Military Resistance 7J17

[GI Special]

Oct. 18, 2009 Fort Lewis Rally For GI Resisters Bishop & Church: Submitted by ghost on Wed, 10/21/2009: www.givoice.org

The Name On The Body

From: Dennis Serdel

To: Military Resistance

Sent: October 22, 2009

Subject: The Name On The Body

Written by Dennis Serdel, Military Resistance 2009

Dennis Serdel, Vietnam 1967-68 (one tour) Light Infantry, Americal Div. 11th Brigade, purple heart, Veterans For Peace 50 Michigan, Vietnam Veterans Against The War, United Auto Workers GM Retiree, in Perry, Michigan

Dennis Serdel, Vietnam 1967-68 (one tour) Light Infantry, Americal Div. 11th Brigade, purple heart, Veterans For Peace 50 Michigan, Vietnam Veterans Against The War, United Auto Workers GM Retiree, in Perry, Michigan

************************************************

The Name On The Body

The vultures in Iraq drink so much

blood and oil that they can not fly

anymore and drag themselves

too big to fail like drunken pirates

trying to make it back to ship

where crossbones skulls of their

long desert of death sold by churches

crash and crucify the victims

in their town and country so

important unreal flags that sparkle

in the sky as Afghanistan stars

villages with anti-christ computers

are howling from the ground

the air insidious design from

the playground to the grave

emotional feelings thought while

subterraneously looking like raisons

prunes a giant panda in the mire

soviets not far behind the US all

diplomatic political tiddlywinks

maps making lines to keep

their workers etched in glass

divided by languages large and

small war lords control sitting

as a crystal ball that the oceans

dominate warm songs sings

amidst the tree worms and cannons

rule the night halloween gasmasks

confront crocodiles between not

the water land the waste land

this war goes on between the ages

beyond today tomorrow yet in

the past tense all the time never

ending like a bear and now an

eagle learns he never had a chance

as long times ago but the river

flows as nothing changes

just the body behind the name

MORE:

MORE OF DENNIS SERDEL’S WORK IN PEACE SPEAKS FROM THE MIRROR:

Get Some While There Still Are Some To Get:

[You know the power of the poems by Dennis Serdel from the front pages of GI Special:  now they’re in book form: Ordering information below: T]

DENNIS SERDEL:

Shipped to Vietnam in November 1967.

Returned home in October 1968 to Kalamazoo, Michigan.

Joined Veterans For Peace in January 1990.

Joined Vietnam Veterans Against the War when Iraq and Afghanistan War started.

Books are $15 Post Paid:

Check or Money Order Payable to Dennis Serdel

Dennis Serdel

339 Oakwood Lane

Perry,

Michigan 48872

Walt Whitman

Carl Sandburg

Allan Ginsberg

Now: Dennis Serdel

DO YOU HAVE A FRIEND OR RELATIVE IN THE MILITARY?

Forward Military Resistance along, or send us the address if you wish and we’ll send it regularly.  Whether in Iraq or stuck on a base in the USA, this is extra important for your service friend, too often cut off from access to encouraging news of growing resistance to the wars, inside the armed services and at home.  Send email requests to address up top or write to: The Military Resistance, Box 126, 2576 Broadway, New York, N.Y. 10025-5657.  Phone: 888.711.2550

ACTION REPORTS

"Success"

[Outreach To New York Army National Guard]

From: Lillian U; Military Resistance

To: Military Resistance Newsletter

Sent: October 20, 2009

Subject: Outreach to New York Army National Guard 10/16/09

10/16/09:

On Friday night, four Military Resistance members and one first-time outreacher engaged in yet another outreach to soldiers of the National Guard at the [XXXX] Armory in New York City.

We were able to cover both the South entrance and the North entrance, though the North entrance yielded little action.

