this & that
- Gorgeous pictures of Cape Town's new Green Point Stadium.
- A somewhat less-than-hopeful view of the next two years in Sudan.
- Delivering aid via text message. Brilliant.
- Debit cards come to Somaliland.
- How much aid really goes to the DRC? About $4 billion a year. And what have the Congolese gotten in exchange for that aid?
- "The Congolese army is the single greatest threat in the Congo."
- "Abu Sharati: Storm in a Teacup"
- I was teaching about South Africa this week in the context of a lecture on negotiated democratization and mentioned the inequality that persists in the country today. This picture from the cover of PS would have sufficed to tell the whole story.
- Next on the what doesn't work for ending poverty aid world buzz? Village mobile phone systems.
- Surprise, surprise. Zimbabwe won't let a torture expert in.
- Following Wednesday morning's events in Kabul on Twitter.
- This story about Afghan girls' self-immolation to avoid abusive marriages made me ill. And therein lies the dilemma. We can't win in Afghanistan and it's a waste of time and resources to pretend otherwise, but if we leave, what happens to these girls?
- Speaking of Afghanistan, would paying off the Taliban work? The problem with this is the lefty-liberal assumption that people join the Taliban because they don't have economic opportunities. But what if that's not the case? What if people really do act on the basis of ideological commitment? I'm willing to bet that the level of ideological commitment of most Taliban fighters are not similar to those of the 90,000 Iraqis who accepted cash to get out of the sectarian violence business. But maybe I'm wrong.
- South Africa now has an HIV+ soldier serving as a peacekeeper in Sudan.
- Saying that there is "country-ownership" of PEPFAR is nonsense.
- My friend Amanda's husband Daniel has a new blog about travel & adventure gear. He knows his stuff.
- Kenya plans a census of homosexual citizens. I'm sure they'll all be willing to self-identify, what with the fact that homosexuality is illegal in Kenya and all.
- You know, when I notice a sudden, obvious change in writing style in a paper I'm reading and look into it, it's called plagiarism. Apparently that's what passes for journalism in the Sudan Tribune. (Be sure to check out de Waal's comment about cutting & pasting being a standard m.o. for reporting on Sudan.)
- The TSA delivers a typically lame response to a really funny & prescient XKCD cartoon. TSA, there's a reason the American public hates you more than the IRS. But I do feel sorry for your bloggers. Having to defend pointless policies that don't make us safer to people with reasonable, fact-based arguments must get really exhausting.
posted by texasinafrica at 10/30/2009
4 Comments:
Okay, here's the thing. There is no single entity that is the Taliban. I think it's easiest to think of them like this:
Al Qaeda: Foreigners taking advantage of lawlessness. Probably not able to buy them off. They'll move somewhere else while Afghanistan is lawless.
Afghan Ideological Taliban: Not going to be able to buy them off. They're motivated by ideals. There aren't that many of them. They can be defeated.
Everyday Taliban: They want jobs and the assurance that they have a place at the table. They should be part of the reconciliation process. Many of them in the south are frustrated by the haphazard military techniques (alternately attacking and abandoning villages) and lack of opportunity. There are alot of them and they can be dis-armed and reintegrated to the culture.
I know I haven't offered any citations (let's leave that for another day) but I've worked in Afghanistan and have studied it.
Friday, October 30, 2009 7:48:00 PM
Similar pictures could also taken from thousands of places in the world, even in the US.
Actually the first thought that jumped into my crazy mind was this was I-10 just west of El Paso, TX as it swings close to Anapra, MX.
Charlie Mac
Sunday, November 01, 2009 5:58:00 AM
As for the PS picture: Actually, I'd argue that it is NOT that telling specifically because it does not take into account change over time. Anyone who spent time in South Africa in the period from, say, 1994-2000 and the period since can tell you the dramatic difference in the number of informal settlements. Yes, that picture is still appalling, but it is also static. A full picture of the highways outside of Cape Town and their relationship to settlements looked far worse in 1997 than it does now. South Africa has a long way to go, but it is fatuous (nah, screw that -- it's just plain disingenuous) to imply that things have not changed.
dcat
Monday, November 02, 2009 9:26:00 AM
Quite frankly, if foreign forces leave, most of the hospitals will shut down before long, either because the Taliban close them and the doctors flee, or because they are abandoned by skittish aid organizations and run out of money.
FPFJ is correct to break the insurgency into subsets. The ideological Taliban are a gang (several gangs, actually) of genocidal (Yes, genocidal --there's a reason Iran nearly invaded in 1998), misogynist fanatics who cannot and will not run even a minimal state. Though a protracted military campaign is unpalatable, letting the Taliban retake even half the country should be seen as a non-option. It would have disastrous humanitarian consequences for Afghanistan and for its neighborhood of weak states.
The everyday Taliban are a different story. As FPFJ said, they can be disarmed and reintegrated if given real opportunities. The phenomenon of the "Taliban-by-the-hour" can definitely be reduced by creating jobs.
And, of course, the Taliban aren't the only problem. Most of Afghanistan's many non-Taliban warlords are not much better, and some as just as bad. A collapse would mean militias re-arming and going at each other all over the country. Last time, a million people died.
It should be emphasized that none of the above actors has appeal with more than 10% of the population.
The current situation sucks, and alternatives need to be devised, but certain options do need to be off the table.
-Una
Tuesday, November 03, 2009 9:23:00 AM
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