Barnet Council offers to house five Afghan households

Barnet Council has the highest population of any of the 32 London Council's. It has recently announced that it will be housing five Afghan refugee households. These refugees are people who put their lives and the lives of their families on the line to support the British Army operations in the country. They are arriving in the UK having left everything behind, with what they can carry. The figures indicate that there have been 8,000 people airlifted out with up to 20,000 eventually coming. As the largest of Londons councils, is 5  households really all we can do? 

We have a responsibility to these refugees. They are at risk from the Taliban because they chose to work with us. It would be immoral to abandon them. I was initially quite pleased when I saw that Barnet Council were offering assistance, but five households seems like a very small number. Surely people who have fled such terror need the support of friends, family and community. Of course Barnet Council haslimited resources and is massively stretched and for once I will refrain from being too harsh on them for such a small number. Central government and Boris Johnson are the ones who have created this crisis and they should be offering generous funding for councils to encourage them to assist. 

One aspect the government are keeping very quiet about is what they will do the billions that they are not spending on the war anymore. There clearly is the cash there, it would be good to spend some of it in the UK on people who need it. 

My assumption is that the people who are coming over are people who have a history of working, many as interpreters, so they will be fluent in English and will surely be able to find work, they will not be a burden. They also have demonstrated a commitment to democracy and inclusiveness. We should house them and give them the means to earn a living ASAP. It is the very least we could do, and surely we should do more than the very least.

Afghanistan - A few thoughts

 I've always taken a bit of an interest in Afghanistan. Back in 1979, I was planning a visit. One of my friends, Emil Brydon ran Budget Bus, an overland travel company which ran a coach service from Totteridge Station to New Delhi. Another friend was one of the drivers, Ernie Ferebee. They both fascinated me with tales of  their exploits on the overland trail, travelling passing through Afghanistan on the way. Both told me of villages in the middle of the nation, where all of the citizens were blond haired and blue eyed, a legacy of the conquest of Afghanistan by Alexander the Great. Emil's great uncle, William Brydon was the sole survivor of the British force of 12,000 massacred by the Afghans in 1842. As Emil had a familial interest, he studied the region and would take passengers on detours to check details. Ernie also developed an interest in the culture and history of the region. Ernie was in Kabul when the Soviets invaded. He told us stories of being told by the hotel staff to get his passengers out and head for the border as quickly as possible, being advised to pay whatever bribes were necessary to escape.

Emil and Ernie predicted that the Soviet Union would be vanquished. They said that history was not on the side of foreign powers intervening in the country. Soon the western papers were full of news of the brave Mujahadin. Emil and Ernie were both staunch supporters of the Afghan resistance to the Soviet occupation. They would rub shoulders with the likes of Sandy Gall, the ITN newsman, at events for the resistance. The US backed the Mujahadin, with such figures as Osama Bin Laden being on the CIA payroll. After a long struggle, that decimated the country, the Soviets were forced out. The scenario unfolded exactly as Emil and Ernie predicted on their return from the region in 1980. Sadly for my plans, the Soviet invasion marked the end of the overland Hippy Trail and my plans to join the boys on a journey.

Both Emil and Ernie ended up working for me. Emil as a tour manager for a band I was managing and Ernie as my studio manager and partner in our retail business. I'd spend many hours discussing the world situation with both. Sadly Ernie passed away in 2001, before the current situation unfolded. Emil however took a keen interest. He soon flagged up the mistakes we were making.

I just had a quick catch up. His view? This moment was inevitable from the moment the first US and UK soldiers arrived on the ground. His question? Trillions have been spent by the USA on the country, what have they to show for that? His knowledge of Afghan traditions, clan ties etc, was that long before the US left, the deals were in place for when they left. As soon as the wages of govt soldiers stopped being paid by the US, they had no reason to support the government. The relatively orderly change in Kabul does not so far look like the victorious end of a bitter civil war. 

