Taliban Still Hold Sway

Sunday 16 May 2010 - Filed under Dumbassery + Military + War on Terror

Carlotta Gall via The New York Times:

Farmers from the district of Marja, which since February has been the focus of the largest American-led military operation in Afghanistan, are fleeing the area, saying that the Taliban are terrorizing the population and that American troops cannot protect the civilians.The departure of the farmers is one of the most telling indications that Taliban fighters have found a way to resume their insurgency, three months after thousands of troops invaded this Taliban stronghold in the opening foray of a campaign to take control of southern Afghanistan. Militants have been infiltrating back into the area and the prospect of months of more fighting is undermining public morale, residents and officials said.

It seems to me that the fighters in the Taliban have one thing in their favor which will make it impossible to be defeated.  Though our military is certainly superior in every facet of waging war, the Taliban fighters have the will to protect their homes and their way of life, and they are willing to be patient, mounting sporadic sprees of gunfire then immediately melding back in to their rural communities until the next time.  Say what you will about their way of life, violently oppressing those around them who don’t subscribe to their medieval mode of understanding and practicing Islam, but a man protecting his home from a foreign invader is a strong one.  And it isn’t as if we’re the first foreign power these guerrilla fighters have faced.  In fact, we aren’t even the first massive world power to be given fits by the destitute farmers and peasants of Afghanistan in this generation.  We must remember that one man’s terrorist is another’s freedom fighter, and that those lines are much less clear when we’re in their backyard, especially when we continue to kill Afghan civilians by the bucketload.  I’m convinced that we have good intentions in sticking out the war in Afghanistan, but I’m also convinced that this is a confrontation we cannot win in its present form.  All we’re doing now is creating more terrorists. According to Glenn Greenwald of Salon

The extreme paradox of our actions in the Muslim world is now well-documented: namely, the very policies justified in the name of fighting Terrorism (invasions, occupations, bombings, lawless detentions, etc.) are the precise ones that most inflame and exacerbate that threat.

Afghanistan is but one theater in the battle against terrorism, and it’s blatantly obvious to all but the most staunch supporters, which apparently include Obama’s administration, that this is a battle we cannot win.  Even if only because there is no such thing as victory.  Victory doesn’t exist because it cannot be defined.  There is no objective beyond the immediate objective in a given battle.  We can’t win, because no one knows what that means, and with every fallen Afghan we kill, legitimate terrorist fighter or civilian, we create another and anything even remotely resembling victory gets even further away.

2010-05-16  »  madlibertarianguy