It was a quieter occasion than usual, as it seemed that fewer troops were coming and going into the armory. Despite the quietude, we distributed between 50 - 65 packets of publications including the new issue of Traveling Soldier and all but 3 of the 38 DVDs, which consisted of 28 copies of "Querido Camilo" and 10 of "Sir! No Sir!"

The reason for the vague approximation of how many packets were distributed is due to the nicest surprise of all, which did not come until the five of us were leaving by way of the North side.

There, soldiers were still approaching with the coffee and snacks they had just bought from around the corner.  One member, Alan S, recognized a private approaching who had been responsive to our work in the past.

"You got any brownies for me?" she asked.

We responded in the affirmative, giving her what brownies and cookies were left, while also offering her the remaining packets of publications along with some DVDs.

"And do you want DVDs?" AS asked. "How about some lit packets?"

"Sure, sure," said the private, enthusiastically taking 3 DVDs and approximately 50-60 packets of literature! "I even like to leave them in my Laundromat too."

"Well remember," said AS, "these are for the troops."

"There’s troops everywhere," she said matter-of-factly.

We left the outreach, with no supplies remaining.

Success.

MORE:

ACTION REPORTS WANTED:

FROM YOU!

An effective way to encourage others to support members of the armed forces organizing to resist the Imperial war is to report what you do.

If you’ve carried out organized contact with troops on active duty, at base gates, airports, or anywhere else, send a report in to Military Resistance for the Action Reports section. 

Same for contact with National Guard and/or Reserve components.

They don’t have to be long.  Just clear, and direct action reports about what work was done and how. 

If there were favorable responses, say so.  If there were unfavorable responses or problems, don’t leave them out.

If you are not planning or engaging in outreach to the troops, you have nothing to report. 

NOTE WELL:

Do not make public any information that could compromise the work. 

All identifying information – locations, personnel – will be omitted from the reports.

If accidentally included, that information will not be published.

Whether you are serving in the armed forces or not, do not in any way identify members of the armed forces organizing to stop the wars.

The sole exception: occasions when a member of the armed services explicitly directs identifying information be published in reporting on the action.

AFGHANISTAN WAR REPORTS

U.S. Military Dictatorship Targets 50 Afghans For Death:

"The List Is Thought To Include People With Close Ties To The Afghan Government And Others Who Have Served As Intelligence Assets For The CIA And The U.S. Military"

"Already, People Feel That Foreigners Didn’t Really Come Here To Reconstruct Our Country"  "They Think The Foreigners Just Came Here To Kill Us"

October 24, 2009 By Craig Whitlock, The Washington Post Company [Excerpts]

KABUL -- A U.S. military hit list of about 50 suspected drug kingpins is drawing fierce opposition from Afghan officials, who say it could undermine their fragile justice system and trigger a backlash against foreign troops.

The U.S. military and NATO officials have authorized their forces to kill or capture individuals on the list, which was drafted within the past year as part of NATO’s new strategy to combat drug operations that finance the Taliban.

The list is thought to include people with close ties to the Afghan government and others who have served as intelligence assets for the CIA and the U.S. military, according to current and former U.S. and Afghan officials.

Afghan counternarcotics officials expressed frustration that U.S. and NATO military leaders have refused to divulge the names on the list, a decision that they said could undercut joint operations to hunt down opium traffickers.

Gen. Mohammad Daud Daud, Afghanistan’s deputy interior minister for counternarcotics efforts, praised U.S. and British special forces for their help recently in destroying drug labs and stashes of opium.  But he said he worried that foreign troops would now act on their own to kill suspected drug lords, based on secret evidence, instead of handing them over for trial.

"They should respect our law, our constitution and our legal codes," Daud said. "We have a commitment to arrest these people on our own."

Afghan counternarcotics officials expressed frustration that U.S. and NATO military leaders have refused to divulge the names on the list, a decision that they said could undercut joint operations to hunt down opium traffickers.

