NP Afghanistan

[KXX4493553 at aol.com]

In einer eMail vom 09.11.01 22:07:21 (MEZ) Mitteleuropäische Zeit schreibt 
jbor at bigpond.com:

> But more and more nations are sending troops (Britain, Australia,
>  Japan - for the first time since WWII) and offering strategic military
>  support to the rebel forces within Afghanistan. Again you resort to
>  propaganda ('"war doctrine"', 'US Forces') to distort the facts.
>  
Yes. But I was very amused yesterday when Mr. Rumsfeld spoke about "offering 
troops and support" - at the same the German government spoke about "that the 
Americans ASKED US if we could send troops and military support".  Very 
embarrassing for Mr. Schroeder because of his Green partners which have got 
more and more difficulties with their pacifist past...

>  By the way, what is your purpose in forwarding the translation of bin
>  Laden's "war doctrine". Do you actually endorse this propagandist bullshit?
>  
Come on, Robert, what a silly argument. This was for documentary reasons, 
nothing else. Knowing the thoughts of your enemy is the precondition of 
fighting against him, right? BTW, tell this your Pentagon friends, because it 
would be better to end this war faster... in the SPIEGEL magazine I read that 
in the CIA there was only one (!) man who spoke the Pachtune language 
fluently (they are looking for others at the moment). I don't think that 
terrorists are doing you the favor speaking English all the time.

I'm not interested in your American Kulturkampf (who are you? Bismarck or the 
Catholics?), I'm interested in the consequences for the "rest of the world", 
for the Afgans, the Pakistans, AND the US population. The so called 
"international politics" is a mixture of opportunism and opportunity. Let's 
remember. In the first Gulf War (1980-88) Saddam Hussein was the friend of 
the Western world, he was part of the "policy of containment" of the Shiit 
revolution in Iran. In the second Gulf War, the same Saddam Hussein was the 
"evil" himself (remember the Kuwait baby story? It was the best soap-opera 
the UN ever had). The same number with Osama bin Laden. Who will be the next? 
Some of these figures of the Northern Alliance? Or the old Afgan elite during 
the Soviet occupation waiting in the Hotel Sewastopol in Moscow for a second 
chance? Well, we'll see and be surprised, all a question of opportunism and 
opportunity...
I heard a radio documentation about the situation in Karachi today. Karachi, 
the biggest city in Pakistan, 16 million inhabitants, most of them Sunnites, 
with a minority of 300.000 shiits. There were several short wars between the 
Sunnites and the Shiits in Karachi in the last years, with thousands of 
casualties, nobody spoke about it in the West. Hundreds of thousands of 
drug-abusing people are "living" there on the streets, the crime rate is 
high, Karachi is one the dangerouest cities in the world. In the eighties, 
the average GNP of Pakistan raised 6 % per anno, in the nineties, in the era 
of "privatization", only 2-3 %. In this situation, making predictions about 
the social and political future of Pakistan is like asking the oracle of 
Delphi. You ask me about the "right strategy"? Really don't know. All I know 
is that not everything, but most depends on the future of Pakistan.

BTW, Robert, "US Forces" and "war doctrine" are neutral terms in my eyes.


Kurt-Werner Pörtner