Why is America's War In Afghanistan Another Endless Vietnam!! Unwinnable!!

I possess no military secrets, no capacity to read the future through analysis of tea leaves!! But history is my sole guide when I say that America's war in Afghanistan is destined to be another loser. The same was the case in Vietnam.

From the study of global conflicts, a valuable conclusion emerges: the indigenous population rising to confront a foreign invader always wins. It may take years for the Taliban in Afghanistan to overcome the American formidable military hardware, technology, and reliance on foreign and local intelligence. However such American assets can never compensate for the Taliban knowledge of their mountains, valleys, tribal affiliation, and a long history of ceaseless combat.

I am not evaluating the Taliban cause. I am assessing their assets, which are best expressed in Kipling's 19th century words about why Great Britain had suffered humiliating defeats in Afghanistan. This is not a question of valor. It is a question of the superior impact of a tribalized society forcing the Soviets to flee in the late 1980's.

Osama Bin Laden claimed that Soviet defeat was due to Al-Qaeda's combative resourcefulness. Bin Laden lied. He and his fighters were only a part of that tribal resistance effort. A supplementation, egged on by training by the Americans, the Pakistanis, the Saudis, and other actors. The spinal cord of combat and sacrifice was the Taliban.

As a term, Al-Taliban  means "two students." A protest movement which capitalized on devotion to Islam, to hate for structure and institutions, to instant readiness to pick up arms. There was also involvement by female units as back-up reserves.

Their's is an economy based on opium production. Afghanistan is a multi-ethnic scene, versed in using the resources of India, Pakistan and Iran to great advantage. Tribal affiliation is the glue which keeps alliances forming and, when weakened, dissolving. To all of these human formations, Kabul, the capital, is where corruption resides. Afghan is a complex fabric which is dedicated to the sword which is forever ready to slice through invaders.

Afghanism is a blend of nativism, faith (mostly Sunnis; the west is Shii), and an outlook on life as a mere passage through an existence of intrigue. The only durable loyalty is to the core tribe.

It is the embodiment of what an Arab poet had once said about tribalism. "They never ask their brother, who calls for help in adversity; How was he wronged, by his enemy?" 

There are historic icons, like Jamalu-Din Al-Afghani (1838-1897). His sole life, together with his companion, Sheikh Muhammad Abduh (a distinguished Egyptian Azhar scholar, 1849-1905), was devoted to combating foreign intrusion in the lands of Islam.

From this struggle, nurtured by these two reformers, grew the notion of total unity of Muslim countries. Unity in purpose, not in structure. For Islam did not create a State. It created a Nation.

From Muhamad Abduh and Al-Afghani, the central idea of Islam, namely the "One-ness of God" (Tawheed) became deeply ingrained. All faiths are one, because God is one. But don't step over boundaries through aggression. That would be a fight that shall end in the invader's exit, sooner or later. This is the only unshakable pillar in the Taliban movement.

Against this formidable background of tribal loyalties, combat resilience, and indigenous presence, American military planning, surges, and war technology make America in Afghanistan the non-announced underdog. Taliban casualties are quickly replaced; Trump's exhortation of Pakistan to do more in the Afghan struggle is a useless call. For it keeps the influence of New Delhi in Kabul at a minimum. Pakistan is a beneficiary of the Taliban movement.

9/11 was an understandable casus belli for American entry upon the invasion of Afghanistan in 2002. But after 16 years of American losses in blood and treasure, without a clear strategy except "the defeat of the Taliban," there is no end in sight for America.

Yes, Bin Laden is dead (and good-riddance). But he was an Arab, a foreign element in an Afghani demographic landscape. They protected him as a Muslim who helped them defeat the Soviets and usher in the collapse of Soviet communism. They were living up to a tribal code, not to an Al-Qaida affiliation. Eventually Bin Laden was killed in Pakistan, not in Afghanistan.

From all indications, the effectiveness of the government in Kabul in fighting the Taliban is not greater than the effectiveness of government in Somalia in fighting Al-Shabab. The only difference between the dilemmas in Kabul and Mogadishu is that in Somalia, a terrorist gang, Al-Shabab, causes mayhem in the surrounding area. But in Afghanistan, the overwhelming sentiment is to rid the country of America's presence.

The war on the Taliban shall eventually lead to an American exit. Such an exit, ala Vietnam, shall also signify a clear recognition of the failure of "nation-building." The concept of "nation-building" when introduced from beyond national boundaries, as in the case of Afghanistan, is ultimately a losing proposition. The importance of the indigenous factor in all war-like situations, cannot be over-exaggerated. That factor is the elixir which keeps the Taliban to never contemplate falling within the sphere of America's influence. That is regardless of how many roads or schools America builds in Afghani ancestral lands.

