The Courtship of Sirajuddin's Father

Paul: Nothing to do but cut and run, huh? What else?
What about the old American social custom of self-defense?
If the police don't defense us, maybe we ought to do it ourselves.
Jack: We're not pioneers anymore, Dad.
Paul: What are we, Jack?
Jack: What do you mean?
Paul: I mean, if we're not pioneers, what have we become?
What do you call people who, when they're faced with
a condition of fear, do nothing about it, they just run and hide?
Jack: Civilized?
--Death Wish (1974)

It's like surfing, except that we're surfing on top of a
shit tidal wave, and we're just trying not to fall in
--Major Robert O'Brien,
head of Maverick's National Police Transition Team
_____________

Wisdom a la Charlie Bronson' s "Death Wish." Paul's is the straw man argument we are fed today -- we are either wimps who cut-and-run, or stand and fight. Of course, those who offer that dichotomy conveniently ignore the fact of their own bellicosity, and that the condition of fear is artificially propped up by the 'round the clock Code Orangification of U.S. airports.

A recent reader's comment on the failures in Afghanistan reminded me of the U.S.'s courting and rejection of terrorists there, and the essential otherness of the raw material at hand.

Aside from the blatant venality motivating the whole enterprise, one need only look at the nuts and bolts to see the futility of the enterprise. The Wall Street Journal ran an article last last month, "Failed Courtship of Warlord Trips Up U.S. in Afghanistan (11/07/08)" found here.

"The U.S. is struggling to find tribal allies in Afghanistan and Pakistan as it tries to beat back the resurgence of al Qaeda and the Taliban. In alienating a powerful warlord named Jalaluddin Haqqani a few years ago, however, some U.S. and Afghan officials argue the Americans may have shot themselves in the foot.

"Mr. Haqqani is now one of the major rebel leaders roiling Afghanistan. But back in autumn 2002, he secretly sent word that he could ally with the new U.S.-friendly Afghan government. The warlord had once been a partner of the Central Intelligence Agency, and later closely collaborated with Osama bin Laden and the ruling Taliban."

What in the hell are we doing allying with warlords? Possibly he was democratically-elected? Alliance with warlords does not a nation make. Ten warlords allied with the U.S. does not equal nation-building.

"[1/10/07] Near midnight, hundreds of armed Pashtuns crossed into Afghanistan. Some were barefoot; others wore garbage bags on their feet to protect themselves from the frost, say U.S. soldiers present. The 10th Mountain Division hit them with artillery and machine-gun fire from Apache helicopters, killing about 150 of Mr. Haqqani’s men, say U.S. Army officials. 'That was a very good day,' says Col. Bushey, a battalion commander who was present. 'We showed we were increasingly challenging their space.'"

"Debate continues in the U.S. and Afghan governments over whether major Afghan warlords can be turned."

They are not like some overinflated piece of Florida real estate, to be flipped to the next highest bidder. Not walking in the mountain snow, barefooted. That entails a certain devotion to cause.

The New Yorker's "Inside the Surge" weaves the story of one family's revenge throughout a tale of American confusion, weaving terrorists and anti-American triggerman into ostensible allies. In an interview with matriarch Um Jafaar of her tribal vendetta for her son's death, she says she:

"took the body parts of Amar’s victims, wrapped in cloth, to his grave, in the holy city of Najaf, and buried them there. “I talk to my son, I tell him, ‘Here, this is from those who killed you, I take revenge.’ ” Moving one hand in a horizontal circle, she said, “I put them around the grave. So far, I have taken one hand, one eye, an Adam’s apple, toes, fingers, ears, and noses.” (Karim told me that the hand had made the house stink for days.) I asked her how many Mahdi men Amar had killed. “I don’t know: eighteen, twenty? But still my heart hurts. Even if we kill all of them, I won’t have comfort,” she said.

"A few days earlier, Um Jafaar told me, she had been at the funeral of a Mahdi fighter, and had heard one of his comrades vow to avenge him: “He said, ‘If before I decapitated them at the neck, now I will do it at their mouths.’ ” She made a hacking motion across her mouth."

Strong and resolute people, and absolutely foreign to our way of thinking. Rudyard Kipling was right. So, what benefit exactly are we gaining there, aside from making Um Jafaar's revenge possible?