Although unheralded by major news media, today marks the
900th day of the American invasion and occupation of Afghanistan.
As such, I thought it merited a look at the ongoing situation.
Would you like to join me?
After 900 Days:
Too unstable for elections:
"Insecurity in the country continues to follow a well-known pattern and has shown no signs of significant improvement," Secretary-General Kofi Annan said in a written report to the Security Council and the General Assembly. "The risk of suicide attacks against well-protected, international military targets remains of concern."
Fighting continues in city of Herat in the West:
The day-long battle between federally-backed troops and a powerful local militia erupted after government Aviation Minister Mirwais Sadiq - the son of Herat-based warlord Ismail Khan - was killed in the city.
A federal garrison commander said Mr. Sadiq was killed in a fight at the commander's home. Authorities in Kabul said he was assassinated as he rode in a car.
Fighting continues in Waziristan in the East:
Unknown attackers killed at least 12 Pakistani soldiers and wounded 15 as they traveled to join the hunt near the Afghanistan border for fighters linked to Al-Qaeda, military officials said Tuesday.
The officials said a Pakistani army convoy was ambushed 30 miles east of Wana late Monday as it moved to join the main battalion in the South Waziristan tribal region.
Meanwhile pro-Taliban tribes in area strike serious blows:
Assailants set a roadside bomb that killed three police officers and a civilian, officials said Wednesday, in the latest of a series of attacks raising fears that a bloody offensive by Pakistani forces against al-Qaida militants could be provoking a broad backlash.
The bomb exploded late Tuesday in northwestern Pakistan as an army vehicle passed as part of the military's sweep against suspected terrorists holed up in the rugged tribal regions along the Afghan border, police said.
Fighting continues in Kandahar in the South:
"Early this morning we re-engaged the enemy forces with direct fire and with fire support from US Air Force aircraft," US military spokesman Lt. Col. Bryan Hilferty said.
US and Afghan forces have beefed up activity in the region under Operation Mountain Storm, a new US offensive launched March 7 against Al-Qaeda leaders.
And the Kabul government still struggling to disarm warlords in Mazar-e-Sharif in the North:
The Defense Ministry has announced plans to impound before the elections all the heavy weapons held by the militia commanders who still control most of the country. Dozens of tanks, rocket-launchers and artillery pieces left over from two decades of war have been collected near the northern city of Mazar-e-Sharif as well as Kabul.
Women's rights barely existant:
Madina, a twenty-year-old Afghan woman, set herself on fire. She wanted to commit suicide, she said, because her husband's family constantly beat her. According to Afghan officials and human rights workers, many other women are also beaten or otherwise deprived of their rights.
US military keeps building new bases:
Village elders in this hamlet of 45 families in Paktika province said the Americans arrived 18 days ago with Afghan militia.
The camp is home to 60 Americans, working with 200 Afghan militia, the Afghan militiamen say. The Westerners wear T-shirts and sunglasses, and most sport beards and mustaches, with pistols strapped to their legs. Rank and file U.S. soldiers must remain in uniform and are banned from growing beards, but special operations forces are not subject to the same regulations.
On Tuesday, the Americans were erecting 100 yards of wire fence along the border beside their base. They also dug holes, which will become bunkers, to live in while their Afghan allies put up tents.
Land mines and other ordinance continues to kill innocent people:
This was not the carnage of battle, but the lethal legacy of decades of other wars.
A U.S. Army Explosives and Ordnance Demolition team had been preparing to destroy a stack of what appeared to be old artillery shells. Some of the shells detonated prematurely, shortly after 3 p.m.
The blast killed four Afghans and badly wounded another. An American soldier was seriously injured in the blast.
"This is life in Afghanistan," said an Afghan translator for the U.S. military, whose name is being withheld at the request of military authorities here. Tears shone in his eyes as he stared at three of his countrymen lying dead, side by side, on olive-green American stretchers.
The Taliban is still alive and kicking:
Hakimi added that the Taliban was able to target US soldiers with increasing ease and gave numerous examples.
"We killed 18 American soldiers near the Maryam school in Gazney province, another three in the town of Zargary.
"In the mountains of Khoyani we set a trap in a depot and killed 43 US soldiers with one bomb."
"We never let the Americans sleep in their base at Khost. Every night there is a rocket attack."
The anti-American forces are now using magnetic bombs:
International peacekeepers in the Afghan capital have been warned of the risk of "magnetic bombs" being placed on their vehicles, an Afghan intelligence official said yesterday. About 60 of these bombs have been made in Pakistan and smuggled into Afghanistan by militants belonging to the Hizb-e-Islami movement, the official said, requesting anonymity.
