> > Subject: Thought's from an Afghan-American
> > Date: Fri, 14 Sep 2001 09:51:18 -0700 (PDT)
> >
> > I've been hearing a lot of talk about "bombing Afghanistan back to
the
> > Stone Age." Ronn Owens, on KGO Talk Radio today, allowed that this
would
> > mean killing innocent people, people who had nothing to do with this

> > atrocity, but "we're at war, we have to accept collateral damage.
What
> > else can we do?" Minutes later I heard some TV pundit discussing
> > whether we "have the belly to do what must be done."
>
> > And I thought about the issues being raised especially hard because
I am
> > from Afghanistan, and even though I've lived here for 35 years I've
> > never lost track of what's going on there. So I want to tell anyone
who
> > will listen how it all looks from where I'm standing.
> >
> > I speak as one who hates the Taliban and Osama Bin Laden. There is
no
> > doubt in my mind that these people were responsible for the atrocity
in
> > New York. I agree that something must be done about those monsters.
>
> > But the Taliban and Ben Laden are not Afghanistan. They're not even
the
>
> > government of Afghanistan. The Taliban are a cult of ignorant
> > psychotics who took over Afghanistan in 1997. Bin Laden is a
political
> > criminal with a plan. When you think Taliban, think Nazis. When you
> > think Bin Laden, think Hitler. And when you think "the people of
> > Afghanistan" think "the Jews in the concentration camps." It's not
> > only that the Afghan people had nothing to do with this atrocity.
They
> > were the first victims of the perpetrators. They would exult if
someone
> > would come in there, take out the Taliban and clear out the rats
nest of
> > international thugs holed up in their country.
> >
> > Some say, why don't the Afghans rise up and overthrow the Taliban?
The
> > answer is, they're starved, exhausted, hurt, incapacitated,
suffering.
> > A few years ago, the United Nations estimated that there are 500,000

> > disabled orphans in Afghanistan--a country with no economy, no food.

> > There are millions of widows. And the Taliban has been burying these

> > widows alive in mass graves. The soil is littered with land mines,
the
> > farms were all destroyed by the Soviets. These are a few of the
reasons
> > why the Afghan people have not overthrown the Taliban.
> >
> > We come now to the question of bombing Afghanistan back to the Stone

> > Age. Trouble is, that's been done. The Soviets took care of it
already.
> > Make the Afghans suffer? They're already suffering. Level their
houses?
> > Done. Turn their schools into piles of rubble? Done. Eradicate their

> > hospitals? Done. Destroy their infrastructure? Cut them off from
> > medicine and health care? Too late. Someone already did all that.
> >
> > New bombs would only stir the rubble of earlier bombs. Would they at

> > least get the Taliban? Not likely. In today's Afghanistan, only the
> > Taliban eat, only they have the means to move around. They'd slip
away
> > and hide. Maybe the bombs would get some of those disabled orphans,
they
> > don't move too fast, they don't even have wheelchairs. But flying
over
> > Kabul and dropping bombs wouldn't really be a strike against the
> > criminals who did this horrific thing. Actually it would only be
making
> > common cause with the Taliban--by raping once again the people
they've
> > been raping all this time
> >
> > So what else is there? What can be done, then? Let me now speak with

> > true fear and trembling. The only way to get Bin Laden is to go in
there
> > with ground troops. When people speak of "having the belly to do
what
> > needs to be done" they're thinking in terms of having the belly to
kill
> > as many as needed. Having the belly to overcome any moral qualms
about
> > killing innocent people. Let's pull our heads out of the sand.
What's
> > actually on the table is Americans dying. And not just because some
> > Americans would die fighting their way through Afghanistan to Bin
> > Laden's hideout. It's much bigger than that folks. Because to get
any
> > troops to Afghanistan, we'd have to go through Pakistan. Would they
let
> > us? Not likely. The conquest of Pakistan would have to be first.
Will
> > other Muslim nations just stand by? You see where I'm going. We're
> > flirting with a world war between Islam and the West.
> >
> > And guess what: that's Bin Laden's program. That's exactly what he
> > wants. That's why he did this. Read his speeches and statements.
It's
> > all right there. He really believes Islam would beat the west. It
might
> > seem ridiculous, but he figures if he can polarize the world into
Islam
> > and the West, he's got a billion soldiers. If the west wreaks a
> > holocaust in those lands, that's a billion people with nothing left
to
> > lose, that's even better from Bin Laden's point of view. He's
probably
> > wrong, in the end the west would win, whatever that would mean, but
the
> > war would last for years and millions would die, not just theirs but

> > ours. Who has the belly for that? Bin Laden does. Anyone else?
> >
> > Tamim Ansary