Gen. Mohammad Daud Daud, Afghanistan’s deputy interior minister for counternarcotics efforts, praised U.S. and British special forces for their help recently in destroying drug labs and stashes of opium.

But he said he worried that foreign troops would now act on their own to kill suspected drug lords, based on secret evidence, instead of handing them over for trial.

"They should respect our law, our constitution and our legal codes," Daud said. "We have a commitment to arrest these people on our own."

At a meeting in Budapest last October, however, NATO defense ministers reversed their strategy and authorized their forces to confiscate narcotics and target drug labs as well as kingpins who provide monetary or other support to the Taliban.

Since then, the U.S. military has developed a target list of about 50 drug kingpins thought to support the insurgency and has ruled that they can be killed or captured "on the battlefield," according to a Senate Foreign Relations Committee report released in August.

"We have some people, powerful people, inside and outside government, who can freely smuggle drugs," said Nur al-Haq Ulumi, a member of the Afghan parliament from Kandahar. "If we had an honest government, the government could track down and arrest these people -- everybody knows this."

But Ulumi said it would make things worse if coalition troops began to kill drug dealers. "Already, people feel that foreigners didn’t really come here to reconstruct our country," he said. "They think the foreigners just came here to kill us."

OCCUPATION ISN’T LIBERATION

ALL TROOPS HOME NOW!

THIS ENVIRONMENT IS HAZARDOUS TO YOUR HEALTH;

ALL HOME, NOW

A U.S. helicopter releases flares near U.S. Marines during a Taliban ambush in southern Helmand province October 9, 2009.  REUTERS/Asmaa Waguih

Oct 9, 2009: US Marines enter a house during Operation Germinate in Farah Province, southern Afghanistan.  (AFP/David Furst)

U.S. Marines use a mine detector to check for IEDs during a patrol close to Barcha village in Helmand province, October 11, 2009.  REUTERS/Asmaa Waguih

IF YOU DON’T LIKE THE RESISTANCE

END THE OCCUPATIONS

TROOP NEWS

THIS IS HOW OBAMA BRINGS THE TROOPS HOME:

BRING THEM ALL HOME NOW, ALIVE

Wounded U.S. servicemen are seen on stretchers before boarding a C-135 aircraft for transport to Landstuhl Regional Medical Facility in Germany for medical treatment at Bagram Air Field in Afghanistan, Oct. 13, 2009.  (AP Photo/Maya Alleruzzo)

British Soldiers Begin To Stir:

"Soldiers And Their Families Were With Those Gathered At Speaker’s Corner In Hyde Park At The Start Of The March"

"The Stop The War Coalition Says There Is Deep Resentment Among The Lower Ranks Who Feel They Are Locked Into A War That Has No Clear Justification Or Exit Strategy"

[Thanks to Mark Shapiro, Military Resistance, who sent this in and to Felicity Arbuthnot, [UK] for her prescient advance notice that this event would make some history.]

24 October By Dan Bell, BBC News

As the war in Afghanistan enters its ninth year, thousands of people have gathered in central London to protest against what they say is a futile and unwinnable conflict.

The organisers of the march say the protest reflects a sea change not only in public opinion, but in the views of military rank and file, who now want UK troops brought home, they claim.

The Stop The War Coalition says there is deep resentment among the lower ranks who feel they are locked into a war that has no clear justification or exit strategy.

Soldiers and their families were with those gathered at Speaker’s Corner in Hyde Park at the start of the march.

Also at the demonstration was 25-year-old Paul McGuirk, who served in Helmand until April 2008, but left the Army because he could not support the war in Afghanistan.

Speaking above the sound of protest chants, he said: "I just left the Army last month because I think it’s ridiculous we are there.

"I think the government should stop pretending it’s a just war and wasting the lives of our guys, and stop pretending it’s a winnable war."

Joan Humphreys’ grandson, 24-year-old Kevin Elliott, was one of the 222 soldiers killed since the invasion.  The 62-year-old from Dundee said quietly: "My grandson was killed 54 days ago on 31 August in Afghanistan.

