Afghanistan
The key to understanding Afghanistan is this - it is not a country harbouring terrorists, it's a place where terrorists are harbouring a country.
Geography: Pile of rocks west of Iran. They say (the historians) that in the 15th century Herat was the centre of the universe, the heart of Asia. This was the place to see and be seen for A-list celebs back in the day.
Population: est. 30 million depending on which slaughtering warlord is in power. The Russians managed to reduce the population by 1.5 million. How many civilians have died since 2001 is a secret.
Age Expectancy: Only 2% of the population are 65 plus, so no pension problems to speak of.
GDP: est. $29 billion, i.e. about the same amount as Roman Abramovich has in a biscuit tin under his bed. A key part of the mix is services, e.g., reconstruction - the Americans build something, the Talibs blow it up and the whole process starts again
Key exports: opium, opium, more opium, soap, and terrorism, and yes, precious gems - sent direct to a Swiss safe deposit box.
Government: doesn't have one, except in Kabul, where this year's President hides in his palace. According to the Taliban, Afghanistan doesn't need politics because it's got Islam, which obviously transends all else - obvious to anyone who feels at home in the 7th Century.
Economy: doesn't actually have one, lots of camel trading goes on among a loose coalition of stall holders but 50% of the population are unemployed and if you include all the kids who would work, if there were some, instead of sitting around waiting for the school to be re-built and pretending they would go, if there was one, the unemployment figure goes up to around 85%.
Statistics: what the outsider needs to understand about Afghanistan is that everything is an estimate, simply no one knows anything. The CIA Fact Book page on Afghanstan is shorter than the one for the achievements of New Labour.
Future Prospects: nil. Afghanistan is geographic space occupied by a number of tribes who don't like each other and like outsiders less. The only thing Afghans dislike more than outsiders is a Talib but since Talibs will cut your feet off for not walking backwards on alternate Tuesdays, no one's prepared to complain about their unreasonable behaviour. Afghans do not want the Taliban but neither do they want western style democracy, they want MP3 players and plasma TVs but not crazy ideas like education and equality for women; they want corruption and fraud, they want to be just like western democracies without the charade of elections every four or five years.
Britain's role in the Afghan Fiasco
Britain will be leaving Afghanistan in five years. According to the Ministry of War Mongering we will leave when the job's done - five years then?
The job, apparently, is to enable the Karzai regime to run the show itself. Sorry, nearly forgot, we are also over there to stop the Taliban invading Oxford Street. Forget the second argument, it's patent garbage from the Centre for Social Cohesion
However, providing a corrupt, bankrupt, discredited bandit like Karzai with the wherewithall to control his own country is going to take a bit longer than five years.
Currently, all Karzai controls is the capital Kabul, that's it, nothing else. IN the recent past he has popped over to Paris, New York and London but he can't go anywhere in his own country.
Effective control lays with the Mujahideen warlords, people smugglers and Taliban drug barons. The Taliban's rightious crusade against poppy growing of a few years ago has been replaced by pragmatism. Drugs buy guns and recruits. Afghanistan is all about drugs. Helmund, where British troops die every day, is the centre of Afghanistan's poppy growing activity; 50% of all growing takes place in Helmund.
We, the great British public, are asked to believe that the job is all about training Afghan policeman and soldiers to do the job themselves. The news bulletins never tell us how poor the Afghan recruits are, fact is, an Afghan is more likely to sell his M-16 than shoot someone with it. Many of those who retain their weapons haven't yet grasped the concept of taking aim whilst firing and Afghan commanders are renowned for inventing 'ghost' soldiers, so that they can pocket their wages.
So to recap, the job is that over the next five years
- the Karzai Government will reform itself by putting an end to corruption and cronism and find some accommodation with the theocratic lunacy of the Taliban and placate the warlords with one hundred camels apiece
- the international community will come up with a scheme that either facilitates the legal growing of opium plants, by putting in the infrastructure to make this possible and by removing the distortions in the market for legal opium or facilitates some alternative forms of economic activity that allow growers to engage in something that doesn't provide the bullets that kill our soldiers.
- the Afghan army will be trained to a standard of professionalism that enables them to take charge of their own country.
