Iraq and Afghanistan in 2020...

whygohome

I would love to hear your thoughts on what these two nations and the region will be like in 10 years.

In my opinion nothing will change. The U.S. will leave thinking that they have established a form of democracy, but the region will fall back to their old ways. It is impossible to change a culture that is thousands of years older than ours. And, this "mission" has not been worth 1 American life

fuck

whygohome wrote:

I would love to hear your thoughts on what these two nations and the region will be like in 10 years.

In my opinion nothing will change. The U.S. will leave thinking that they have established a form of democracy, but the region will fall back to their old ways. It is impossible to change a culture that is thousands of years older than ours. And, this "mission" has not been worth 1 American life

I'm surprised no one's responded to this topic yet. I think it's a very important issue because so many supporters of the wars, especially Afghanistan, support them without thinking about what's the best possible outcome. Because, anyone who rationally thought about these wars could see how it obviously hurts American interests. On the other hand, so many of the people shouting withdrawal also never think about the bigger picture. You have an example of that yourself in the post where you talk about "1 American life" while ignoring the lives of the Iraqis and Afghanis who have been so much more destroyed, but you probably didn't mean it like that, it's just how Americans talk to eachother these days.

Anyway, I don't know what these two nations and the region will be like in 10 years. I can guess scenarios but rather than give a prediction which will probably be very cynical, I'm just gonna say what I think we should do regarding these wars, namely Afghanistan because that's more of the hot topic these days and it's what I've been talking about a lot more.

Personally, I think what we need to realize about Afghanistan is that we can no longer kill the Tablian and eliminate them so easily without threatening the interests of many Afghan communities who support the Taliban mainly because they are against the corrupt government of Karzai. Negotiation is the best solution. After reading and listening to many analysts on this issue, I agree that the best democratic solution is to implement community self-governance. that would be a way that would divide constituencies for different communities, starting with villages, where its people can vote and hire their politicians and civil servants. This can start with villages, with the different cities, provinces, and so on. The highly centralized government right now makes the laws, implements the law, and monitors the law. this works badly. it would make much more sense to have community governments implement the law. This would also solve the issue with regards to nationalizing shari'ah law, a major ideologue of the Taliban. However, if we keep shari'ah implementable at a community level, each community can have the choice of electing its own leaders who follow their own interpretations of shari'ah law. this is the most fair choice, in my opinion, and quite possible one of the only solutions left able to negotiate. the US should make a complete military withdrawal of course, and decentralizing the government and amending the Afghan constitution that was framed by karzai and his corrupt friends to keep all the power for them is the only route that would also ensure the best for the Afghan people.

As for Al Qaeda, the US cannot absolutely guarantee a defeat. however, if the US and Pakistan begin cooperating under better circumstances, i.e. a more stable Afghanistan, and the Afghan people are living in a stable, democratic environment, the possibility for a strong base for Al Qaeda slims down tremendously and I think that a military withdrawal from Afghanistan and Iraq are only a number of things on a long list that the US needs to start doing in order to raise its standing in the world and eliminate the possibility of threats to us in general.