As to the other cities, each of these has it's own local power structure. None of these areas are particularly wealthy or desirable.  For many areas, the only real asset is the opium trade. Local warlords trade allegiance for the right to hold the local franchise to produce narcotics. Will the Taliban stop this when they have no tangible source of wealth in the nation? It seems unlikely to me. 

The biggest losers in all of this will be the educated, city dwelling middle classes, especially the females. But afghanistan is not just Kabul. There is a side that most of us never see, this is the side that Ernie and Emil were fascinated by. So what is this Afghanistan? Whilst not all Afghans are Taliban, apart from Kabul, most areas have a fairly fundamentalist population.  Generally, whilst they are welcoming of guests and visitors, this soon disappears when they start getting told how to live their life or interpret the Koran. The West often forgets that as in most major religions, there are different flavours of Islam and different varieties of fundamentalism. Having got rid of the western influence, many will want to juts get on with their lives. The trillions have had little impact on the lives of the ordinary people in outlying areas. Without a war to fight, many men will have to find something else to do. Only one thing is for certain, there will be far less cash flowing into the country and far fewer corrupt officials etc siphoning it off. If nothing else, we've comprehensively proven the Afghans right about what happens when foreign powers stick their nose into Afghan affairs. The argument has been made in some quarters that at least we've prevented Afghanistan being used as a terrorist hub for 20 years. The truth is that threat has long since evolved. When Bin Laden launched the 911 attacks, the internet as we know it did not exist. There was no Dark Web, Whatsapp, Facebook, etc.  Terrorists now understand that information is power in a way few understood when they were living in caves in Afghanistan. The Taliban in 2001 were a shadowy organisation. Now they hold live press conferences. The beast has evolved.

But what about us and the Americans? 456 British soldiers have died. If one of them was my child, I'd feel sick to the pit of my stomach. It will be very interesting in 25 years time, when the papers are released, to see the truth about what our government knew about the situation and what drove the decisions. I somehow suspect that in five years when the papers detailing the decisions to go in are due to be released, they will be withheld. Did we ever really have a plan? Did we learn any lessons from the Soviets? Was there ever a possibility that we'd succeed? I don't know the answer to any of these questions, but if the answer is no, then we really need to take a long look at our foreign policy. One thing I do know is that the reason we lost hundreds of British soldiers is because they were not properly kitted out with the right equipment. It is bad enough embarking on doomed military adventures, but sending soldiers in without decent kit is criminal. But for some reason, no one is talking about that.

Afghanisatan - read this if you are interested in the conflict

http://www.rense.com/general91/impr.htm - If you are interested in the situation in Afghanistan, I'd strongly urge you to read this. It is probably the most interesting analysis of the situation I've read for a couple of years. Sorry to say it's rather grim reading.

Afghanistan - the truth no on will tell you

I've seen my fair share of terrorist atrocities in London at close quarters over the years. I walked across the concourse of Victoria Station one minute before a bomb exploded. It is strange how far you can travel in 60 seconds, I didn't even realise anything bad had happened until I reached the office where I was working in Buckingham Palace Road, just heard a dull thud as I exited the station.

I was on the no 30 bus behind the one which Al-Qaida blew up on 7/7. As I walked up the Euston Road and saw people emerge covered in debris, my first thought was that they'd been at a wedding party and were covered in confetti. So what's all this got to do with Afghanistan. Well 300 British troops have died in Afghanistan. That is a large number of highly trained young men and women. What maybe you hadn't realised, I hadn't till I bumped into a friend who returned from a six month stint there, by chance on Thursday evening in a pub. He said this "If we still had the same medical technology as we had in World War II the number of deaths would be six times higher, we've got really good at saving peoples lives". A squaddie in WWII would be given morphine and if he was still alive by the time they got him to hospital, he had a chance. Now paramedics do what they can on the scene, reacting aggresively. Helicopters fly in (often into perilous situations) and extract wounded soldiers,  who are being treated as they fly back.

