So now we know, who caused all the mess.Prem wrote:Arun, Guess once a while everyone make mistake . Has your great Grand father in law known the future he might have acted differently . Had Chahaca achieved martyrdom in the name of peace, most probably we could have Sardar Patel as PM and no loss of Tibet, Kashmir and schackles of socialistic economy .
BS peddling onlee.Pashtuns are also among the most fiercely nationalist, tribalized and xenophobic peoples of the world, united only against the foreign invader. In the end, the Taliban are probably more Pashtun than they are Islamist.
Has India betrayed Afghans?
Jun 14 2009 20:49 hrs IST
By Tushar Gandhi
……………. our betrayal of the Pukhtoons of Pakistan’s North West Frontier Province (NWFP) is tragic. This region has been overrun by the Taliban and the Al Qaeda. In Afghanistan, the Americans are chasing Al Qaeda and their inaccurate bombings are wreaking havoc on the villages of Afghanistan & NWFP. …………..
The world has kept quiet, but the silence of the Indian government is tragic. The Pukhtoons of NWFP, the romantic ‘Qabuliwalas’, have been our friends since long. During our independence struggle, under the leadership of Khan Abdul Gaffar Khan, the Frontier Gandhi, the Pukhtoons in their hundreds of thousands joined the non-violent fight for freedom. ……………… The Punjabi politicians of Pakistan have never forgiven the Pukhtoons and have been persecuting them since its inception. Now they have found an ally in the Americans. Under the pretext of fighting the Taliban, the Pakistani military and government have unleashed a reign of terror on the Pukhtoons. Like the Tamils of Sri Lanka …………….. the Pukhtoons too have been dreaming of a Pukhtoonkhwa, a nation comprising of Pukhtoon territories of Afghanistan and NWFP in Pakistan. Unfortunately the Pukhtoons have not found any patrons in their quest for a homeland.
It makes strategic sense for us to help divide Pakistan further by helping the Pukhtoons in their quest for Pukhtoonkhwa, carving out a great Pukhtoon nation friendly towards us. The Pukhtoons are practitioners of the moderate Sufi Islam, they will be a buffer against the Talibanised form of fanatic Islam. The Pukhtoons are being persecuted by both the fanatic Taliban and the vengeful Pakistani establishment. ………………… The Pukhtoons are being decimated and the world is watching silently. But our betrayal of the Qabuliwala is shameful.
A new factor has been introduced into the mess in Pakistan making it even more murky and dangerous for us. President Obama has asked China to intervene in Pakistan. We all know the mischief China has been up to against us in partnership with Pakistan. …………………
Will foreign minister SM Krishna raise these concerns with the US? Will the UPA government stand by our friends — the Pukhtoons?
CLICKY
Excellent idea saar!ramana wrote:Also a rally can be organised in Delhi protesting the collateral damage from use of drones.
Would have loved to take part!Perhaps it will help to post this plea on some other threads too, especially those which are well read.ramana wrote:The main message is to Pashtun people the world over that they are not alone. All others are secondary. Cant our Delhi members organize a protest march and call the TVwallas?
ahem..on this related note, it is good to see mainstream news channels echoing what we were saying here couple of years ago."Pashtuns on both sides of the border are feeling that all the world is against them," says Moabullah, a burly six-foot bearded Pashtun.
The Pashtuns and their ethnic agenda are in many ways at the center of the upcoming elections and the armed conflicts in both Afghanistan and Pakistan. Like the Pashtun-dominated Taliban, many Pashtuns who have not taken up arms still share the dream of a united Pashtunistan. This dream grows stronger as the Pashtuns on both sides of the border get more disgruntled..
.
.
.
The Taliban stoke the Pashtun dream. A few years ago, Mullah Mohammed Omar wrote a Pashtu-language letter to his senior military commander Mullah Akhtar Mohammed Usmani, making it clear that the Taliban on both sides of the border were operating as one.
"The Pakistan Taliban are part of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan and they should be under the command of Jalaluddin Haqqani," Omar said in the letter provided to the AP, referring to a powerful Taliban commander with an elaborate network of fighters and suicide bombers on both sides of the border.
This ill-defined border is called the Durand line, after colonial British representative Sir Mortimer Durand. Under a treaty, the line originally marked where British rule in India ended and that of Afghanistan began. The treaty expired in 1993 after 100 years.
.
"Pashtun and Afghan mean the same thing really," says Lateef Afridi, a former Parliamentarian of the secular Awami National Party in Pakistan, who reviles the Taliban but shares their dreams of Pashtunistan.
The Taliban made the point in a colorful map of Afghanistan drawn at a school in Kandahar.
The word "Pashtunistan" runs the entire 2,430-kilometer (1,520-mile) border with Pakistan.
.
.
