Education resources
Saturday, August 07, 2004
Editorial: Failed states?/Iraq, Afghanistan on the edge
Editorial: Failed states?/Iraq, Afghanistan on the edge: "You hear it all the time from defenders of the war in Iraq: Lots of progress is being made, but the cynical media are ignoring this 'good news.' In fact, things aren't going better in Iraq -- or Afghanistan -- than the media are reporting; the realities are far worse. Both nations are at risk of ending up as failed states -- breeding grounds for a large new generation of America-hating terrorists.
That conclusion comes from a cross-party committee of the British House of Commons. Issued last week, it warned that unless NATO countries send more troops to Afghanistan, this 'fragile state in one of the most sensitive and volatile regions of the world could implode, with terrible consequences.' Afghanistan, one former defense minister said, 'is on a knife edge.'
The British report came less than a day after Doctors Without Borders, which had served the people of Afghanistan through a quarter-century of brutal turmoil, withdrew because of increased security concerns for its people.
Of Iraq, the British members of Parliament said the war had actually heightened the threat of terrorism: It had made Iraq 'a battleground for Al-Qaida, with appalling consequences for the Iraqi people.' The failure of Britain and the United States to impose order in Iraq, the British legislators said, means the country is in real danger of chaos.
In Afghanistan, the problem is reducible to two factors: too few foreign troops to stabilize the security situation and too little foreign aid for reconstruction. The United States likes to pretend that Hamid Karzai and his government control the future of Afghanistan, but the truth is that without massive amounts of additional outside help -- both personnel and money -- the Karzai experiment in Afghanistan will go sour. As it did following the defeat "
That conclusion comes from a cross-party committee of the British House of Commons. Issued last week, it warned that unless NATO countries send more troops to Afghanistan, this 'fragile state in one of the most sensitive and volatile regions of the world could implode, with terrible consequences.' Afghanistan, one former defense minister said, 'is on a knife edge.'
The British report came less than a day after Doctors Without Borders, which had served the people of Afghanistan through a quarter-century of brutal turmoil, withdrew because of increased security concerns for its people.
Of Iraq, the British members of Parliament said the war had actually heightened the threat of terrorism: It had made Iraq 'a battleground for Al-Qaida, with appalling consequences for the Iraqi people.' The failure of Britain and the United States to impose order in Iraq, the British legislators said, means the country is in real danger of chaos.
In Afghanistan, the problem is reducible to two factors: too few foreign troops to stabilize the security situation and too little foreign aid for reconstruction. The United States likes to pretend that Hamid Karzai and his government control the future of Afghanistan, but the truth is that without massive amounts of additional outside help -- both personnel and money -- the Karzai experiment in Afghanistan will go sour. As it did following the defeat "
