Thought provoking....

[Kassia]

This was emailed to me...

Sent: 17 September 2001 9:50 AM

This is written by Tamim Ansary, a writer and columnist in San Francisco who is a native of Afghanistan. It's both thought provoking and chilling....


"I've been hearing a lot of talk about "bombing Afghanistan back to the
Stone Age." Ronn Owens, on KGO Talk Radio today, allowed that this would
mean killing innocent people, people who had nothing to do with this
atrocity, but "we're at war, we have to accept collateral damage. What
elsecan we do?"

Minutes later I heard some TV pundit discussing whether we
"have the belly to do what must be done."

And I thought about the issues being raised especially hard because I am
from Afghanistan, and even though I've lived here for 35 years I've never
lost track of what's going on there. So I want to tell anyone who will
listen how it all looks from where I'm standing.

I speak as one who hates the Taliban and Osama Bin Laden. There is no
doubt in my mind that these people were responsible for the atrocity in New
York.

I agree that something must be done about those monsters.

But the Taliban and Ben Laden are not Afghanistan. They're not even the
government of Afghanistan. The Taliban are a cult of ignorant psychotics
who took over Afghanistan in 1997. Bin Laden is a political criminal with
a plan.

When you think Taliban, think Nazis. When you think Bin Laden,
think Hitler. And when you think "the people of Afghanistan" think "the
Jews in the concentration camps."

It's not only that the Afghan people had nothing to do with this atrocity.
They were the first victims of the perpetrators. They would exult if
someone would come in there, take out the Taliban and clear out the rat's
nest of international thugs holed up in their country.

Some say, why don't the Afghans rise up and overthrow the Taliban? The
answer is, they're starved, exhausted, hurt, incapacitated, suffering. A
few years ago, the United Nations estimated that there are 500,000
disabled orphans in Afghanistan--a country with no economy, no food.

There are millions of widows. And the Taliban has been burying these
widows alive in mass graves. The soil is littered with land mines, the farms
were all destroyed by the Soviets. These are a few of the reasons why the
Afghan people have not overthrown the Taliban.

We come now to the question of bombing Afghanistan back to the Stone
Age.Trouble is, that's been done. The Soviets took care of it already.

Make the Afghans suffer? They're already suffering.

Level their houses? Done.

Turn their schools into piles of rubble? Done.

Eradicate their hospitals? Done.

Destroy their infrastructure? Cut them off from medicine and health
care? Too late. Someone already did all that.

New bombs would only stir the rubble of earlier bombs. Would they at
least get the Taliban? Not likely.

In today's Afghanistan, only the Taliban eat, only they have the means to
move around. They'd slip away and hide.

Maybe the bombs would get some of those disabled orphans, they don't move
too fast, they don't even have wheelchairs. But flying over Kabul and
dropping bombs wouldn't really be a strike against the criminals who did
this horrific thing. Actually it would only be making common cause with the
Taliban--by raping once again the people they've been raping all this time

So what else is there? What can be done, then? Let me now speak with true
fear and trembling. The only way to get Bin Laden is to go in there with
ground troops.

When people speak of "having the belly to do what needs to be done" they're
thinking in terms of having the belly to kill as many as
needed. Having the belly to overcome any moral qualms
about killing innocent people.

Let's pull our heads out of the sand. What's actually on the table is
Americans dying. And not just because some Americans would die fighting
their way through Afghanistan to Bin Laden's hideout.

It's much bigger than that folks. Because to get any troops
to Afghanistan, we'd have to go through Pakistan. Would they let
us?

Not likely. The conquest of Pakistan would have to be first. Will other
Muslim nations just stand by? You see where I'm going. We're flirting with
a world war between Islam and the West.

And guess what-- that's Bin Laden's program. That's exactly what he wants.

That's why he did this. Read his speeches and statements. It's all right
there. He truly believes Islam would beat the west.

It might seem ridiculous, but he figures if he can polarize the world into
Islam and the West, he's got a billion soldiers. If the west wreaks a
holocaust in those lands, that's a billion people with nothing left to lose,
that's even better from Bin Laden's point of view.

He's probably wrong, in the end the West would win, whatever that would
mean, but the war would last for years and millions would die, not just
them, but us. Who has the belly for that?

Bin Laden does. Anyone else?

Tamim Ansary

[bob]

Oh! I am happy to see this chain letter again.

Is this propaganda? I laugh at their inferior intellect.

[BishBoshBaby]

Sorry to disagree with you Bob. But most of what he said about the Taliban and Afghanistan is true. I think that the point he was trying to make was that by bombing Afgahnistan from the air or by cruise missiles you will NOT get the people you want to do. You will be killing innocent people, "collateral damage". So what I hear you say? Remember this, those thousands of victims that lost their lives in the WTC and the Pentagon were not the intended tagets. The targets were the WTC and the Pentagon themselves and symbols that they represent to the world.