Article by Kathy Gannon of AP which describes the civil war and self determination aspects of this Fak-Ap war.Gerard wrote:Pashtun ethnic agenda at heart of Afghan war
However, a closer look reveals that successful secular parties in the NWFP hardly have any inclination towards Pashtun nationalism beyond renaming the province. However, a small section of intelligentsia still carries the nationalistic aspirations and sees an opening for redrawing the boundaries on the basis of ethnicity.
Depending on whether the Pakiban succeed or fail in capturing power in Pakistan, the situation can be interpreted in two ways.The Pakistani Pashtun Taliban have acted quite differently from their Afghan brethren. While the Afghan Taliban adopted a policy of non-intervention in Pakistan or even in Northern Afghanistan, the Pakistani Pashtun Taliban manifested their aspiration to change the state and indeed the entire ideological make-up of Pakistan. In other words, the Pakistani Pashtun Taliban have acted as a centralist rather than a separatist ideological force, notwithstanding their temporary takeover of certain tribal areas. This shows how much Pashtun nationalism has weakened over the last thirty years.
Mostly confirms Paul's analysis of the Pashtun Civil War.Afghanistan: On 7 October, the eighth anniversary of the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan, the Taliban posted a statement on their website, shahamat.org, saying they pose no threat to the West.
According to Reuters, the statement reads: “We had and have no plan of harming countries of the world, including those in Europe … our goal is the independence of the country and the building of an Islamic state.” the statement went on to say that the Afghan Taliban were prepared for "a long war" if foreign troops "want to colonize the country of proud and pious Afghans under the baseless pretext of a war on terror."
Comment: The point worth noting is that the Taliban posting reinforces the statement on Sunday by US National Security Advisor Jones that there are fewer than 100 al Qaida in Afghanistan. Al Qaida is not welcome in Afghanistan by either side of the fight. The statement posted on the website is accurate, based on the past eight years. The Taliban resurgence is a home grown development that did not appeal to, rely on or seek Arab or al Qaida help, according to information in the public domain.
After their ouster from Kandahar in 2001, the Taliban openly derided the Arabs of al Qaida and blamed them for the Taliban’s misfortunes. They vowed never to allow the foreigners -- especially the haughty, insensitive Arabs -- back into Afghanistan, consistent with the history of Pashtun xenophobia. They have been true to that vow ever since, as General Jones confirmed, indirectly.
The premise that Afghanistan would become an al Qaida safe haven under any future government is alarmist and bespeaks a lack of understanding of the Pashtuns on this issue and a superficial knowledge of recent Afghan history.
In December 2001, Omar was ridiculed in public by his own commanders for inviting the “Arabs” and other foreigners, which led to their flight to Pakistan. The worst atrocities committed by the vice and virtue cops of the Taliban government were committed by the foreign thugs who accompanied bin Laden, according to media reports at the time. The Afghans did not behave that way against their own people, though they were brutish against the Soviets.
There is no factual basis for presuming that support for international Islamic terror is the norm in Afghanistan, rather than a tragic mistake. More than a thousand years of history reinforces the ethnic trait of visceral hatred of outsiders of all kind. Omar’s experience with the bin Laden and the Arabs revalidates the ancient wisdom.
See Neustadt and May’s Thinking in Time, Chapter 3, for a discussion of the appropriate uses of reasoning by historic analogy.
Bin Laden and his acolytes were/are exporters of a toxic world view that took root in Germany deeper than in Afghanistan. The Taliban were focused on subjugating recalcitrant Uzbeks and Tajiks of the Northern Alliance, not on exporting terror. No Afghans attacked the World Trade Center.
Even today, Omar and his merry men do not push – as they easily could -- the age old idea of a greater Pashtunistan that would join Pakistani Pashtuns with Afghan Pashtuns and would split modern day Pakistan north to south along the Indus River. The point is the security situation could be much, much worse and has been in the past, if the Quetta Shura were as brutish as some claim.
There are no good guys, but any successful strategy in Afghanistan will include the Pashtuns in some kind of power sharing arrangement. No matter who governs in Kabul in the future, bin Laden and al Qaida will not find a safe haven in Afghanistan again because almost all Afghans continue to agree on that point after eight years.
For the record, the leading exporters of violent revolutionary doctrines today are the remnants of al Qaida in Pakistan and Iran via the Revolutionary Guards Quds force and its Hizballah proxies. Pakistan is just a regional supporter of terror against its neighbors, but so is India from time to time.
I can't believe you actually take that article seriously. It could have been written by Maleeha Lodhi. "Worst atrocities of Taliban Virtue and Vice Cops were carried out by Arabs... Taliban only wants independence and Islamic state, not in favor of international jihad... "Al-Qaeda" is something different and disconnected from the TSPA/ISI which spawned Taliban onlee... a Taliban returning to power would not harbour anti-Western Jihadi terrorists onlee..."ramana wrote:From Nigthwatch, 7 Oct., 2009
India’s position has remained: there is no purpose in talking to the Taliban; there is no such thing as a moderate Taliban.
