Q&A: Ahmed Rashid. (On the Line).Ahmed Rashid Ahmed Rashid (b. 1948 in Rawalpindi) is a Pakistani journalist and best-selling author. Rashid attended Malvern College, England, Government College Lahore, and Cambridge University. is a journalist based in Lahore, Pakistan. He has been covering Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Central Asia for more than twenty years TWENTY YEARS. The lapse of twenty years raises a presumption of certain facts, and after such a time, the party against whom the presumption has been raised, will be required to prove a negative to establish his rights. 2. for The Far Eastern Economic Review and The Daily Telegraph. He is the author of Taliban (Yale University Yale University, at New Haven, Conn.; coeducational. Chartered as a collegiate school for men in 1701 largely as a result of the efforts of James Pierpont, it opened at Killingworth (now Clinton) in 1702, moved (1707) to Saybrook (now Old Saybrook), and in 1716 was Press), which has sold a million copies and has been translated into more than twenty languages. His latest book is Jihad: The Rise of Militant Islam in Central Asia Islam is the most widely practiced religion in Central Asia. The Hanafi school of thought is the most popular.[1] History The Battle of Talas in 751 between the Abbasid Caliphate and the Chinese Tang Dynasty for control of Central Asia was the turning point (Yale). David Barsamian David Barsamian is an American radio broadcaster and writer of Armenian descent. He is the founder and director of Alternative Radio, the Boulder, Colorado-based syndicated weekly talk program heard on some 125 radio stations in various countries. spoke with him by phone on August 23. Q: General Tommy Franks Tommy Ray Franks (born June 17, 1945 in Wynnewood, Oklahoma) is a retired General in the United States Army, previously serving as the Commander of the United States Central Command, overseeing United States Armed Forces operations in a 25-country region, including the Middle East. , head of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, says his troops will be in that country "for years." What are the implications of that? Rashid: Very serious. You have a lot of suspicion among the neighbors of Afghanistan about U.S. intentions. Certainly, if the United States United States, officially United States of America, republic (2005 est. pop. 295,734,000), 3,539,227 sq mi (9,166,598 sq km), North America. The United States is the world's third largest country in population and the fourth largest country in area. is going to be there for a long time, it's going to exacerbate regional tensions. And the idea of a permanent U.S. military presence, as opposed to an economic presence, is going to create a new wave of hostility toward the United States within Afghanistan. In the south amongst the Pashtuns, that sentiment is already strong. And I don't equate this with the Pashtuns becoming pro-Taliban or pro-Al Qaeda. Pashtun nationalism is reasserting itself. Its political history spans several hundred years. The Pashtuns are angry at the Americans because, one, they're still being bombed, and two, they perceive that the Americans are backing the Tajik faction, which controls the army and security forces in Kabul. The problem right now, which I've been pointing out very bluntly to American officials in Washington, is that the U.S. has no economic presence in Afghanistan. The Afghans can't point and say, "Oh, the Americans built that road. They built that telecommunications facility. They built that electricity powerhouse," because nothing has been built so far. Q: The Bush Administration is focused on Iraq. The mantra is "regime change." The show is basically over in their view in Afghanistan. There will be a few mop-up operations, but now we're off to new battlegrounds. Rashid: It would be hugely detrimental for the Afghan people. It will become even less likely that Afghanistan will get the kind of funding and aid to revive society than it would otherwise. But the other really big strategic issue here is that the war on terrorism Terrorist acts and the threat of Terrorism have occupied the various law enforcement agencies in the U.S. government for many years. The Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996, as amended by the usa patriot act will take a back seat. There is no way the Americans are going to be able to carry out a full scale war against Iraq and at the same time maintain the same kind of pressure on the Al Qaeda network in countries as diverse as Indonesia, the Philippines, and Pakistan, as well as in Europe. With the victory in Afghanistan, the Bush Administration is imagining that it can fight many wars, in many places, and win everywhere. To read more of this interview, log on to www.progressive.org. |
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