Chickens, Goats and the Taliban
I have been out of the posts for a while for many reasons but I wanted to chime in with respect to something that has been weighing on my mind for some time. As a witness to the current events unfolding in Waziristan I cannot help but think that there must be a more holistic approach to fighting the Taliban and their respective allies. As any fair-minded person would wonder, I often say “Well jeez, these people are only terrorists because the politics of the day make them so”. How then can we answer the questions which they raise, and the issues that so often divide us.
While this subject is worthy of much scholarly debate and has been since 9-11, we as a global community need to ask ourselves the fundamental questions. How can we successfully fight terrorism without so much collateral damage? Collateral damage in this sense refers to civilian loss of life. I am not going to enter into a debate about privacy or the hijacking of religious themes. The simple matter of the fact is that the current conflict in that part of the world claims the lives of many innocent people. I would like to propose we focus on non-violent means to answer the infringement of terrorists on the lives of the everyday person in “AFPAK”.
One alternative to fighting terrorism is simply empowering people economically. The US military has recently seen evidence to support the fact that Afghans would rather raise livestock and traditional crops as opposed to opium. The only reason they continue to grow the problematic plant is that the Taliban pay to do so. So, in short, instead of dropping bombs and leveling villages in an attempt to kill high value targets, why not parachute a box of male and female goats into a village? Why not let chickens drop from the sky? Imagine the scene if villagers came upon a ready and of age flock of chickens and roosters, goats, and livestock. There would be an immediate appreciation and a simultaneous impulse to protect and defend ones livelihood. In this part of the world, the most important bargaining chip is that which you can do and show for. Forget the far off notions of democracy and freedom. The people need food and a means of empowerment before any sort of political system. First, address the most basic of needs, then move to the next step. At the same time, give the people a reason to trust the occupiers. Presently, American troops and their Afghan partners are promising security and prosperity on the condition of cooperation. In reality the average Afghan doesn’t give a hoot about what goes on in Kabul. They care about the village and tribe. So, to answer this dilemma, fill a gap the Taliban cant–give them chickens and goats to raise and sell.
While this may sound funny and out of place in light of much more articulate descriptions of the current problems, I would like to humbly remind the reader of an acronym I learned recently. KISS. Keep It Simple Stupid. We have PhDs and generals losing sleep overnight about how to fight the insurgency. Could it be the reality of the matter is not about terrorists and AK-47s, but simply about alternatives and finding something else to do with ones time? People are more inclined to avoid subversive behavior, of any sort for that matter, if they are engaged in something productive and fruitful. At present, the average Afghan is jobless, poor and without much alternative. This leads to desperation and poverty and in some cases seeking sustenance via any alternative…aka shooting a weapon.
I think my point has been made and I will leave it at that.
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Omid, I agree with you wholeheartedly that much of the problem is economic. If you empower people economically, they are much less likely to jump onto the bandwagon of martyrdom.
However, economics, as important as it is, does not address the issue that there are those few among us who are hell bent on acquiring and consolidating political power by exploiting the needs of the poor, and who will use any means at their disposal, including perverting their religion, to enhance their extremist agendas.
Therefore, even if you could bring a measure of prosperity to most of the people, that would not necessarily diffuse the ambitions of these ideological extremists. A more comprehensive approach is called for by which we are able to beat the extremists at their own game, by doing what they do only better, by co-opting their strategies, and by marginalizing them in the eyes of their own people. In short, since you can’t kill all the extremists, you may want to try killing them in the imagination of their own people.
If the extremists are ideological about violent Jihad, we should be ideological about common sense. If the extremists invest peanuts in charitable handouts, we should invest some serious dollars in jobs; jobs which grow our economies, jobs which protect the environment, and jobs which help neutralize the hold of extremist thinking. If the extremists sell a vision of hope for martyrdom, or paradise, or virgins, or what have you, we should sell a vision of hope for peace, prosperity, and freedom. At every turn we should cut them off at the pass and beat them at their own game.
In the final analysis, the ideological extremists will not be able to capture the public’s imagination, once people begin to imagine a better life for themselves.
