|| -----Original Message-----
|| From: Cian O'Connor
||
||
|| --- Hakki Alacakaptan <nucleus at superonline.com>
|| wrote:
|| > Afghans do a lot of
|| > killing and dying, but it's
|| > never senseless or random, never the result of a
|| > dumb-assed domino theory,
|| > or a sadistic desire to crush third-world upstarts.
|| > It's more like Big Oil's
|| > devious but calculated Enduring Freedom, a rational
|| > means to an end.
||
|| Rubbish. Plenty die due to some warlord's latest fit
|| of pique with his neighbour, or some dumb assed blood
|| feud. If that's not senseless, I don't know what is
|| (though dying from an American bomb after the country
|| has supposedly been liberated might come close).
||
||
Not even close. Warlords and blood feuds are the way Afghanistan functions, in the absence of foreign meddling. Warlords are military commanders, dispensers of justice, managers of economic activities (agriculture and animal husbandry but also smuggling, opium selling, banditry), and social benefactors: The warlord keeps his people fed. The blood feud is the way they deter unnecessary killings: You don't go and blast anyone you feel like because by doing so you've put a contract on your own head. Warlords don't tangle with each other unless absolutely necessary, but when they do they take no prisoners. None of them has the fabled full-spectrum dominance so they can't afford to have fits of pique. Even the bloody, sadistic Dostum has to watch his step because his men could easily find a less dangerous employer.
Hakki