What if the only reason the Taliban is fielding lots of fighters is because the Taliban is the only “business” hiring in Afghanistan?
What if, instead, taking a lesson from the WPA and the CCC, and the reality that men will accept pay to do anything rather than see their families starv – we paid them to rebuild their country instead?
My research indicates that the Taliban is only paying $8.00 a day – men might even accept $7.00 a day not to get shot at, but to haul rock, and build.
Here is what the Civilian Conservation Corps or CCC was
I happen to think the WPA and the CCC saved democracy and many families in this country, and similar programs, done with some ethnic and local adaptations, could end the war in Afghanistan and save many many lives there.
NPR says most Taliban fighters only in it for the pay, not ideology
Taliban wages exceed police wages in Afghanistan
Alexander Hamilton famously said that where a man’s wallet goes, his heart goes also. It is worth considering.
Security.
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p>The Taliban has targeted aid workers for a while.
I think this diary may be onto something. We need to figure out how to show these people a better life. There will probably always be Taliban, just like we still have the KKK, but the latter is shoved to the extreme fringes and the same fate should befall the Taliban.
Reconstruction is something that we’ve tried to do in both Iraq and Afghanistan. The problem has been controlling the process and preventing fraud, waste, and abuse, particularly among the thousands of contractors and subcontractors that are involved. One of the more recent and comprehensive reports on this has been done by the Commission on Wartime Contracting in Iraq and Afghanistan. http://www.govexec.com/pdfs/06…
If we could do the Marshall Plan we can do this.
I’m not sure I think this idea will be successful due to security issues, as I mentioned above. However, if something like this is the right idea, then it could very much be worth it.
about realistic assessments and goals for the U.S. in Afghanistan. (The link will have the show available tomorrow, please disregard comments by the 9/11 Truthers there) I highly recommend listening to it.
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p>Rory points out lots of fallacies in the narrative that the President and the media repeat in America. For instance, the Marshall Plan rebuilt Europe and Japan, which had a history of education and modern life. Afghanistan is the poorest nation in the world with no history of education nor modernization. There’s no precedent in history for the turnaround/nation-building you suggest, AmberPaw. Afghanistan’s culture and strength is centered in villages–so centralized government is an impossible leap to achieve. This is a big difference between Afghanistan and Iraq, but there is one super important fallacy left…
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p>The Taliban can not takeover that country as it did in 1991. Then, the Taliban got the consent of the population because it was a movement of students promising to end corruption. Now, the people of Afghanistan see the Taliban as a failed govt. The Taliban might be able to dominate a small section of the country, but not the north and west and not the cities. Moreover, Al Qaeda would be more vulnerable to US Special Forces if opened camps there, and that’s why they hide behind Pakistan’s sovereignty.
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p>Let’s be more realistic about what burdens the US should take on over there.
The Wartime Commission contracting report that I referred to in my comment above notes that the U.S. Congress has appropriated more than $80 billion for reconstruction in Iraq and Afghanistan since 2001, and that more than $30 billion of that has been appropriated for Afghanistan. As the report points out, reconstruction includes a range of actions, including rebuilding infrastructure, and programs to strengthen governmental and civil institutions. In other words, nation-building.
Nation building is the wrong idea — or, with so much corruption and so much power in the hands of warlords, it is so underfunded as to be hopeless.
If there is enough interest on the ground, maybe the “security” issue could take care of itself…self interest could trump. Anyway, the NPR story was such that the idea that there are few idealogues in the Taliban, and few fathers who want to throw acid in their daughter’s faces – but many fathers who will do anything to not seek their kids and wives starve…
sorry, but i don’t have good reference links at hand, but . . .
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p>i remember a poignant anecdote from the vietnam era describing how lyndon johnson was absolutely convinced that what would ultimately turn ho chi minh around was the offer of big public works projects to improve the lives of the vietnamese people.
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p>having cut his teeth in the era of the new deal, and the tva, and bringing poor rural people out of hardship (thus earning their admiration and votes), lbj just couldn’t get his head around the idea that . . these people are different. it’s not about ‘stuff’ to them.
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p>the vietnamese communists were driven by ideology. they didn’t care about a big fat american hydroelectric dam on the mekong. that’s not what is was about to them. the taliban doesn’t want american bling. they want anything associated with western culture banished from their society.
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p>not to be glib, but many taliban sympathizers would rather live in relative hardship, while in the glory of allah. than to feed from the hand of satan.
And basic infrastructure, not big hydro or “big buildings”. Nope.
I believe this is about those who will follow the money to put food on their table. Right now it seems the Taliban is writing the checks. You won’t convert everybody, but just as the Marshall Plan was vital in keeping the Communists to just half of Europe, a similar program will hopefully limit Taliban membership to ONLY its ideologues.