Afghanistan

It is time to closely look at what the USA has done, whether it was done with good intent is not the issue. What has been done must be seen to correct any mistakes made. It is now quite obvious that the USA could have used all it's vast military might to totally take Afghanistan, to take control (policing) until a republican government could be formed. Distracted by Iraq the, USA failed to complete it's mission.

 More war-ring will not solve the problem. It is time to look at new solutions.
 

2001: A Lost Window of Opportunity

In 2001, Afghanistan presented the international community two golden

opportunities: the opportunity to destroy Al Qaeda’s safe haven by ousting the Taliban regime; and the opportunity to successfully rebuild the strategically critical nation of Afghanistan, creating a model of positive engagement between the West and an Islamic nation

Five years ago, the events of 11 September 2001 threw two global cultures together in the most dramatic way possible. The United States led the international community’s response, launching extensive military operations in Afghanistan. Yet Afghanistan represented a window of opportunity for the international community to successfully collaborate in a powerful and far-reaching manner with an Islamic state. Its stated commitment to removing the perpetrators of terrorism in Afghanistan generated a largely enthusiastic welcome from the Afghan people, providing the international community with an excellent chance to address the real and immediate needs of Afghans. In turn, this could have positively influenced the perceptions of the global Islamic community, opening a window for further collaboration to address the root causes of extremism.

US and UK-led failed counter-narcotics policies have led directly to the return of the Taliban, by creating security and hunger crises in southern Afghanistan

Five years later, large areas of Afghanistan, particularly in the South, are not under central government control. Insurgency is present in half of the country: the Taliban are back and advancing rapidly towards Kabul. The Taliban’s return is directly connected to a number of failures on the part of the international community, many of which are linked to the formulation and implementation of failed counternarcotics policies.

Although the events of 11 September 2001 are perceived by many in the Muslim

world as embodying the clash of two global cultures, recognition of this underlying cultural clash has not been evident in the international community’s subsequent responses in Afghanistan. There has been a profound failure on the part of the international community to appreciate that the majority of Afghans have a completely different “world view” to that of the ‘Western’ world. The Afghan population identifies itself first and foremost as Muslim, and its sense of cultural identity is very closely tied to Islam and the global Islamic community -

http://www.senliscouncil.net/modules/publications/014_publication/documents/5y_preface