Meanwhile Karzai loses control of another 9 districts:
The government of Hamid Karzai has officially acknowledged that nine districts of Paktika have been lost and that they are no longer under control of the government in Kabul. Further, government officials have warned that unless Americans come to help the besieged province, the entire province will be overrun. The governor of province, Gulam Mangal, told an American radio station that nine districts including the districts of Gyan, Barmal, Zerok have been lost. He said that not all the districts were ruled by Hizb-e-Islami, a Taliban ally but that some were ruled by tribal leaders who are against the Karzai regime.
Warlord, formerly US ally in the "Northern Alliance" is now pro-Taliban warlord:
Former Afghan prime minister Gulbadin Hekmatyar, now wanted by the United States, has declared year 2004 as the `Year of War' by giving a call to `mujahideen' to increase target-oriented attacks on the US-led coalition forces in Afghanistan.
There are still sad reminders of the thousands of civilians killed by American bombs:
"What causes the documented high level of civilian casualties -- 3,000 - 3,400 [October 7, 2001 thru March 2002] civilian deaths -- in the U.S. air war upon Afghanistan? The explanation is the apparent willingness of U.S. military strategists to fire missiles into and drop bombs upon, heavily populated areas of Afghanistan."
When U.S. warplanes strafed [with AC-130 gunships] the farming village of Chowkar-Karez, 25 miles north of Kandahar on October 22-23rd, killing at least 93 civilians, a Pentagon official said, "the people there are dead because we wanted them dead." The reason? They sympathized with the Taliban. When asked about the Chowkar incident, Rumsfeld replied, "I cannot deal with that particular village."
During the first two months of the war, an average of 65 Afghan civilians killed by US bombs, per day. Detail listed of who killed when by whom is here.
Due to poor local intelligence, Americans and allies keep killing innocent people:
In December 2001, a tip from the warlord, Badshah Khan Zadran, sent American AC-130 gunships and Navy fighters to attack a convoy of vehicles full of Afghan tribal elders on their way to show allegiance to the post-Taliban government; 65 civilians were reportedly killed.
In July 2002, at least 48 people were killed and 117 wounded when US warplanes attacked a wedding party in the town of Deh Rawud in central Afghanistan. The US military said a gunship had come under fire in the area.
More recently, on Dec. 6, 2003, US forces admitted mistakenly killing nine children when they bombed the home of a suspected Taliban commander near the town of Ghazni. The attack, prompted by "extensive intelligence" was precise, but the target left the location an hour before.
"I believe as long as you use local, infamous warlords, you'll always have problems," says Ali Ahmed Jalali, the Afghan interior minister, who maintains an extensive intelligence service. "Some of these warlords wanted to ensure mistakes were made, to keep the war going. There are cases where misinformation has been fed into the system."
Illegal drugs continue to flourish:
Afghanistan produced three-quarters of the world's opium last year as poppy cultivation neared a record level, the State Department said.
Meanwhile 104 American soldiers are dead. Including these two human beings from March 19, 2004:
The Department of Defense announced today the death of two soldiers supporting Operation Enduring Freedom. They died on March 18, in Dehrawood, Afghanistan, when their team came under small arms fire while clearing a village. Both Soldiers were assigned to the 2nd Battalion, 22nd Infantry Regiment, 10th Mountain Division (Light Infantry), Fort Drum, N.Y. Killed were:
Staff Sgt. Anthony S. Lagman, 26, of Yonkers, N.Y.
Sgt. Michael J. Esposito, Jr., 22, of Brentwood, N.Y.
What about cost? What about monetary expense?
USA Today says 1 billion dollars a month in Afghanistan
Radio Netherlands says 4,000 dollars per day per soldier in Afghanistan
Our friendship with Pakistan is costing the US taxpayer between 132 million dollars and 600 million dollars a year and "we" just forgave a billion dollars of their debt
Not to mention the millions spent on arming the Taliban during the Soviet days
Let's do a mission check:
Osama bin Laden? Still not caught
Mullah Omar? Still not caught
Zarqawi? Still not caught
Karzai freely elected? Not yet
Democracy in place? Not yet
Does a central government exist? Not yet
Taliban? Still not disbanded
Al-Qaeda? Still trucking
And finally, last but not least, the average wartorn, tired, embattled Afghani citizen makes 700 dollars a year
And President Bush is running on the "success" of his record??
I don't know what else to say. I really don't.
Peace is the only answer