Will Collier forwarded this story, asking “Is the Afghan War over?” Maybe:
One of the Taliban’s most senior and charismatic commanders has become a key negotiator as more and more members of the Islamic militia in Afghanistan give up the fight against the Americans.
The commander, Abdul Salam, earned the nickname Mullah Rockety because he was so accurate with rocket propelled grenades against Russian troops.
He later joined the Taliban as a corps commander in Jalalabad before being captured by the Americans after September 11.
Now he is a supporter of President Hamid Karzai and is tempting diehard Taliban fighters to accept an amnesty offer and reconcile themselves to Afghanistan’s first directly elected leader.
“The Taliban has lost its morale,” he said, speaking by satellite phone from the heartlands of Zabul province, a Taliban redoubt.
“But you have to go and find the Taliban and call to them and ask them directly. If they believe they will be secure and safe they will come down from the mountains.”
After the Taliban’s three-year struggle against a superior US force, there is growing optimism among the Americans and Afghan government that the end is close.
Afghanistan isn’t going to become Vermont (or even New Jersey) any time soon, but there’s no way to paint this story as anything but good news.
Not that some won’t try.
“Afghanistan isn’t going to become Vermont (or even New Jersey) any time soon, but there’s no way to paint this story as anything but good news.
Not that some won’t try.”
Most won’t try. If they try they look foolish. If they report it, they look stupid. They won’t say anything, therefore no bias!
I’d disagree.
Sure, it’ll be easier to kill ‘em w/ silence. I doubt the front page of too many papers are going to focus on this (short of Mullah Omar being bagged).
But there’s several ways to go about undercutting these developments:
1. “What took you so long”? Do you realize how long it’s taken to get Afghanistan into shape?
2. “How much more quickly could it have gone”? If only we hadn’t invaded Iraq, Afghanistan would be even better!
3. “It’s not really that great”! There’ll be reverses—play those up! There’ll be holdouts—focus on them! Just as crime reporting can focus on individual cases and ignore overall trends (which is safer, NYC or London?), you can certainly do the same for Afghanistan.
4. “But what about…”? Is there a growing opium trade? Is there arms smuggling? Have all women stopped wearing burqas? Is Mullah Omar still running free? Hah, so none of this matters until the item du jour is taken care of.
5. “Yeah, but what about Iraq?” And in the end, it’s Iraq that matters. And all of the above tactics apply in spades there.
“several ways to go about undercutting these developments…”
That is not what Mr. Green said though, is it? No, he said:
“…but there’s no way to paint this story as anything but good news.
Not that some won’t try.”
Please, prove it – cite one example. Don’t cite “yes, but” examples, cite one of your “this is not good news” example.
Heh, if you can.
Rockety!
What will be increasingly for Afghanistan is that it continues to show transparency within the government and be the receiver of US aid, as well as some more stingy EU countries (ideologically stingy as well). A civil society with the functionality to keep it stable in the long-run is unclear at the moment, and for the sake of the Afghans, and for the sake of proving the legitimacy of US missions elsewhere, the US (and preferably NATO) must continue its presence.
As I suspected, no effort to actually cite an example of someone, somewhere “trying to paint this story as anything but good news.”
Have a care, your hyperbolic slip is showing.
We all await your retraction, or at least your admission that you are wrong.