"Nothing’s going to be achieved. I’ve read back from 1840 to now, all the different conflicts (in Afghanistan) until now - and there have been a lot - and everyone has left without anything improving."

They point to opinion polls such as a YouGov survey for Channel 4 News that found 62% of those questioned wanted British troops withdrawn in the coming year at the latest.

But of all the marchers it was the oldest protester who made the most poignant comments.  Hetty Bower, 104, has lived through both world wars and says she feels nothing has been learnt.

As a nine-year-old she remembers cheering young men as they marched to the trenches, and then seeing their broken bodies return.  "It didn’t take long before we saw those men coming back missing legs and missing arms, totally blind and war was no longer fun.

"I think I was 10 years old when my hatred of war began and I’m 104 and still marching.  "I just want my great-grandchildren to grow up in a world where war is past."

MORE:

"He’s Had A Surprising Amount Of Support Both In And Outside The Military, Lots Of Soldiers Are Quietly Supporting Him"

Serving Soldier Uses Anti-War March In London To Accuse Politicians Of Abusing The Trust Of The Army And Servicemen:

"I Think Other People Are Thinking 'If He Can Do It, Why Can’t I?’"

Lance Corporal Glenton Leads The Demonstration Through The City.

British soldier Joe Glenton, who faces court martial because he refuses to return to fight in Afghanistan, led an anti-war rally in London October 24, 2009.  REUTERS/Luke MacGregor

[Thanks to Mark Shapiro, Military Resistance, who sent this in.]

24 Oct 2009 By Andrew Alderson and Rebecca Lefort, Telegraph Media Group Limited & 23 October BBC

L/Cpl Glenton, who is facing a court martial for refusing to return to Afghanistan, made his comments before an anti-war demonstration through central London attended by an estimated crowd of 5,000 people.

Speaking to BBC Radio York, Mrs Glenton said her husband had received a lot of support.

"He’s had a surprising amount of support both in and outside the military, lots of soldiers are quietly supporting him."

She added: "I think Joe represents just a simple soldier who has these thoughts and feelings on what’s going on out there and I think other people are thinking 'if he can do it, why can’t I?’.

"He’s very proud to be leading the march, it means so much to him.

L/Cpl Glenton, 27, from the Royal Logistic Corps, was joined by former colleagues, military families and anti-war protesters in the march, which called for the 9,000-strong British force to be brought home.

He issued a statement - at Speakers Corner in Hyde Park - before the march saying:

"When I went to Afghanistan I was proud to serve the Army and to serve my country, but before long I realised the Government was using the Army for its own ends.

"It is distressing to disobey orders but when Britain follows America in continuing to wage war against one of the world’s poorest countries I feel I have no choice.  "The Geneva Convention was launched after the Second World War and the Nazi extermination of six million Jews. It means no soldier can say I was just obeying orders.

"Politicians have abused the trust of the Army and the soldiers who serve. That is why I am compelled and proud to march for Stop The War Coalition today."

L/Cpl Glenton, from Norwich, who defied orders in order to go on the march with his wife Clare, led the demonstration through the city.

After the march ended, L/Cpl Glenton addressed the crowd. He said: "I’m here today to make a stand beside you because I believe great wrongs have been perpetrated in Afghanistan.

"I cannot, in good conscience, be part of them. I’m bound by law and moral duty to try and stop them.

"I’m a soldier and I belong to the profession of arms.

"I expected to go to war but I also expected that the need to defend this country’s interests would be legal and justifiable.

"I don’t think this is too much to ask.

"It’s now apparent that the conflict is neither of these and that’s why I must make this stand."

John Tipple, who is a member of L/Cpl Glenton’s legal team and who was also on the march, said: "I am delighted to be here with someone who is showing so much courage. If the politicians showed a fraction of it, we would not be in this position.

