all and his political party gives him a complete pass on his criminal activities. New chickenhawk cards must be issued for Hillary Clinton, Obama and all the other neocons in his cabinet.
THE LAST WORDS OF RICHARD HOLBROOKE, by John Escher, Kindle Books, Amazon.
Not the wrong occupation, rather one for the endgame - the White House, Congress and/or Pentagon occupied.
Don't neglect or forget the Occupied Media!
Case in point:
On March 26, 2006, the Whistler Blower of Israel's WMD Program, Mordechai Vanunu told me:
“Many journalists come here to the American Colony, from CNN and NY Times. They all want to cover my story, but their EDITORS say no...CNN wants to interview me; but they say they can't do it because they don't want problems with the Israeli censor. BBC is doing the same thing.
"Sixty Minutes from the United States from the beginning they wanted to do a program, but because of the censor situation they decide not to do it. Also big media from Germany, France, Italy, Japan. None of them wants problems with the Israelis."
-The "Big Get" Don Hewitt and "60 Minutes" Didn't Get @http://www.wearewideawake.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1370&Itemid=223
In 2009, Ann Jones, humanitarian aid worker and author of Kabul in Winter wrote from Kabul, Afghanistan:
"I've come back to the Afghan capital again, after an absence of two years, to find it ruined in a new way. Not by bombs this time, but by security.The heart of the city is now hidden behind piles of Hescos giant, grey sandbags produced somewhere in Great Britain. They're stacked against the walls of government buildings, U.N. agencies, embassies, NGO offices, and army camps (of which there are a lot) -- and they only seem to grow and multiply…What's called security generates fear.
"How Lies Begat Illusions Begat Lies…you can't understand the Taliban without knowing about America's covert operations in the region in the 1980s. Back then, President Ronald Reagan's administration, mainly through the CIA, used the Pakistani Intelligence services to fund, arm, and train Afghan and foreign Islamist jihadis to defeat the Soviet army in Afghanistan. Pakistan subsequently used "channels built with U.S. money" to install in Afghanistan a friendly government -- the Taliban.
"Later, after the George W. Bush administration invaded the country and the U.S. ousted the Taliban, it installed Hamid Karzai as president and returned many of the old Islamist jihadis to power in his government. Thus, this peculiar, well-established fact underlies the current war in Afghanistan: the United States sponsored both sides.
"Only the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission has called, year after year, for a moral accounting. Its surveys of Afghan citizens consistently find that the people want lasting peace, and to attain it, they would prefer some sort of truth and reconciliation procedure, like the one that took place in South Africa, to cleanse the country and set it on an honest intellectual and moral footing.
"As I write, 4,000 newly arrived U.S. Marines are trudging through the blistering heat of Helmand Province to push back the Taliban so local Pashtuns can turn out to vote next month for Karzai, their fellow Pashtun. What's wrong with this new Obama strategy? For one thing, in some areas the local Pashtun population has instead turned out to fight against the foreign invaders, side by side with the Taliban (who, it should be remembered, are mostly local Pashtuns). They're as fed up as anybody with the puppet Karzai. Like millions of other Afghans, they say Karzai has done nothing for the people. But saddled with history, Karzai remains the horse the U.S. rode in on." -To all the Sharp Dressed Soldiers Shipping Out @
http://wearewideawake.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1343&Itemid=222
Pernicious effect of USA started after Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1980ies, when US decided to arm war lords like Taliban, essentially being complicit in bringing those medieval evil men into power. When they came to power, they introduced the most oppressive sharia in the world and practically destroyed the country They banned women from working, put burkhas on them, destroyed Buddhas, and started ethnic murder of minorities. Osama bin Ladin became their guest and his training camps were instrumental in creating terror around the world.
US invasion of Afghanistan was an absolute necessity to restore civilization and prevent Bin Ladin to gain even more trained Jihadists adherents in his terrorist training camps. Since so much was destroyed by the Taliban, it will take a long time to restore what existed in Afghanistan until 1980. Actually, the Soviet occupation greatly increased education of women in Afghanistan but unfortunately at that time US was still afraid of "communism" and thus had supported those Jihadists who are current days barbarians.
Soft people like Katy Kelly needs to learn history and also read Koran and understand that Taliban, with its radical Islamic Jew-hating misogynist philosophy is incompatible with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The problems that Afghanistan suffers will not disappear overnight, since most men grew in violence and women were locked up behind the four walls and under burkhas. The Islam in Pakistan, and exported to Afghanistan is taught in madrases who are teaching young men to murder in the name of Allah and become "martyrs" in order to get a fast ticket to Paradise with 72 virgins.
Where to begin? First of all, why aren't you in Afghanistan? You're making no sacrifice of your own in any capacity. Typical chickenhawk. You hate Afghan people, but you're too big of a coward to face them yourself, despite all your Islamophobic rhetoric.
Change doesn't happen overnight, but apparently it doesn't happen over 10 years either. Our occupation has turned Afghanistan into a corrupt narco-state run by warlords. who behave no differently that the Taliban. There is no democracy or human rights in Afghanistan under NATO's watch. Speaking of which, NATO also casually murders and tortures civilians just like the Taliban and Northern Alliance warlords.
Opium production is soaring and women are no better off. Occupying Afghanistan failed to stop al-Qaeda and play a non-existant role it stopping Osama bin Laden. It was unnecessary from the get-go. It's simply another case of useless and overbearing power projection.
The Taliban are Afghanistan's problem, which we're incapable of solving, and they're not a threat to our nation or the world. The United States is pushing Afghani people back to the Taliban by routinely murdering and torturing civilians and backing the corrupt Karzai regime and his warlord friends.
A whole decade has proven that "nation-building" and "humanitarian interventionism" are failed ideals and impossible. Afghanistan will only change on its own accord, not with NATO troops rigging their elections and killing its civilians on a daily basis.