relations with Taliban and Al Queda. There's been enough time now for those who cared to do so.
For example:
Interview with BBC Reporter David Loyn, who has written the definitive book on the subject of Afghanistan and the history of foreign-power involvement there over the last 200 years.
David Loyn: Geography certainly defines Afghanistan’s destiny. Less than 5% of the land is irrigible farmland; the rest is deserts and mountains, framed by the right-angled ranges of the Hindu Kush across the middle, and the Suleiman Mountains running up the east of the country. But this does not mean it was always poor. In the 1970s Helmand exported more raisins than California, thanks to the Helmand irrigation project (based on the Tennessee Valley Authority). That fertile valley now grows about 90% of the world’s illegal opium. Afghanistan is on a geographical crossroads, trampled across by invaders for thousands of years, but none has stayed the course. There were big mistakes made after 2001, with raised expectations that women would ‘throw off the burqa’ and that a western-style voting system would somehow conjure up a civilised society as if by magic out of nowhere. In a highly critical report the World Bank talked of an ‘aid juggernaut’ descending on Kabul, sucking out the translators and officials for itself, rather than building the capacity of the Afghan state. Dealing with local corruption might have been a better use of international effort. In the first year after the Taliban fell, government revenues were actually lower than during the Taliban years, as local warlords creamed off the cash again for themselves. There is a growing realisation that it will not be possible to create something like Switzerland in the Hindu Kush, and eight years on there are far lower expectations about the kind of society that can be built. Respecting Afghans’ ability to do things for themselves and then letting modern notions of sexual equality spread out from the cities would be a better way forward. But without stability and competent government none of this will happen. . .
David Loyn: If you ask people in rural Afghanistan, or in the Pakistani North-West frontier, why they are backing the Taliban, the answer that most often comes back is that the Taliban provide justice. It may not be the kind that we would like – sharia law has some notoriously harsh penalties, such as amputation. But the worst failure in Afghanistan since 2001 has been in allowing corruption to return so that the police and courts did not provide justice. How could 2 million refugees be expected to return to their land if warlords were again controlling things? It is the same story on the Pakistani side of the mountains. Easy access to justice has deprived people of any recourse other than to the Taliban. And the failure to provide any education has opened the door to Wahhabi religious schools, madrasas, some financed from Saudi Arabia, who teach little other than the recital of holy texts by rote. Any western-designed policy that does not address this, and do it in a way that respects local customs, is likely to fail. Expensive and cleverly constutructed aid programs designed outside the country have not worked so far. One of the popular reasons for the war against the Taliban was because of their harsh treatment of women, but the outspoken Afghan woman MP, Malalai Joya now says that ‘Rights for women in Afghanistan are worse now than under the Taliban.’
http://themoderatevoice.com/38259/interview-with-david-loyn/
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