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Building a "Mature" Democracy in Afghanistan
How primitive the Afghans are! A New York Times account of faltering negotiations over a possible “strategic partnership” agreement to leave U.S. troops on bases in that country for years to come highlights just how far the Afghans have to go to become, like their U.S. mentor, a mature democracy. Take the dispute over prisons. Afghan President Hamid Karzai has been insisting that the U.S. turn over its prison facility at Bagram Air Base to his government. (The recently burned Korans came from that prison’s library.) The Obama administration initially refused and now has suggested a six-month timetable for such a turnover, an option Karzai has, in turn, rejected. No one, by the way, seems yet to be negotiating about a second $36-million prison at Bagram that, TomDispatch recently reported, the U.S. is now in the process of building.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai looks on during a news conference in Kabul, Afghanistan, Tuesday, March 6, 2012. (Credit: AP Photo/Anja Niedringhaus)
The Times’ Alissa Rubin suggests, however, that a major stumbling block remains to any such turnover. She writes: “The challenges to a transfer are enormous, presenting serious security risks both for the Afghan government and American troops. Many of the estimated 3,200 people being detained [in Bagram’s prison] cannot be tried under Afghan law because the evidence does not meet the legal standards required to be admitted in Afghan courts. Therefore, those people, including some suspected insurgents believed likely to return to the fight if released, would probably have to be released because Afghanistan has no law that allows for indefinite detention for national security reasons.”
Honestly, what kind of a backward country doesn’t have a provision for the indefinite detention, on suspicion alone, of prisoners without charges or hope of trial? As a mature democracy, we now stand proudly for global indefinite detention, not to speak of the democratic right to send robot assassins to take out those suspected of evil deeds anywhere on Earth. As in any mature democracy, the White House has now taken on many of the traits of a legal system -- filling, that is, the roles of prosecutor, judge, jury, and executioner.
Six months to learn all that (and how to burn Korans, too)? I don’t think so. Or how about a really mature plan that, according to an Associated Press report, top Pentagon officials are now mulling over: to put whatever U.S. elite special operations forces remain in Afghanistan after 2014 under CIA control. The reason? Once they are so lodged, even though their missions wouldn’t change, they would officially become “spies” and whoever’s running Washington then will be able to swear, with complete candor, that no U.S. troops remain in Afghanistan. Even better, the CIA is conveniently run by former Afghan War commander David Petraeus and the U.S. public would no longer have to be informed about “funding or operations” for those non-troops. Now, that’s how a mature democracy makes the trains run on time!
Had enough? Then try finding your inner khan by checking out “Green on Blue” by the indefatigable Ann Jones, author of War Is Not Over When It’s Over, who knows more about Afghanistan than any of us.
Tom Engelhardt, co-founder of the American Empire Project, runs the Nation Institute's TomDispatch.com. His latest book, co-authored with Nick Turse, is Terminator Planet: The First History of Drone Warfare, 2001-2050. His other most recent book is The United States of Fear (Haymarket Books). Previous books include: The End of Victory Culture: a History of the Cold War and Beyond, The American Way of War: How Bush's Wars Became Obama's, as well as of a novel, The Last Days of Publishing. To stay on top of important articles like these, sign up to receive the latest updates from TomDispatch.com here.
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19 Comments so far
Show All"Six months to learn all that (and how to burn Korans, too)? I don’t think so. Or how about a really mature plan that, according to an Associated Press report, top Pentagon officials are now mulling over: to put whatever U.S. elite special operations forces remain in Afghanistan after 2014 under CIA control.
The reason? "
and who exactly has been profiting from the distribution of opium and herion throughout the world ? hmmmmm...
...peace...
The US government has run the drug trade for a long time. And they have their DEA and FBI to cut out the competition.
i found these 2 articles this morning...
