.Helmand Province and the wider “War on Terror”.
"Background
On 11 September 2001, the west had the sympathy of the vast majority of people in the Muslim world, who were against the attacks carried out by a load of nihilist extremists. In the days following those attacks, western Governments—including our own—realised the enormity of the problem that we faced and within months had successfully defeated the Taliban and expelled al-Qaeda from its operating base there. Afghans literally danced in the streets in gratitude for their release from a mediaeval regime and from their hated Arab guests. At that point, there was a massive opportunity to make progress and good will on the part of the Afghan people to accept foreign aid and development. Although General McColl managed to get a tiny £2 million from the Department for International Development for development, the reality in Whitehall was that we were not concentrating on Afghanistan or more generally on al-Qaeda. Instead, we were focusing on a crazy and quite unnecessary invasion of Iraq.
Despite our early success in toppling the Taliban, almost everything we did afterwards undermined the massive amount of good will we had across the Muslim world after 9/11. Today, al-Qaeda are no longer seen as a bunch of extremist crazies; they are, to some extent, seen as heroes fighting against what they perceive to be an arrogant west. I fully accept that—with the possible exception of Iraq—our Government has acted in good faith and realised the seriousness of our situation, but I also believe the way we have executed this operation has been incompetent and half-cocked."
Michael Yon
On 11 September 2001, the west had the sympathy of the vast majority of people in the Muslim world, who were against the attacks carried out by a load of nihilist extremists. In the days following those attacks, western Governments—including our own—realised the enormity of the problem that we faced and within months had successfully defeated the Taliban and expelled al-Qaeda from its operating base there. Afghans literally danced in the streets in gratitude for their release from a mediaeval regime and from their hated Arab guests. At that point, there was a massive opportunity to make progress and good will on the part of the Afghan people to accept foreign aid and development. Although General McColl managed to get a tiny £2 million from the Department for International Development for development, the reality in Whitehall was that we were not concentrating on Afghanistan or more generally on al-Qaeda. Instead, we were focusing on a crazy and quite unnecessary invasion of Iraq.
Despite our early success in toppling the Taliban, almost everything we did afterwards undermined the massive amount of good will we had across the Muslim world after 9/11. Today, al-Qaeda are no longer seen as a bunch of extremist crazies; they are, to some extent, seen as heroes fighting against what they perceive to be an arrogant west. I fully accept that—with the possible exception of Iraq—our Government has acted in good faith and realised the seriousness of our situation, but I also believe the way we have executed this operation has been incompetent and half-cocked."
Michael Yon
posted by madtom at 10:05 PM
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