Interesting Nissim. Military practioners would call this psychological operations. Potatoe, potato, right? In all honestly though, you are right and whatever the method may be, we have to appeal to a common humanity.
…we have to appeal to a common humanity.
That’s exactly right. We can do that with good paying jobs, which is something that almost everyone on earth can relate to. And also, with an ideology which makes more sense, an ideology which is rooted in some very basic common sense notions, such as: The Golden Rule, The Golden Mean, and The Greatest Good.
If the world is already coming together economically and technologically, and if the problems we face are becoming global in nature, then we owe it to ourselves to come together ideologically as well, at least to the extent necessary to begin solving some of the intractabl problems which threaten us all, such as: How to grow our economies? How to protect the environment? And how to neutralize the hold of extremist thinking?
Let’s face it, a lot of what we believe is nonsense. I don’t really know how we got ourselves stuck in such a situation. But by hook or by crook we better find a way to work ourselves out of this mess, before things get out of hand, and solutionss become a moot point.
How about the “Golden Occupation”, the “Golden Shelling”, the “Golden Killing” Nissim?
Occupation is ugly and no cosmetics can beautify it… fullstop.
Sami, the bedouin.
Terrorism: The nasty bi-product of globalization…Which came first the chicken or the egg?
Very nice thinking Omid and Nissim. The problem is that even in best developed countries and with people that have all they need (and much more), the worst part of human instincts comes alive. So this is something we cannot delete forever. There will always be people that will lead others to death with religious or whatever other intention. But I fully agree with Nissim. The only way to “fight” them is to communicate better to people.
@Omid: Terrorism is a modern word to make people scared and describe something we don’t like. Other words to make excuse to “kill the others” are globalisation, capitalism, fundamentalism,… All words are used with the same purpose – to make people hate the others that belong “to that group”. It is all about making “your people” belive that “other people” are bad.
So terrorism or any other violent act against innocent people came with any religion and belive. Pick any time in history and place and ask people if someone said that someone else should die because they didn’t follow “the rules of god”. So if you ask me, the chicken called religion (whichever) came first. And only some very bad people in those religions made very bad things.
Others are blogging and communicating around.
Sami, the occupation is ugly, but so is a surprise attack on Yom Kippur, or a bus bombing, or 8500 rockets fired on civilians. It’s all ugly. And that’s why we have to sit back, start thinking straight, and come up with, and implement, a plan that works to bring justice to all concerned.
I talk about common sense because that’s what we were given, since the beginning of our stay on this good earth, to bring a semblance of order into our lives. Here is an example.
The Golden Rule: “Treat one another as you want to be treated,” would have us treat one another well by Investing in one another.
The Golden Mean: “The truth is usually found somewhere between two extremes,” would have us think straight by using common sense as our Ideology.
The Greatest Good: “Do what brings the greatest happiness to the greatest number,” would have us maximize justice by organizing ourselves around a vision of Hope.
Putting it all together, the formula for world peace is not all that complicated. As Thomas Jefferson might have put it, “We find this truth to be self-evident: Ideology plus Investment equals Hope, and with hope all things are possible, even the impossible dream of peace.
There is a chance now, Sami, to cut a peace deal. The deal will be cut because Fattah is a lot more worried about Hamas than about Israel. But doing that will require all of us to step back from some of what we believe, in favor of something we can believe in even more like peace.
I agree with Dusan that false belief is at the heart of what is wrong in this world. People believe certain things, and their beliefs can be manipulated by some devious fellows to bring about actions which are very contrary to what makes sense, and to the main principles on which the religion or ideology was founded.
We have to find the courage to step back from some of what we happen to believe in, if what we believe in doesn’t make sense. Instead of believing what we want to believe, why not believe in what makes sense? Instead of jumping to false belief and then rationalizing why we’re right, why not use rationality in the first place to arrive to what is worth believing in?
In a more perfect world, common sense, the collective wisdom born of shared experience, will inspire our thinking, and inform our speech. In our fractured world, common sense is the common denominator.