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OpEdNews Op Eds    H3'ed 12/10/09

Fresh Afghanistan Warriors the President Needs

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America, barely 500 years old, blessed with a gentle climate and once abundant resources, too often assumes that we know what's needed in cultures thousands of years old who are burden with hard climates and few resources.

Afghanistan's illiteracy rate hovers around 90%. Were it testable, America's ignorance of the world might hover around the same rate. That shouldn't be surprising when one does the math on how many Americans fill and flip passport pages in order to learn about the world.

About 15%-20% of Americans hold passports. When one subtracts military, corporate, and Club Medish trips, a minuscule percentage uses passports to venture out to serve and learn how the world works. A much higher percentage of yanks think they know all they need know about the world, because they have passports to our version of civilized gladiator games. They know a helluva lot about televised games and ranting opinion makers. They think that's all they need know about how the world works and who they should elect to run it.

No matter where those with pixilated passports to the world stand on the President's recent Afghanistan speech, eighteen months of military work will neither erase the problems that plague the "stans and world, nor eliminate criminal terror cells. Cultures, relationships, and needs that took centuries to build will not change in 18 months or eight years of soldiers, drones, and pronouncements of democracy.

Although the Sunday game watchers will cheer their Patrick Tillman's playing on artificial turf, they will refuse to take the time to learn the lessons Tillman, who ventured onto the deadliest battlefield, wanted to come home and tell them before he was shot by his own. And the same game watchers won't take the time to read Mother Tillman's book explaining what her son wanted to bring home about the futility of even his Special Forces warfare.

Poverty and ignorance lead to terrorism and war. Education and jobs that grow an involved middle class lead to rational discourse and healthy development.

Whether 400 or 2,000 years old, a nation's rational and healthy development, depends not on its vicarious knowledge of sporting events, but on its practical knowledge of the world. Wisdom doesn't come from absorbing pixels while lying on a couch. Wisdom comes from doing.

That's why the President's "civilian surge must be much more than a surge of taxpayer funded contracts to transnational corporations. The President must involve Americans in grassroots initiatives not only in Afghanistan but in all the other "XXXstans and XXXnams that drain blood and dollars from all.

The last time a Peace Corps Volunteer was in Afghanistan was 1979; in Pakistan, 1967. PCVs who served in those states were admired, respected, and protected. In appropriate areas they, and the other organizations' volunteers under the umbrella of People's Lobby's American World Service Corps (AWSC) Congressional Proposals, should be surged. Throughout the world, these serving civilian volunteers need to be surged.

Containment Policy

In the 20th century, we contained our fear of Communism by using the strength of the world's undisputed strongest economy to encircle communist states with missiles, soldiers, and a booming economy that made things. In the 21st we should use an American World Service Corps. Such a cost effective containment policy will in a generation dramatically reduce poverty, increase world understanding, address climate change, and erase organized terrorism. America's broken economy cannot encircle an "ism that lurks in hearts and minds with missiles, soldiers, and an economy driven by financial gimmickry and transnational corporations. Working in conjunction with other nations, a World Service Corps, should be our 21st century "Containment Policy.

Hopefully, we will soon hear the President say, "The first step to eliminating terrorism and war is to eliminate poverty and ignorance. Into safe areas, we and other nations will send our World Service Corps volunteers to contain and then eliminate poverty and ignorance. By doing so, we will contain, dramatically reduce, and then hopefully eliminate terrorism and warfare.

Some who read this may say, "This is a peacenik's pipedream. Just kill them all" Others may say, "It's too dangerous for a civilian surge to take hold and do good"

Three Cups of Tea

For all you naysayers, please read Greg Mortensen's Three Cups of Tea. Mortensen is working as well-trained and determined PCVs do. American Mortensen roams throughout Afghanistan and Pakistan. Mortensen doesn't teach or preach Americanism or Christianity. He builds schools, especially for girls. Where he's done his work, our troops, if properly trained in community development, will be much safer. Where he's been, terrorists will not easily find safe havens.

Right teams, personnel, plays

Winning football teams do wear out their personnel by just banging plays up the middle. They change players, pass, run sweeps, do reverses, call screens" America has failed in building a big, strong, and versatile enough first and second teams that can pass, run sweeps, do reverses, etc. when pitted against a new and treacherous team. It can't continue to grind up its military by just pounding plays up the middle.

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Dwayne served in the Peace Corps in the slums of Mumbai, India, worked several Habitat Projects, and was on the start-up team of the California Conservation Corps. He has a Ph.D. from Claremont Graduate University, has been a builder, teacher, (more...)
 

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