“Afghans are growing increasingly disenchanted with their perceived second-class status in their own country. [They] are paid a fraction of the salaries given to international experts, and it is disgruntling for well-educated locals to see foreign aid workers frequenting restaurants and shops that they themselves cannot afford.” (Mojumdar 2008) Or indeed, stores that they are not let into!

There has been a lot of talk about the resentment of local Afghans towards the returnees and expatriates. They take the jobs, make the housing prices skyrocket, and ultimately do nothing for the common good. They extract what they can before returning back to their comfortable lives in the West. Every Afghan who returns wants to be treated like a king or a queen in their own right.

People have been thrown out to the streets by their own families, who have come to claim the property that they did not care for during all the years of war, just to rent it for international NGO’s and other organizations for some extra dollars (if you recognize yourself from this description, I hope you feel a twinge in your heart just about now). Whatever happened to that famous Afghan hospitality, not to mention the family ties? Well, you know what they say… “You can find anything in Afghanistan, as long as you have the money.” I suppose our hospitality is for sale now too, up for grabs for the highest bidder.

The following are just a few comments from Afghans in the West concerning a possible return:

“I will return if they pay me well enough.”

“Depends on what position I will get.”

“Who can guarantee my security if I do return?”
(Who can guarantee anyone’s security in Afghanistan? While admittedly it is the government who is the guarantor of security in any healthy nation, I doubt if these people have realized the state of the Afghan government and the overwhelming tasks it is faced with, even without having to guarantee the security of every returning Afghan.)

I do not wish to belittle the valuable work that so many Afghans and non-Afghans who have returned to Afghanistan do, while leaving families behind and risking their life, for surely the country needs them. What I am critical about, however, is the arrogance and pride that so many people return with. There are millions of bright minds in Afghanistan just waiting to get the same opportunities that we have received in the West. We are not “something else”, a higher race of Afghans, that would make us somehow more deserving of protection, money and possibilities. It should be an honour for us to do whatever little it is that we can for our country, without making Afghanistan our “playground” in the process. When one truly wants to help, it should not depend on the position, nor should the salary be a deciding factor beyond being able to make ends meet (and this does not include living in Wazir Akbar Khan).

The aid money is disappearing like ashes to the wind before it ever reaches the ordinary Afghans. This serves to increase the discontent towards the international community and returnees as well as the elites, which in turn creates fertile breeding ground for support for the Taliban and other opposition groups. And then we’re back at one, going around in a vicious circle.

The dissipation is evident in the government as well. There are some 24 different ministries in Afghanistan. Looking at the list it seems ridiculous having a ‘Ministry of Finance’ and a ‘Ministry of Economy’. Then there’s the ‘Ministry of Education’ and ‘Ministry of Higher Education’. And what about the ‘Ministry of Public Welfare’ and the ‘Ministry of Public Health’? I could go on and on until the list is down to roughly a dozen or so vital ministries. Are we really so bad with our management skills that we need a ministry for everything? Indeed, two ministries for matters that could perhaps more easily be taken care of under one roof. Or, (and I know at least 24 people who will probably be upset about my accusations) were there too many “important” men going to be left jobless if we didn’t create all of these minister posts? I don’t know about others opinions on this matter, but to me it seems like a disgusting waste of resources in a time when that money could be used for much more productive activities! What makes the number of ministries even more ridiculous is the fact that apart from a few, they don’t even manage to fulfil their functions.

This being the time of change and hope around the world, watching Obama’s inauguration speech, the following struck me as something I wish that would have come from an Afghan president: “The question we ask today is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works...And those of us who manage the public's dollars will be held to account -- to spend wisely, reform bad habits, and do our business in the light of day -- because only then can we restore the vital trust between a people and their government.” (Emphasis my own).

Those few who truly want to do good either get so discouraged that they end up leaving, or worse, they stop caring and turn into the very people that are keeping the country in the desperate state that it is in. What hope does this leave Afghanistan with?

Reference from:
(Mojumdar, A. 2008 Afghanistan: the Challenges Facing the Next US Presidential Administration, Eurasia Insight, Eurasianet. Available from: http://www.eurasianet.org/departments/insightb/articles/eav102108a.shtml . Accessed: 24.01.2009)

For those of you who didn’t read the news in the past few weeks, the US has announced its new strategy in Afghanistan. In addition to sending in 30,000 new troops this includes arming local militias to fight the Taliban. Sound familiar? Apart from being a repetition of the US strategy in Iraq, it should strike a chord closer to home. The wounds from the last time the United States armed Afghan fighters have not yet healed and already a new round is planned. Have we really not learned anything from the past or do we just play ignorant?

In Iraq there were (roughly) two warring groups, the Shiia and the Sunni. American officials themselves have counted that in Afghanistan there are over 400 tribal groups which could potentially attack each other. I am no military strategist or a political advisor, but my common sense says that something doesn’t add up here. The fact that there is even a chance these militias will be fighting anyone else other than the Taliban should be enough to halt such plans. Then again the Americans, who have been advising the government with their right hand while handing money and other resources to the warlords with their left one, have never quite mastered their military strategies.

Or perhaps I am underestimating the US. Maybe a lack of a real strategy in 2001 has caused them to put at least some effort into this one. Or maybe they have finally found out what we Afghans have known all along; every invader leaves eventually (and we will endure whatever it takes till this moment comes). For an Empire (despite a diminishing one) like the United States to admit defeat in Afghanistan would be unbearable. So here’s the plan: arm the Afghan militias, step back and in no time they will start killing each other (surely a few Talibans will be caught in the line of fire every now and then). You see, technically that would be a civil war and the US would have no real interest in it. Not until the war is taken back to the US soil anyway, and this will take a few years. Above all this would be a great excuse for a withdrawal without admitting defeat.

Later on the US officials can blame it on the Afghan blood and say there was nothing they could have done to stop it. All of these wars are in our genes, encrypted in our DNA. We’re such mean killing machines that if they didn’t give us guns we were going to do it by bare hands. Then there are traditional sayings such as “Me against my brother, my brother and me against my cousins, we and our cousins against the enemy” at hand to further prove a point. The country is such that even the Almighty One comes there to weep. As for us Afghans, we can once more be proud that we stood undefeated. Who cares what price we have to pay for this…

But I am getting carried away here. What I really had in mind were some questions. What is going to happen to the weapons once the militias have defeated the Taliban (assuming they would)? Who can make sure these weapons don't get into wrong hands? What is done to ensure that the fighters, both militia men as well as the Taliban, are rehabilitated back into the society by giving them alternative options later on? ARE THERE GOING TO BE ANY ALTERNATIVE OPTIONS?!? Or are they going to be stuffed in cargo containers, as the surrendered Taliban fighters were in 2001, in a hope that they suffocate sooner rather than later? Why is the Afghan government so willing to shoot itself on the foot when the US asks it to?

All I have is questions. I am hoping someone else is thinking about the answers.