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US-CIA Heroin Transit Base Proven
Monday, January 30th, 2012 | Posted by Sibel Edmonds
http://www.veteranstoday.com/2012/01/30/us-cia-heroin-transit-base-proven/
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The Spoils of War: Afghanistan's Multibillion Dollar Heroin Trade
by Michel Chossudovsky
http://globalresearch.ca/articles/CHO404A.html
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i recognize there are many factors at play in afghanastan and in the surrounding region (all more urgent in a sense - than the drug trade). the heroin trade is unregulated money in a global black market. the cia can play at the crime syndicate casino b/c of completely black operations - funded / overseen off the books. it's bizarre that it's commonly accepted 90% of the world's opium is flowing out of afghanastan, yet it's a subject (drug war, drug reform ) is never addressed outside of the context of the prison industrial complex. reforming the world's drug laws would benefit the people of afdghanastan, as they can produce poppies and trade on the world market.
the irony is our military/intelligence agencies are smuggling the drugs out of afghansatan for profit, while people on the street go to jail for petty drug possession crimes. your correct tomcarberry.... they cut out the competition. from farm to hypodermic needle.
...peace...
Vietnam was allot about heroin also, meet a soldier who carried some for the Army to Bangkok. And the Contras were funded by coke smuggled to LA.
A lot of GIs wound up in prison for dope smuggling. I know (or knew) a few of them.
The Green on Blue article is highly recommended. The tone of sarcasm in this article makes for fun reading. The take-away is that no matter what the official policy, there is always a way to circumvent it. Morris Berman says the fact that the U.S. is a nation of hustlers lies at the root of its decline. You can read his article here.
http://www.alternet.org/world/154453/why_the_american_empire_was_destined_to_collapse/
"Honestly, what kind of a backward country doesn’t have a provision for the indefinite detention, on suspicion alone, of prisoners without charges or hope of trial?"
Excellent question. Does Britain, France, Spain, Switzerland? Who else does?
i don't think they even require suspicion
in russia under stalin they would just pass around a list during wild drunken parties and you could put anyone's name on it for assassination - that's where we are
we kill a wedding party or a bunch of kids playing in a field and we always say: they were terrorists
karzai is going to have a single car accident or maybe like breitbart he will succumb to a heart attack during a late night stroll
then the new guy will sign anything
its called nation building and we do it so well
The CIA should be renamed The Corporate Intelligence Agency.
Feeding on our taxes they roam the planet as rogue psychopathic criminals doing whatever will produce profits for the Corporate Tyranny. Kill for Wall Street.
If the TAPI pipeline is ever built across Afghanistan it will require a permanent occupation of some kind to guard the pipeline. And of course Afghanistan itself has vast resources including the heroin trade that has increased dramatically as a result of the illegal invasion and occupation.
Unlike most of the "progressive" writers, Chossoduvsky actually explains why American forces are doing terrible things in Afghanistan.
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=5514
Heroin is "Good for Your Health": Occupation Forces support Afghan Narcotics Trade
Multibillion dollar earnings for organized crime and Western financial Institutions
by Prof. Michel Chossudovsky
"The occupation forces in Afghanistan are supporting the drug trade, which brings between 120 and 194 billion dollars of revenues to organized crime, intelligence agencies and Western financial institutions.
The proceeds of this lucrative multibllion dollar contraband are deposited in Western banks. Almost the totality of revenues accrue to corporate interests and criminal syndicates outside Afghanistan."
And there are many other resources involved:
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=19769
The War is Worth Waging": Afghanistan's Vast Reserves of Minerals and Natural Gas
The War on Afghanistan is a Profit driven "Resource War".
by Michel Chossudovsky
"The 2001 bombing and invasion of Afghanistan has been presented to World public opinion as a "Just War", a war directed against the Taliban and Al Qaeda, a war to eliminate "Islamic terrorism" and instate Western style democracy.
The economic dimensions of the "Global War on Terrorism" (GWOT) are rarely mentioned. The post 9/11 "counter-terrorism campaign" has served to obfuscate the real objectives of the US-NATO war.
The war on Afghanistan is part of a profit driven agenda: a war of economic conquest and plunder, "a resource war".