Mr Tipple added: "After he left his barracks, he was given a direct order from his commanding officer not to come on the march.  He is disobeying a direct order and we expect he may get arrested again."

Almost half of the UK public believe that military victory in Afghanistan is impossible and significant majorities think British troops are not winning the war and should be withdrawn either immediately or within the next year, according to a new poll.

The YouGov survey for Channel 4 News uncovered a much more pessimistic attitude towards the conflict than in a similar survey in 2007, when 36 per cent said that victory was not possible.

Only six per cent of those taking part in the poll said that British troops were winning the war, compared with 36 per cent who said they were not winning yet but eventual victory was possible, and 48 per cent who said that victory was not possible.

Demonstration held by Stop the War coallition calling for troops to leave Afghanistan in central London.  (AFP/Ben Stansall)

Troops Invited:

Comments, arguments, articles, and letters from service men and women, and veterans, are especially welcome.  Write to Box 126, 2576 Broadway, New York, N.Y. 10025-5657 or send email to contact@militaryproject.org:  Name, I.D., withheld unless you request publication.  Same address to unsubscribe.  Phone: 888.711.2550

The New Issue Of

Traveling Soldier Is Out, Featuring:

1. Fun Times at Fort Drum: My Story

http://www.traveling-soldier.org/10.09.paul.php

2. Mailbag: Mass Casualties

http://www.traveling-soldier.org/10.09.mail.php

3. "If You Are A Private, You Are Treated Like Complete Dog Shit"

http://www.traveling-soldier.org/10.09.dogsh.php

4. Veterans Call For Immediate Withdrawal From Afghanistan

http://www.traveling-soldier.org/10.09.ivaw.php

5. "Vietnam Without Napalm"

http://www.traveling-soldier.org/10.09.napalm.php

6. Download the new Traveling Soldier to pass it out at your school, workplace, or at nearby base.

http://www.traveling-soldier.org/TS25.pdf

FORWARD OBSERVATIONS

"At a time like this, scorching irony, not convincing argument, is needed.  Oh had I the ability, and could reach the nation’s ear, I would, pour out a fiery stream of biting ridicule, blasting reproach, withering sarcasm, and stern rebuke.

"For it is not light that is needed, but fire; it is not the gentle shower, but thunder.

"We need the storm, the whirlwind, and the earthquake." 

Frederick Douglass, 1852

"Hope for change doesn’t cut it when you’re still losing buddies."

-- J.D. Englehart, Iraq Veterans Against The War

I say that when troops cannot be counted on to follow orders because they see the futility and immorality of them THAT is the real key to ending a war. 

-- Al Jaccoma, Veterans For Peace

Code Pink And Assorted Others:

Up To Their Necks In Bright Red Blood:

Some Who Pretend To Be "Anti-War" Oppose Getting U.S. Troops Out Of Afghanistan Now

[An advanced university degree in philosophy or logic is unnecessary to understand that those opposed to removing U.S. troops now are for killing more U.S. troops and Afghans tomorrow and the days after.  Their politics serve the Empire, and they are indeed up to their necks in its bloody work.  T]

October 20, 2009 By Sharon Smith, Socialist Worker [Excerpts]

EIGHT YEARS into the war on Afghanistan--and with no end in sight--seems a peculiar time for antiwar activists to claim that U.S. forces need to stay there even longer for the sake of the Afghan people.

Yet Yifat Susskind, communications director for the human rights organization MADRE, recently argued on CommonDreams.org, "'Bring the Troops Home’ is a bumper sticker, not a policy."  She continued, "For MADRE, U.S. obligations stem from the fact that Afghanistan’s poverty, violence against women and political corruption are, in part, results of U.S. policy over the past 30 years."

Code Pink cofounders Medea Benjamin and Jodie Evans began arguing for a "responsible withdrawal" after their recent visit to Afghanistan, which focused on discovering Afghan women’s attitudes toward the U.S. occupation.