The recent clear examples in the Arab world of the unvanquished resilience of the local populace confronting outside invasions are numerous. They may be found in the Algerian struggle for independence (1954-1962); the October war of 1973 (Egypt v. Israel); and the second Gulf War of 1990 (Kuwait v. Saddam of Iraq).

Rudyard Kipling (1865-1936), through poetry, has sung the praises of British colonialism. But even he, in regard to Afghanistan, lamented the prowess of Afghani women preying on the hapless British soldiers as they lay motionless on the open fields of Afghanistan. So did Arab women in Algeria during the war for independence. There I was an eye witness as UN spokesman in the early years of my UN career.

Scrutinizing the above statements, you might also have to conclude that America cannot win in Afghanistan. That is even when America uses non-military means which are known as "sanctions." For the ultimate goal of such methods is "regime change." A false coin.

When you flip the false coin of "nation-building" by an outsider, you shall find the term of "regime change." Again only sovereign people do their own "regime change." And again, if they need help from outside, especially when faced by a brutal dictatorship a la Saddam or Qadafi or Assad, that help goes by a fancy but good legal term. It is called "international humanitarian intervention." Cases in point: Kosovo; Iraq.

If you want to do nation-building, do it within your own borders. For nation-building has never been a matter for export. Otherwise it becomes imperialism.

Americans love fantasies. In films, theatre, novels, and even in foreign policy such as in the Middle East and the Pacific. Winning the war in Afghanistan is an American fantasy. Benjamin De Mott has noted that America was experiencing "a universal descent into unreality."

For his op ed column in the New York Times of May 25, 2018, David Brooks chose an apt title: "Trump's Magical Fantasy World." 

Facts are difficult things to challenge. Their challenger is a fake peddler of falsities. Following history and tribal dynamics, it is impossible to see how America can win in Afghanistan.

By Invitation: In January, the Rabbi Was Unable To Go To Al-Azhar, But In May, Al-Azhar Was Able To Go To the Rabbi

When there is a will, there is a way!! Perfectly  applicable to the mutual invitations between Al-Azhar and Rabbi Dr. Robert Widom of Temple Emanuel of Great Neck, New York and Al-Azhar through me.

During my visit in December 2017 with the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar, I was briefed on the plan for a global conference on Jerusalem that was to be held in Cairo in January of this year. The purpose was to invite me to it, and to have me recommend leaders of other faiths to be guests of Al-Azhar and to speak at that conference. My prompt response was: "I would be honored to come, and to invite my distinguished friend, Rabbi Widom to join." As I sat facing Dr. El-Taiyeb, the enthusiasm for that response was palpable.

But the leader of that great Reform Temple, with which I have been associated as an "honary member" since 1974, had a conflict of appointments. He could not attend, but his support for a non-change of the status of Jerusalem as a shared capital for Israel and a future State of Palestine was well known.

It was Widom's fair-mindedness over the past 44 years of my proximity to him, to his thoughts, and to the congregation of Temple Emanuel, which led me to invite over the years senior Egyptian diplomats to address that congregation.

So from 1980 to nearly 1990, "the pulpit" of Temple Emanuel of Great Neck reverberated by the voices that authoritatively expounded Egypt's outlook on peace in the Middle East. Those voices belonged to the late Dr. Esmat Abdel-Mcguid, and to the then Ambassador Amre Moussa, Ambassador Abdel-Raouf El-Reedy and Ambassador Hussein Hassounna, who spoke at that time in the name of the League of Arab States.

It was that activity on behalf of an Egypt which has been for 7000 years a universal cultural bridge which the Muslim Brotherhood in Cairo has never recognized. For in 2007, as I was visiting the country of my birth, I was asked at a public meeting if I would visit Mehdi Akef, the then Supreme Guide of the Muslim Brotherhood.

In reality that invitation was a challenge couched in the form of an invitation. I instantly could perceive several pitfalls in such an encounter. Primarily, such a visit could not be of any assistance to the central purpose of my visit at that time to Cairo. I was in the process of gathering ideas and material in preparation for my new seminar at Fordham University School of Law in New York.

The graduate seminar which lasted from 2008 to 2015, was entitled: "Islamic Law and Global Security." My Cairo coordinator was my late beloved friend Dr. Mahmoud Mahfouz, former Health Minister.