WTC - symbol of financial and industrial dominance of the US over the world.

Pentagon - symbol of military and intelligence dominance over the world.

Those thousands dead -"collateral damage"

Choosing to ignore the innocent lives that you would destroy, you are no better than Osama bin Laden himself, and in a way justify what he has done. if you don't care about innocent lives why should he?

He was also saying that the only way to get these people was with ground troups, which would mean going through Pakistan. Possibilities are, with the approval of the Pakistan government, which could mean the otherthrow of that government by a popular pro-Islam anti-west uprising or Afghanistan and other Islamic nations going to war with Pakistan. With the disproval of Pakistan which would almost certainly mean war with pakistan and then a war between the west and the Islamic world.

Osama bin Laden is a west hating mass murdering psychopathic Islamic fundamentalist who has shown total disregard for human life. Is it really that hard to think that maybe this is what he wants?

I think the post was saying MAKE SURE YOU KNOW WHAT YOU ARE DOING WW3 IS JUST AROUND THE CORNER. Unless you're a fifteen year old who likes the idea of war and the fact that the US can attack and wipe out any country in the world.

And if you will simply dismiss something as propoganda (even if it is) your point is useless unless you try and explain why.

I say get the SAS in there and take him out with a bullet.

Bish

Bish

[LawyerRon]

I agree with most of what's said in that letter. Ground troops are the only way. Bush has hinted as such. The Taliban receives much financial support for the Saudi's.

[HAL9000]

I agree as well. You can't just go in and bomb the heck out of Afghanistan. Doing so would kill innocent people and make the US no better than those who committed these acts of terrorism. Nukes aren't the answer either as you begin to drop fallout on neighbouring countries. This is going to be a long, dragged out war to get to the heart of the problem. At home, I would expect the US to be the victim of more terrorist acts such as car bombings. Things are going to get ugly before they get better.

[mairving]

Obviously the Bush administration knows this. I am sure that it was tempting and would have please a lot of people but done no good to start bombing them soon after the attack. Kudos to them for their patience. It is definitely a difficult situation. These terrorists are not above killing innocent civilians in America or in their own country if it serves their cause. You know Sadaam built schools and hospitals next to ammo dumps and military headquarters on purpose. The PLO in the past positioned canons in the basement of hospitals. So who is responsible if the hospital is bombed?

[BishBoshBaby]

Not being from the US and never having been there I don't know the answer to this: what would your average US citizen think of Osama bin Laden being handed over to a neutral Islamic country and being tried under Islamic law? If the US feels that it has enough evidence to convict him in the US is it prepared to give that evidence to a an Islamic court. The reason why is this, very few governments recognise the Taliban as a legitimate government and as such I don't think the Taliban therefore sees any request from such countries as valid. Also the Taliban does not recognise secular law, the only law it does recognise is the law in the Koran, I think it's spelt as SHIA law and as such that is the only law it would allow bin Laden to be tried under. If the evidence does exist to prove him responsible, then as far as I can tell under Shia law he'd be put to death.

The reason I ask is this it is the only way that I can see of avoiding military action that has a high chance of escalating into something worse and continued acts of terrorism on US and western soil. It would also show those intent on commiting these acts that the countries of the world, no matter what our differences stand together to condemn terrorism.

Can you please also ask your president not to use such words as crusade. It reminds the arabs of the bitter history when the streets ran red with the blood of muslims at the hands of (I'm sorry to say) the English. It kind of makes them feel uneasy.

Bish

[Jade]

Since there have been attacks on the Talban from from the rebels already I can see a joint rebel attack while US planes drob bombs from above. We just need constant communication with the rebels. No funding, no weapons lending, just a helping hand from above. And some healthy doses of Napalm for the holes.

Really I hear these Talban decimated centuries old religious statues and buried widows alive in mass graves long before anything broke out. They should be decimated on human right infringes in thier own country alone.

[Carl Price]

Originally posted by BishBoshBaby Not being from the US and never having been there I don't know the answer to this: what would your average US citizen think of Osama bin Laden being handed over to a neutral Islamic country and being tried under Islamic law? If the US feels that it has enough evidence to convict him in the US is it prepared to give that evidence to a an Islamic court.

I can't speak for everybody, but for me this would work except for one thing. I don't believe you can find a neutral Islamic country that would do anything but a whitewash job. If they would only rule on his guilt or innocence, I would be for this. But I really believe it would be deplorable like the old southern USA where you could never find a jury that would convict a white man of crimes against a black. I don't believe an Islamic jury would convict an Islamic of crimes against Christians.