Nicholas D. Kristof: A Scary Afghan Road

[gristy]

By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
November 15, 2003
New York Times

A Scary Afghan Road

Here's a foreign affairs quiz:

1. In the two years since the war in Afghanistan, opium production has:

(A) virtually been eliminated by Hamid Karzai's government and American forces.
(B) declined 30 percent, but eradication is not expected until 2008.
(C) soared 19-fold and become the major source of the world's heroin.

2. In Paktika and Zabul, two religiously conservative parts of Afghanistan, the number of children going to school:

(A) has quintupled, with most girls at least finishing third grade.
(B) has risen 40 percent, although few girls go to school.
(C) has plummeted as poor security has closed nearly all schools there.

The correct answer to both questions, alas, is (C).

With the White House finally acknowledging that the challenge in Iraq runs deeper than gloomy journalism, the talk of what to do next is sounding rather like Afghanistan. And that's alarming, because we have flubbed the peace in Afghanistan even more egregiously than in Iraq.

more

At the end of the article: "If Afghanistan is a White House model for Iraq, heaven help us."

[berner59]

1. good editorial...

Amazing how none of this makes the daily news... Why aren't the Dems jumping on this?? Throw all of this into the pot and Bush is boiled...