While Afghanistan is acknowledged as a strategic hub in Central Asia, bordering on the former Soviet Union, China and Iran, at the crossroads of pipeline routes and major oil and gas reserves, its huge mineral wealth as well as its untapped natural gas reserves have remained, until June 2010, totally unknown to the American public."
True. Same with Iran and other countries. We deposed or undermined democracies that were elected by the wisdom of their people, especially if those democracies displayed any socialist tendencies by putting their people's needs before those of foreign corporations. We put in tyrants like the Shah in Iran or disruptive reactionaries in Afghanistan. Remember the "Freedom Fighters" that we funded to counter Soviet influence, supposedly? Those Freedom Fighters were the most regressive fundamentalists in Afghanistan, the ones we now use to prove how primitive the Afghan people are, and how we must take over.
Any examination of America's actions in Afghanistan and the rest of the third world that assumes the good faith of the imperialist forces cannot be taken seriously. The United States does not invade and occupy countries with good intentions but rather to subdue and colonize and this attempt to change Afghanistan has been doomed to failure from the beginning and when the Americans talk about leaving we can only fear for the poor people who will be the next victims of their killing machine.
--Colonize? Really? Where do we have any colonies?--
In the strict definition that you seem to be adhering to, Puerto Rico and Diego Garcia come to mind. Come to think of it, have you ever spoken to any native Hawaiians?
Then again, with the definition of the economic extraction of the wealth of the third world the Corporate Empire has effectively colonized most of the world. Depends on the definition of terms, something that rarely gets mentioned when people throw words around.
What do you know about Afghan history? From the Ann Jones article referenced in this piece we read:
"From 1933 to 1973, Nadir Shah’s son, Zahir Shah, presided over gradual social progress. He introduced a new constitution, free elections, a parliament, civil rights, women’s rights, and universal suffrage."
And speaking of working democracy... One here would be nice.
Perhaps USA has become a colony of China. USA exports more raw material than finished products, and most of the raw material goes to China. And the USA buys finished products from China. Plus China controls USA debt. Very similiar to a colony.
The US is and has always been a colonization project. The original 13 states were colonies. The land grabbed after the Mexican war was colonized. Most of Latin America operates as a de facto colony for US commercial interests. Those are just a few of many, many examples.
Did England or did England not have colonies in what is now the US? Those were corporate charters - commercial interests from England, backed up by the threat of British troops landing. They were governed by officials who did the bidding of the corporate masters in England, or faced removal. How is any of that substantially different than the way the US government operates around the world? It is not.
Territory is not formally annexed to the US for the simple reason that it benefits commercial interests to run the empire without doing that. Troops are not landed and the bombers are not launched so long as the various puppet governments play ball with US corporations. But the moment there is a popular uprising that could threaten US corporate interests, the troops will be landed and the bombs will rain down - with absolute certainty.
An army of colonizers from the US - military "advisers," intelligence agency operatives, corporate management people - live and work all over the world.
The US is a colonial power maintaining and expanding a global empire, through force and the threat of force. To say that this is not true one would also have to say that Britain, too, was not a colonial power maintaining and expanding a global empire, , through force and the threat of force. That is an impossible case to make.
Listen kid - if you don't learn how to be a man, I'll beat it into you. I've been doing that all along, but I guess it has not worked yet. More to come. Now pull down your pants.
That is the arrogant cruelty of our occupations by a country drunk on power, avid for acquisition. Edit 3/12: Today's report of slaughter of civilians by drunken soldiers shows how sick US actions are, and how destined to fail.
Hell... Declare Victory, strike the flag, form up, march out of the place, and let the Afghans figure out their own system of government.
It takes more than dipping fingers into an inkwell and"voting" to make a democracy. First a sense of nationhod is necesssary. Although we speak of it as a country, it is really only a huge tribal area governed by warlords who preside over various valleys. One also must have a judiciary, an electoral system, probably political parties, and a banking system. Indeed, it takes a hundred years.