But now there is a shift. In New Delhi today, Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao, addressing an international seminar on Afghanistan, declared that India would support the process of “reintegrating individuals with the national mainstream”, code for dialogue with the moderate Taliban who agree to renounce violence.
SwamyG wrote:^^^
Even India supports reconciliation with Taliban
India’s position has remained: there is no purpose in talking to the Taliban; there is no such thing as a moderate Taliban.
But now there is a shift. In New Delhi today, Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao, addressing an international seminar on Afghanistan, declared that India would support the process of “reintegrating individuals with the national mainstream”, code for dialogue with the moderate Taliban who agree to renounce violence.
Probably becuz it is a non western viewpoint.Nowhere is the Durrani-Ghilzai conflict even referred to.
-------------------America, Pakistan and the Taliban
http://www.hindu.com/2009/10/24/stories ... 980800.htm
M.K.Bhadrakumar
No matter who wins the November 7 runoff, he will carry the cross of being an American puppet, and forever will the common Afghan sit on the fence dangling his feet and refusing to rally in the fight against the Taliban.
The first Nizam of Hyderabad brought a large number of Qizilbashis with him to hyderabad. If you see someone with a name like "Ali Quli" in Hyd, chances are he is descended from the concubine of a Qizilabashi.The Qizilbash warriors accompanied Mughal emperor Humayun from Safavid Empire in Iran to South Asia to reconquer his empire from Suri Dynasty. The Qizilbash tribes settled in large numbers in northern Pakistan, Afghanistan and also in India at Delhi and Agra, centers of Mughal administration in South Asia.
Paul,Paul wrote:I think the Pakhtun struggle for independence is basically the struggle to roll back the shia power back to 1747 when Ahmed Shah Durrani ( Durran means Pearl in Pushto) formed this state with the Qizaibashi Nadir Shah Afshar's support.
A still smaller group, the Qizilbash, are the descendants of the Afshar guard of Nader Shah Afshari, believed to have been brought to Afghanistan in order to govern certain territories. Ahmad Shah Durrani favored the Qizilbash, creating some conflict between them and the Pashtuns. The people of this group speak Dari. The Qizilbash ruled Persia for two centuries in Iran until they spilled over into Afghan territory. Approximately 50,000 Qizilbash live in Afghanistan and are historically Shi'a Muslim. The Qizilbash have a tradition of being among the more literate groups and, therefore, were frequently members of the professional and governmental society. Nadir Shah Afshar directly preceded Ahmad Shah Durrani, who became the first Amir of Afghanistan in 1747. They are principally an urban people with greatest numbers in Kabul, but with significant settlement also in Ghazni, Kandahar and several other towns. The word Qizilbash is a Turkic word for redhead, so named because during the Saffavid dynastic period they wore red turbans.
I'm also using JN Sarkar as reference and he is clear that Ahmad Shah rose to prominence because he was accepted as leader by the Afghans in Nadir Shah's service. In seizing Kandahar, Ghazni and Kabul, there was no collaboration with the Qizilbash, and they were actually hostile to the Afghans.Paul wrote:According to noted pre-independence era historian JN Sarkar...
Point I am trying to make is that the Afghan state was formed by the upstart Ahmed Shah with the collboration of the Persians.
Any displacement of the Ghilzais was done by Nadir and not by Ahmad Shah Abdali. In 1708 the Abdalis and Ghilzais were in rebellion against the Safavid empire, and the latter tribe had seized Kandahar and Khurasan. The Persians were saved by Nadir Shah, who was a Turkoman. The Qizilbash of his army were all Turkomans whose ancestors had converted to the Shia faith.Paul wrote:This state displaced the Hotaki Ghalizai Pushtuns.
To understand that, we have to look at two things, IMHO. One is the overall influence of Islam on the tribal society and the other the establishment of modern Afghanistan in the late 19th century. Present day Afghanistan was created by Abdur Rehman who subdued the Hazaras and conquered Kafiristan (renaming it as Nuristan in the process) in the late 19th century. At that point of time, Afghanistan was dominated by Sunni Hanafi school and the Qadriyah & Naqshbandi Sufi orders. The Shi'a followed the Jafaria school. While Qadriyah influence came both from Mesopotamia and India, the Naqshbandi influence came from the Taimur land of Bukhara and also from India. The Afghans looked mainly to India for religious support and training. It was that which brought Shaikh Ahmed Sirhindi-influenced-Naqshbandi thoughts to reach Afghanistan. Sirhindi, aka Mujaddid-Alf-e-Thani (Reformer of the Second Millennium) is credited with the creation of Pakistan three centuries later. (Of course, later Abu Ala Al Mawdudi's Ahl-e-Hadith influence also played a big part in Afghanistan.)ramana wrote:I want to know more about the role of Daud after overthrowing Zahir Shah and the events that led to the coups in late 70s. Also what was the role of ZA Bhutto if any in destabilizing the Afghans before the Soviet takeover.