While there, they met with a handpicked group of politically connected Afghan women that included President Hamid Karzai’s sister-in-law, Wazhma Karzai.

According to Code Pink, many of these members of parliament and businesswomen opposed sending an additional 40,000 U.S. troops to Afghanistan, but also said they rely on U.S. troops for their own personal safety.

On October 6, the Christian Science Monitor published an interview with Benjamin and reported on her change of heart, based on conversations with some of the women she met in Kabul.

For example, CSM reported, "Shinkai Karokhail, an Afghan member of parliament and woman activist, told them 'International troop presence here is a guarantee for my safety.’"

Benjamin claimed she was misrepresented in the Christian Science Monitor.

Yet Benjamin herself said in a recent interview:

"[W]e certainly did hear some people say that they felt if the U.S. pulled out right now, there would be a collapse, and the Taliban might take over, there might be a civil war.

"But we also heard a lot of people say they didn’t want more troops to be sent in, and they wanted the U.S. to have a responsible exit strategy that included the training of Afghan troops, included being part of promoting a real reconciliation process and included economic development; that the United States shouldn’t be allowed to just walk away from the problem. 

"So that’s really our position."

This reasoning assumes, of course, that the U.S. is capable of behaving responsibly toward the Afghan people.

It is not.

**************************************************

THROUGH BLACKMAIL, bribery and brute military force, the U.S. has determined the political landscape of post-Taliban Afghanistan.

U.S. conquerors installed Karzai as Afghanistan’s transitional head of state in December 2001. 

But Karzai was never meant to build a genuine democracy in Afghanistan.

Nor was he expected to champion the rights of women.

On the contrary, he was chosen not for his ethical credentials, but rather for his close ties to the band of warlords with which the U.S. partnered to quickly overthrow the Taliban in November 2001.

Renamed the "Northern Alliance" for the purpose of casting these warlords as freedom fighters, in reality, they were veterans of the National Islamic United Front for the Salvation of Afghanistan, an unstable coalition that ruled Afghanistan between 1992 and 1996, when the Taliban overthrew it.

Together, they constituted seven separate Mujahideen political parties, each representing the fiefdom of a corrupt warlord.  Their president, Burhanuddin Rabbani, suspended the constitution and issued a series of religious edicts banishing women from broadcasting and government jobs, and requiring women to wear veils.  More severe repression soon followed.

Karzai served as deputy foreign minister in Rabbani’s government, while the feuding Mujahideen parties unleashed a rein of terror against Afghanistan’s already war-torn population.

Women were routinely abducted, beaten and raped, or sold into prostitution.  According to human rights expert Patricia Gossman, "Between 1992 and 1995, fighting among the factions of the alliance reduced a third of Kabul to rubble and killed more than 50,000 civilians. The top commanders ordered massacres of rival ethnic groups, and their troops engaged in mass rape."

In June 2002, in what the U.S. media depicted as a "flowering of democracy," a loya jirga, or tribal council, elected Karzai as Afghanistan’s interim president.

But most of the decisions were made behind the scenes, where then-U.S. envoy Khalilzad--a former Unocal oil executive--worked hand in glove with Karzai and the Northern Alliance to manipulate the votes. During the loya jirga, Karzai announced his own election as president before the vote had actually taken place, to the dismay of many delegates.

In the run-up to the 2002 loya jirga, eight delegates were murdered amid a general rise in political violence and intimidation by warlords guarding their own fiefdoms. Meanwhile, Karzai used a rumored plot to overthrow his government as an excuse to round up 700 of his political opponents in the weeks before the voting.

Karzai’s brother, Ahmed Wali Karzai, has long been flagged as a drug trafficker in Southern Afghanistan, but the allegations have never been investigated.

He continues to head the Kandahar Provincial Council, the governing body for the region.

He also has played a role in passing information to international intelligence agencies.