Upon entering the offices of Mehdi Akef, who was surrounded by a dozen of his top lieutenants, Akef immediately shot an arrow across the bow of the conference. He asked me: "Do you speak to the Jews?"

As I learnt at the UN and through litigation as an attorney, an odd question belies an odd perception. And an odd perception, however offensive it might be, calls for a determined counter offensive. "Supreme Guide," I responded, "I am an honorary member at Temple Emanuel at a New York suburb. And why don't I interact with the Jews, any Jews, for the sake of mutual understanding in the Middle East. This is especially critical following 2 peace treaties between Israel and two Arab States: Egypt and Jordan." Then a call to the Noon prayer offered me the chance of a quick exit.

It is such an obscurantist mind which has plagued the Muslim Brotherhood throughout its history since it began in 1928. That is even after its assumption of supreme power in Egypt from 2012 to 2013 under a misfit by the name of President Muhammad Morsi (now an Ex).

Now back to my comfort zone: my speaking on May 11 at Temple Emanuel, during religious services. It was on "The New Religious Islamic Revolution." That is the title of my recent book, authored as Trump was undeservedly elected President of the US and inaugurated in January 2017.

Trump and his base have disastrously converted Islamophobia in America in a war on Islam. Trump's first National Security Advisor, General Flynn, has declared that Islam was "a cancer," and not a religion but "a political ideology." 

Such malicious characterization, which was followed up by Trump's successive executive orders banning citizens of seven Islamic countries from US entry, was a clear signal on what was to come. The new American administration was victim of seeing Islam through the criminal eyes and acts of jihadis.

That circumstance was enough reason for me not only to write that book in response. It was also enough reason to dedicate the book to the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar, and to Al-Azhar itself, from which my late father had graduated.

Appearing at Temple Emanuel on the evening of May 11 was in essence Al-Azhar going to the Temple. The road of interfaith communication does not only run through the advocacy by Al-Azhar Al-Sharif of "The New Islamic Religious Revolution." That road also collides with the retrograde thesis of Sam Huntington in his book on "clash of civilizations."

At my presentation before the enthusiastic congregation at the Temple, I set forth before them the primary sources of my book, published by Amazon, in December 2017. These were the very words voiced by Dr. El-Taiyeb, in 2016 and 2017, before the European Parliament in Berlin, and in France, Russia, Nigeria, the United Arab Emirates. And in Cairo before leaders of the youths of Rohynga of Myanmar.

That torch held aloft by the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar, a graduate of the Sorbonne (Paris), as a trail blazer. His utterances were the essence of ideological attacks on ISIS, Al-Qaeda, and other criminal franchises. For those terrorists sought in vain to present Islam as a high dam separating Islam from the world of enlightenment.

Expressing that universalism at the Temple seems to have hit the mark: The Temple had arranged for me a reception after my speech featuring tens of copies of my book for sale. It was the first time for me as an author of more than a dozen of books to be in the role of signing copies of that book to a long line of Jewish purchasers of a book stating in English the very theme of the Islamic Revolution -namely: In faith, all of humanity is one.

And this is how I began that presentation at Temple Emanuel:

"I kept on drafting, then redrafting my remarks for us tonight: The topic of "the oneness of faith" has multi-layered meanings. It encompasses the existential question of "what is faith." Is it allegiance to duty or a person? Is it fidelity to one's promises? Is it sincerity of intentions? Is it belief and trust in and loyalty to God? Is it a firm belief in something for which there is no material proof?

We were born to think. And if you think, you have to believe that others think also -thoughts that crystallize in complex beliefs which we call faith. And all the questions which introduced my remarks are, in their totality, facets of faith."

A credible advocacy of a global cause needs an articulation in a language with which the global audience is familiar. Good English is a vehicle, so is good Arabic. Except that what is said in the Arab and Muslim worlds in classical Arabic has to be imported to America in classical English.

Otherwise the great culture of universalism shall always remain hidden from view. Not only by geography. But also by recognition that effective interpretation of words and concepts are truly the sinews of global understanding.

In this historic search for universal understanding, Al-Azhar and Temple Emanuel are but one as vehicles of interfaith.

The Historic Abandonment: The Present US Department of Justice Neither Defends Nor Enforces Civil Rights

The American Declaration of Independence (1776) was the promise. The U.S. Constitution (1787) was the fulfillment. The soul of both documents has always been ordered liberty. Expressed differently, Chief Justice Warren Burger (1969-1986) said it best: "Ever since people began living in tribes and villages, they have had to balance order with liberty. Individual freedom had to be weighed against the need for security of all."

