Fracturing Allegiances
Everything, it would seem, has its price. Honour and allegiances are moveable feasts. And perhaps illusory and immaterial when people live on the edge of existence.For nothing motivates a hungry man more than the potential to be nourished, to survive another day. And if that hungry man is a young man without employment prospects, why wouldn't he take up an offer that will pay him? And if that hungry man is a father of children needing to be fed, and that offer emanates from those among his clan, the alacrity of his acceptance would be dazzling.
So here is a new plan spear-headed by Afghanistan's President Hamid Karzai, who has always expressed the longing to welcome back to the fold his "brothers", the Pashtun men of Afghanistan who pledged their allegiance to the fiercely fundamentalist Islamists known as the Taliban. Misguided souls, he thought them to be, and his was the mission to bring them back to sanity and the future of the country.
Finally, his aspirations to reach out a promise of security to those among the Taliban who could be conceived of as "moderates" has helped to fuel an agreement from NATO; specifically Japan, Britain and the United States who stand prepared to offer the monetary wherewithal whereby an irresistible incentive to pay moderates more than the Taliban do, will bring them to support of the government.
Aren't they termed mercenaries in another, less honourable perhaps, context?
"Those Taliban who were not part of terrorist networks or al-Qaeda are the sons of the Afghan soil", declaimed Mr. Karzai. Does that exempt those foot soldiers who were dispatched to plant IEDs, responsible for demolishing civilian Afghans and killing more than enough NATO military personnel to prove the Taliban a formidable foe?
"They are thousands and thousands and thousands, and they have to be reintegrated", Mr. Karzai stolidly pursues. And his intention as head of government is to offer a power-sharing opportunity with moderate Taliban leaders and fighters, estimating the potential for bringing on side 20,000 to 35,000 fighters. Which would be a great assist, considering the inability of his own military and police to counter Taliban forces.
And since analysis by American intelligence has long since arrived at the conclusion that up to 80% of Taliban insurgents are in the fight simply for the earnings and in response to local grievances, there appears to be some sense in that declaration of intent. Besides which, in a notoriously corrupt government it's well known that Karzai's cabinet contains former warlords with blood on their hands.
And one might suppose it is no small thing that Afghanistan's neighbours, Turkey, Pakistan, Iran, China, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan have signed a statement in support of "the Afghan national process of reconciliation and reintegration in accordance with the Constitution of Afghanistan in a way that is Afghan-led and driven."
Now that's a mixed rogue-roster for you. In careful language. Duplicitous Pakistan, self-serving Iran; perfidy their favoured instrument of diplomacy. In support of a major initiative funded by Western democracies, no less. India, another near neighbour and helpmeet of Afghanistan appears unsurprisingly absent from that approving list.
But then India is majority-Hindu with minority Sikh and Muslim populations, and a democracy attempting to balance competing religions and traditions. Doing it on her own, confronting her own historical demons and inequities, hoping to stave off what appears to be the inevitability of another military clash with Pakistan.
Labels: Political Realities, Troublespots, World Crises
posted by Pieface @ Wednesday, January 27, 2010
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