Busting a Gut for Afghanistan

UN-affiliated and NATO forces agreed to enter Afghanistan in the wake of the U.S.-led invasion that routed the Taliban that had so horribly victimized the population of that eternally war-torn country. Its backward social system, its tribal and religious strictures against modernity and equality between the genders, its endemic poverty and hopelessness inspired Western countries to combine their resources in an effort to instill hope and provide the opportunity for progress.

It's been a very long, uphill battle. Initially the invasion took place because the Taliban leadership had given refuge to al-Qaeda, with their shared revulsion for the West. Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda were routed along with the Taliban into the barren and wild mountain tribal territories between Pakistan and Afghanistan, when the U.S. moved on to Iraq.

Leaving other countries' military to pick up the pieces, attempt to build civil infrastructure, defend the country at the request of its new government, from a resurgent Taliban. Five years later, much has been accomplished, and much has yet to be resolved. There is no guarantee of final accomplishment. The Taliban appear capable of dissolving into the background, them re-appearing with increased dedication.

The NATO forces are compelled to remain until Afghanistan's own military and national police force is deemed sufficiently capable and prepared to look to their own interests. Meanwhile, while the military appear to be shaping up as a viable military force for the country's future, its police, also responsible for security, continue to be seen by ordinary Afghans as corrupt, unreliable and complicit with the Taliban.

Gradually, under the tutelage of foreign soldiers, the Afghan National Police are beginning to assume some semblance of professionalism. From a state of presenting as a motley self-interested crew representing poor training, poorly equipped and led, they're finally emerging, it's hoped, as a force to be relied upon. With a whole lot more work yet to be done to ensure their full capability and reliability.

At the same time in Kandahar City and elsewhere in the country women are being enticed to educate themselves. This, in a country where traditionally the role of women was to be in the background, raising children and working in the fields, devoid of social opportunity much less an education. Aid agencies have developed a plan where women who agree to attend classes, to learn how to read and to write and become numerate, receive badly needed food.

Bi-monthly, women attending discreet classes - held in private homes to avoid raising critical responses in a society still beset with ancient traditions that formally victimize women - are given cooking oil, lentils, salt and wheat in amounts sufficient to sustain their families. The hope being that gradually, educated women will see the need to have educated children, helping to bring the country away from its misogynistic roots.

And then there is Afghanistan government infrastructure, and the ruling governing council, led by president Hamid Karzai. Who is, in effect, a virtual hostage of his own cabinet, many of whom are former warlords, many of whom were aligned with the Taliban, many of whom have blood on their hands, many of whom continue to enrich themselves through the poppy trade.

He may himself represent an individual of good character who earnestly strives to represent the best interests of his struggling country and his impoverished people, but he is wholly dependent on the continued co-operation of those of his colleagues in high places whose best interests are served in protecting the poppy trade.

While the United States, Canada, Great Britain, the Netherlands, Poland and other NATO countries spend countless millions upon billions on aid to Afghans, and on building the required civic infrastructure for an emerging, democratic-leaning country, Afghanistan remains the world's largest producer of heroin through its poppy production.

Corruption in the country is endemic, almost impossible to eradicate. Subsistence farmers are understandably loath to give up profitable poppy crops in favour of edible crops which render them far less of an assured living. They're not discouraged from growing poppies, despite efforts by the U.S. to deploy many of its service members in destroying traditionally planted poppy crops.

Riches are gathered in by corrupt officials at every level of governance; federal, provincial, municipal. And here's the real kicker: the Taliban stuff their war coffers with proceeds from the sale of poppies for heroin, reaping great rewards from their own belligerent support of the illicit world trade.

And that's the absurdly vicious cycle that prevails.