Today's Department of Justice must be measured by these concepts. For these measurements have made America, until the age of Trump, a unique environment. That uniqueness stemmed from the creation of energies and talents of a diverse population of an ever-changing America.

Regretfully no more. The present Department of Justice, under the stewardship of Attorney General Jeff Sessions has, for all intents and purposes, abandoned its central mission. It no longer defends nor enforces civil rights. Though Trump has peddled his regime as one of "law and order," the facts on the ground prove that the reality exists outside "law and order." 

No legal argument can prove this point like the recently-published book entitled "Fascism" by Madeleine Albright, former US Secretary of State. That book shall be reviewed in a future posting of this blog. Other good books have been recently published along the same theme of Trump's failure to govern this great union of 50 States effectively.

The global effect of that failure? America can no longer be a global guide to other sovereign States in the pivotal area of concern of the world of today -namely human rights. What compounds this dilemma are the constant attacks by President Trump against the Department of Justice (DOJ) and its head, Jeff Sessions. Trump labels DOJ and Sessions as "Disgraceful."

In these thoughtless attacks by a President on his own cabinet member, Sessions, lies an irony. The U.S. President sees in DOJ a role which has never been intended for the executive branch of the US Government. Since its establishment, DOJ has been regarded as an independent cabinet department which is immunized from interference by the White House.

But not under Trump. He, with no prior experience in government, has regarded DOJ as existing for his own personal legal protection. This thinking has been evidenced by the first and only conversation between president-elect Trump and the then outgoing President Obama. This conversation has been reported as follows: Trump, referring to Obama's former Attorney General, Eric Holder, is reported to have extolled to Obama: how effectively has Holder protected Obama. The surprised Obama responded: Holder was not there to protect me. He was there to protect the American people.

So as the legal challenges to his presidency multiply, including the ongoing investigations into Russia's role in electing Trump president of the U.S., Trump has continually manifested his disgust with the Mueller investigations. These are focused on the alleged Trumpian obstruction of justice and possible collusion with Russia in Trump elevation to the occupancy of the White House.

The issues demonstrating the abandonment by the present DOJ of its historic responsibilities cover a very long list of items. This imposes on us the task of selecting only two primary ones:

Voting Rights:
The right to vote is the gateway to self-rule. Tampering with that franchise is the pathway to suffocating democracy. Under Sessions, those rights have been under constant attack. For twenty solid years, the Republican party has surpassed the Democratic party in building up its representation from the ground up: from school boards to state government, to occupancy of congressional seats.

The Republicans spoke the language of the changed American street. This is while the Democrats focused on urban cities and the language of the elite: urbane, nuanced, and nearly incomprehensible to the half-educated or even the non-educated populace. The most current phrase of the Tea Party, which ushered in the Trump dark ages, was: "We need people who look and speak like us." 

The Republican Party of today, a winner among the non-elite, evokes the memory of the defunct "Know Nothing Party" of the American post civil-war. The Trump governance ethos, now supported by 49 million Americans, is "don't trust either institutions or politicians."

With the Trump rallies, a modern Roman circus, becoming the Trump's mass way of governance, "America First" now means "America is for the whites only."

• The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was adopted in order to ensure and facilitate access to voting. The ballot box is the ultimate container of the popular will. Texas, a traditionally "red State" (Republican) has now adopted voter identification requirements. The introduction by the Texas legislature of those requirements had the hallmarks of racism as affirmed by a ruling by a federal judge against it.
• DOJ has now abandoned its opposition to that measure of voter suppression, a shift in line with the preferences of Trump and Sessions. The non-white population is known to vote democratic. This is an electoral fact which has pushed Trump to claim that Hillary's surpassing him in 2016 in the popular vote by 3 million has been due to millions of people voting fraudulently, a charge which is wholly without merit.
• In Ohio, about 50% of the population, like other Americans, don't vote. It has been reported that 80 percent of the notices sent by the state to eligible voters were never returned. Though there was no indication that such result was due to voters' moving out of that jurisdiction, Ohio took the drastic measure of removing them from the voting rolls.

Thus the citizens of Ohio, upon presenting themselves at their assigned voting station, only to discover that their names were not on the record, were turned away from exercising their constitutional right.

The upshot was a Supreme Court case (Hsted v. A. Philip Randolph Institute). That case challenged in January 2018 Ohio's practice of purging voters from the rolls if they failed to vote and/or failed to return the voting notice mailed to them. Remember that 80% of such notices were never returned.