According to Rajiv Chandrasekaran, writing in the Washington Post, while aware of information implicating Karzai in the drug trade, "U.S. and Canadian diplomats have not pressed the matter, in part because Ahmed Wali Karzai has given valuable intelligence to the U.S. military, and he also routinely provides assistance to Canadian forces, according to several officials familiar with the issue."

Under President Karzai’s watch, Afghanistan has returned to providing roughly 95 percent of the world’s heroin supplies, while the U.S. military looks the other way.

As Jeff Stein recently reported at the Huffington Post, Republican Rep. Mike Rogers of Michigan explained, "We certainly need the president to be with us. That would be hard if we’re hauling off his brother to a detention center."

***************************

THE U.S. left has failed to effectively oppose the war in Afghanistan from its onset, when the U.S. population overwhelmingly supported the war on the pretext that "we were attacked."

That support has severely eroded, and polls show that a clear majority now wants to end the occupation.  Yet many on the left have remained confused for the last eight years--ardently opposing the war in Iraq while remaining silent about the equally immoral war in Afghanistan.

This confusion has apparently been compounded by the election of Barack Obama, who initially opposed the invasion of Iraq in 2003.

Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize notwithstanding, however, he has since embraced the aims of U.S. imperialism with gusto. 

U.S. troops and, perhaps more importantly, U.S. military bases remain in Iraq with no deadline for complete withdrawal.

Obama authorized a surge of 21,000 additional U.S. troops to Afghanistan soon after taking office and is now pondering whether to send at least 40,000 more.

These are no longer George W. Bush’s wars.

Obama has claimed them for himself.

So far, the only consequence of the surge has been the resurgence of the Taliban resistance against U.S. occupation. Even his pledge to close the prison camp at Guantánamo Bay remains unfulfilled.

Yet Obama maintains a substantial following on the U.S. left, sowing yet more confusion among antiwar activists.

For example, in response to Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize, Juan Lopez wrote in the People’s World on October 12, "Now, don’t get me wrong... Like other left and progressive folks, I advocate ending the Afghanistan military venture." Yet he went on to praise the award: "Most of the nation and world embraced the choice as affirmation that, with President Obama at the helm, America has embarked on a new, far more constructive course."

Likewise, Code Pink’s Evans argued on womensmediacenter.com, argued, "I left the States with a judgment about some of the women who were members of the parliament: So many are sisters and wives of warlords or tribal leaders chosen merely to fill the required quota of women. 

But member of parliament Shinkai Karokhal, a radical feminist from Kabul, reminded me that just their existence, that they constitute 25 percent of the body, is inspiring to women throughout the country."

Afghan women surely deserve better than parliamentary representation by the wives of warlords enforcing the lawless and repressive status quo.

Those seeking alternative opinions among Afghan women can easily discover that there is no shortage of those with the courage to expose the rule of warlords and call for the immediate withdrawal of all U.S. troops.

Malalai Joya is a case in point.

As a young woman, she denounced the participation of drug traffickers and warlords at the 2002 loya jirga.  Soon after she was elected to parliament in 2005, she was suspended for her outspokenness. She now escapes violent retribution by wearing a burka as a disguise.

As she wrote in the Guardian on July 25:

"You must understand that the government headed by Hamid Karzai is full of warlords and extremists who are brothers in creed of the Taliban. Many of these men committed terrible crimes against the Afghan people during the civil war of the 1990s. For expressing my views, I have been expelled from my seat in parliament, and I have survived numerous assassination attempts.

"The fact that I was kicked out of office while brutal warlords enjoyed immunity from prosecution for their crimes should tell you all you need to know about the "democracy" backed by NATO troops."

Likewise, the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan (RAWA) has maintained its anti-occupation principles since the war began, risking their lives to organize an underground movement in U.S.-occupied Afghanistan.

:: Article nr. 59414 sent on 27-oct-2009 10:16 ECT