Anyone really want the Talban back?

From leroi at Milnet.ca:

One encouraging opinion from The Walrus: March 2009.

http://www.walrusmagazine.com/articles/2009.03-letters-letters-march-2009/

From the Letters (Reproduced under the Fair Dealing Provision of the Copyright Act.)

The Key to Kabul

I have been engaged in health care development and policy work for more than three of the past eight years in Afghanistan, most recently in Kabul. A friend sent me Charles Montgomery’s article “The Archipelago of Fear” (December 2008), which I thought a reasonably good representation of the dysfunction that plagues the city’s reconstruction and the effect of architectural fearmongering on its people.

But Montgomery doesn’t give any credit where it’s due: to the organizations, both national and international, that have improved the economic situation, literacy, and health of the Afghan people. Some of us were in here before the barriers were built, when we could meet the people. I speak enough Dari to get by and have, unlike most of the westerners in Montgomery’s article, made a tremendous effort to understand the culture and bring this knowledge to bear in my work. Of course, it’s easy to see why successes like mine didn’t make it into the story. Those of us who don’t hang out at L’Atmosphère are harder to find.

It’s typical for the media to focus on the hopelessness of the situation in Afghanistan. But I was also here during the Taliban regime, and I can assure readers there have been many positive changes since then. Maybe if reporters had witnessed this change themselves, they would see fit to broadcast some hope.

Maureen Mayhew
Management Sciences for Health [link added, take a look - MC]
Kabul, Afghanistan

Update: Along similar lines, via Terry Glavin:

Yankees Talking Sense

To this day, the vast majority of Afghans truly prefer U.S. forces over the Taliban. What they don't like, however, is our overwhelming failure to make progress after our initial gains in 2001 and 2002. If they hated us in general, the Afghans would've kicked out our meager force of 30,000 troops years ago. What they hate is when we tell them that we're going to run off the Taliban and fix their country--and then we don't. What they hate is when we offer them incentives to side with us against the Taliban, and then, when the Taliban return to their villages, we leave them hung out to dry. What they hate is when we are forced to rely on air power--resulting in unnecessary civilian casualties--because we don't have enough ground troops.

Here.