The DOJ during the Obama administration had supported that lawsuit. Its support was solidly based on the National Voter Registration Act which clearly prohibits a State from removing voters from the rolls for failing to vote. But with Sessions, the DOJ abandoned a position which it had maintained for two decades under both Republican and Democratic administrations.

Voter suppression, gerrymandering by States of electoral lines in order to reduce the effect of voting by a browning America, and non-substantiated charges of fraud, all point to one sorry conclusion. The Trump's Department of Justice's role in defending and enforcing civil rights, access to the ballot, and equal treatment, has nearly evaporated.

Trump's only ascertainable concern is for saving his own skin from the looming disaster of successful investigations by special counsel, Bob Mueller, into the alleged Russian intervention in the choice of an American president.

Justice System Reform:

The American Bill of Rights (the first ten amendments of the US Constitution) delineates the shape of America's respect for the rights of the accused. One is presumed innocent until proven guilty, through a fair and open court of law. Upon an arraignment of a suspect before a judge, the pleading of the suspect is invariably: "Not guilty, Your Honor."

Both Trump and Sessions have made the phrase "tough on crime," the vehicle for downgrading the right of the accused. Not only has the DOJ been active in selecting very conservative federal judges. The President himself has encouraged police officers not to be too concerned about injuring suspects during arrests. And his Attorney General, Sessions, has never abandoned exaggerating the volume of violent crime.

• The DOJ stands in opposition to bipartisan reform of sentencing guidelines. This is evidenced by Sessions ordering all federal prosecutors across the 50 states to seek the most extreme charges possible against criminal defendants. That is regardless of any extenuating circumstances.
• By contrast, Eric Holder, the Attorney General under President Obama, had a completely different approach. Holder had directed prosecutors to stay away from filing charges which carry unnecessarily harsh mandatory minimum penalties. That is with the exception of cases where the defendant had a significant criminal history, including gang leadership and drug trafficking.
• The result of this shift in charging has been an increase in mass incarceration. Harsher charging decisions made by prosecutors in the age of Trump/Sessions have been the primary cause.
• Just look up the book by Fordham Law professor John Pfaff, titled "Locked In: The True Causes of Mass Incarceration -and How to Achieve Real Reform." It clearly demonstrates that charging decisions have been the cause.

As compared to Germany, for example, we find that per capita, the American incarceration rate is nearly four times as large as in Germany. Germany's emphasis is on rehabilitation and eventual integration in society, rather than on punishment and revenge. The law, if it is worthy of its name, is not meant to "get even," but to effect behavioral change.

One of the most egregious attacks in America on reforming the criminal justice system is the project of privatizing the prison system. An owner of a private jail does not care about the legality of how his residents got to his jail. Like a hotel owner, he is focused on "full occupancy." The profit motive is the primary motivation. The main loser is justice.

It is a great irony that the reduction in crime in America, which began in the Bush/Obama era, is now bold-facedly, claimed by Trump as resulting from his being "a law and order president," a leader who is "draining the Washington swamps." In reality, the age of Trump demonstrates that the persistent swamp is located in Trump's White House. Including the racist and ethnic ban of citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering America.

Walling off of Muslims from entering America, is a part of the Trumpian march towards selectively disengaging the US from world affairs. Witness Trump's persistent call for a wall on the American/Mexico border. This reflects Trump's growing reliance on the popular myth that America is under attack.

The use of American laws as divisive tools within and outside America, especially when it comes to the Muslim world, ignores some basic American facts. In the US of today there are an estimated 3.5 million Muslims from 75 different countries (1% of the US population). Reporting on these facts, the American magazine, National Geographic of May 2018 said about them: "They (the American Muslims) are forming communities, building mosques, and thriving."

To this, I should add that many of these Muslims are enrolled in police departments all over the US, as well as in the armed forces. They included the son of Kizr Khan, formerly of Pakistan, an officer, who died in Afghanistan trying to save his troops from the carnage caused by a suicide bomber.

The father of that officer who died for the U.S. remains a strong advocate in America for the Rule of Law. His famous admonition to Trump shall live on for a long time. He shamed Trump at the Democratic National Convention of 2016 as he said: "Sir!! Have you even read the U.S. Constitution?!"

Michael Hayden, a former director of the Central Intelligence Agency has wondered in his forthcoming book as follows: "How do you brief a president (Trump) who isn't interested in facts?" The title of this awaited book is "The Assault on Intelligence: American National Security in an Age of Lies."