Imran Khan
I once in a while watch the program GPS on CNN which is hosted by Fareed Zakaria. He interviews influential world leaders. Yesterday, he interviewed Imran Khan of Pakistan, leader of one of the opposition parties there. I have heard the name before as he became well-known when he married Jemima Goldsmith of Britain in 1990s, a wealthy socialite, and he was in the news quite a bit.
As Fareed Zakaria interviewed him, I was impressed by Imran Khan's assessment of the situation with regards to Afghanistan, Pakistan and the Insurgency. Is it possible that Barack Obama is wrong on Afghanistan?
It is not a winnable war. Swat Valley and the North Western Territories have been no-man's land and rogue areas for centuries. No one has ever been able to subjugate these people. The British failed and it brought down USSR empire. Why does Obama think he can succeed?
I have heard that it is one of world's roughest terrains. I once drove around Cape Breton on Cabot Trail and I was scared stiff as a minor mistake and I could have ended up in the ocean - a several hundred feet fall. I am told that compared to Swat and frontier territories in Pakistan, Cabot Trail is a picnic. And there is no ocean that you may have a chance to survive in the water.
Imran Khan was asked what he would do if he was running the Government of Pakistan and if he was advising the US. His assessment was blunt and realistic. He said Afghanistan must have never been invaded to start with because you cannot win. He suggested that efforts should have been made to alienate Taliban from Al-Qaeda as the Taliban were not involved in 9/11 in any way. He said that was the sole way to end the insurgency in that area. He said he would negotiate with the Taliban because fighting them brings out the extremists and it is a no win situation.
He said that the latest peace-treaty with tribal forces and Pakistan was inevitable. Pakistan had no choice. It does not have the financial or military resources to defeat these forces. Where the USSR failed, how can Pakistan succeed? The only choice is to negotiate and marginalize Al-Qaeda and other extremist group. It looks that may be the only solution. Maybe Obama will learn in due course.
Many of us have been arguing for years that the US made a strategic blunder in lumping the Taliban in with al-Qaeda, effectively driving them into the terrorists' arms instead of driving a wedge between them.
ReplyDeleteKhan is a cool guy, very pro-Western, modern and secular. In other words, LeDaro, he stands as much chance of every gaining power in Pakistan as you my friend.
I'll bet the military will return to power within 12-months, 18-at the outside.
The problem with focusing on the argument "that the US made a strategic blunder in lumping the Taliban in with al-Qaeda", and that was related to the 9/11 "terrorist attack" is to ignore the Bush administration's and neocon backers strategic prior plan to invade Afghanistan. This had to do with geopolitical positioning and stopping Afghanistan govt from making an oil contract with China. This is about the pipeline. Hence, the Bush administration had to lump the Taliban in with al-Qaeda to justify the invasion, occupation and overthrow of the govt to a puppet-US friendly one.
ReplyDeleteBin Ladin's capture was just a cover, and hence it is more useful to the USA in not finding him.
Il a raison. La seule solution est de négocier avec les Talibans, même si nous ne partageons pas leurs idées. Le terrorisme disparaitra le jour ou on cessera d'opprimer les peuples.
ReplyDeleteIt just doesn't make sense to me that they couldn't find Bin laden and Saadam... they could have taken them out along time before.
ReplyDeleteSo,I suspect Jan is on the right track.
I like to hear from the people who live over there.
There hasn't been much posted on RAWA for awhile but in an interview done just after the US election an article was posted: "Afghans to Obama: End the Occupation. A woman named Eman says much the same as Imran Khan. They have really messed up the society. She also says: even if they bring a million troops, they will fail..."
So much destruction. I'll never forget the mess they made of Sadaam's yacht and palace.... beautiful structures that should have been preserved and then the loss of lives and the land left polluted.Stupid, just plain dumb.
Thank you folks for all these great comments.
ReplyDeleteMoS, I have read your posts in the past on the issue and you seem to have in-depth knowledge of the geo-political situation of the area. You're right that Imran Khan has no chance of forming a government. Because of the Afghanistan war and spill over to Pakistan the progressive is out and fanaticism is in. I would hope that you're wrong on military take-over but the history of Pakistan and instability of current government it looks that Pakistan will revert back to military government. May be military will do better under the current circumstances.
janfromthebruce, I think you're quite right. Liberate women, bring democracy and capture or kill Taliban and Al-Qaeda operatives is just the smoke screen and the strategic location of Afghanistan is the reality behind that smokescreen.
Serge Adam, we indeed can achieve lot more through negotiations. Oppression leads to reaction which we then call insurgency.
Oemissions, again I agree with your reasoning. It was for oil in Iraq and natural gas pipeline through Afghanistan. Rest is war justification hype. Indeed there have been war crimes committed but who is going to make Bush and operatives accountable. No one. Law of jungle (might is right) was never repealed and it still prevails.
If you want to read more about Pakistan, please visit http://real-politique.blogspot.com
ReplyDelete