I asked this question "can we win?". His bitter answer was this "We haven't even decided what winning is". The uncomfortable truth is that the Taliban in places such as Helmand are just the people who live there. They aren't martians. The reason they have barbaric views and pratices is because, unlike us, their civilisation hasn't developed too much since the days of Alexander the Great. Sure Al-Qaida have bases there which they launched terror attacks, but by and large these aren't the people who are killing us. The Taliban know that sooner or later, we'll get fed up and go home, foreigners always do (be it alive or in a box). When they have finished a days terrorism, they go home, have dinner and get ready for the next days work. When we call the Islamic extremists, they are just practising their religion as they have for a thousand years. Helmand is rural Afghanistan.

When we launched the "war on terror" the stated aim was to deny Al-Qaida an operational base. This has been achieved. I have a view, probably not a very popular one, that this is all we ever needed to do. We should pull out and tell the Afghans they can do what they like, so long as they don't let people who wish to wage war on us use their territory. If they do we go back and bomb them incessently until they stop and support any faction who will aid us in this aim. Great Britain is not in the position to sort out everyone elses mess, we have enough trouble sorting out our own. To an Afghani, we are the problem. If we remove our forces and they know that we'll bomb them if they aid Al-Qaida, then Al-Qaida become the problem.

In Islamic culture, there is the concept of a guest. You have to look after your guests and your guests cannot abuse your hospitality. Our actions make the abuse of the hospitality by Al-Qaida acceptable. If we go, then the rules change. Nice though it would be to think that we can transform a feudal society into a Liberal Democracy in a couple of years, by sending the army to fight a guerilla war, it is actually completely bonkers. The whole country is controlled by warlords, each with their own patch. All we could ever reasonably hope to achieve was to stay on these guys good side.

There is one other nasty little factor in the equation - Heroin. This is the main export of Afghanistan. This is the petrol for the fire. Despite what our papers tell us, it is the real problem. You see, this is what pays for the private armies of the warlords. Whilst Heroin is illegal, there will be huge profits to be made from growing it in lawless regions and exporting it, so that Tarquin and Gemima can get off their face. Every time anyone, anywhere in the UK buys a fix, they are ultimately buying the bullets for the people who are killing our soldiers. Now if I was a member of our bright shiny new Con-Dem government, I would do something about this. You won't like my solution at all (probably). I would go back to the English way of dealing with drug abuse. What we did before the US suckered us into "the war on drugs". I'd grow our own opium, make our own Heroin and give it to all registered users for free. If every Western Country followed suit, the Afghan drug economy would collapse and the warlords power would diminish.

I would plaster the billboards with posters saying "Every time you buy a wrap of smack you buy a bullet to kill a British Soldier". I'm not stupid enough to think my solutions will solve every social problem and I'm not stupid enough to think that Afghanistan will become a Liberal Democracy as a result. I'd settle for no more of our troops being killed in a futile conflict, with no end in sight. I'd settle for us subsidising our own hard pressed farmers by buying opium off them rather than warlords in Afghanistan. Sad though it is I'd rather give smackheads a free fix, than have them rob my house to pay to feed their habit. And last of all, I'd rather not be a terrorist target, because some misguided twat thinks we are on a crusade, when in fact we haven't got a clue what we are doing out there.

British Army Chief : I now realise I'm a European, not an American

There is a fascinating report in the Telegraph concerning the tensions between the British and American army leadership during the Iraq conflict. Now as a rule the Barnet Eye doesn't cover national and international politics, there are other bloggers who do it much better, but this is too big an issue to ignore. You see I know people who served in Iraq and lost friends out there. Some are serving in Afghanistan and if this pattern is being repeated, them British servicemen are still dying.

There is a comment from Col Tanner, who served as chief of staff to General Stewart and of the entire British division during Operation Telic 3, from November 2003 to May 2004. He says the following :-

He said: “The whole system was appalling. We experienced real difficulty in dealing with American military and civilian organisations who, partly through arrogance and partly through bureaucracy, dictate that there is only one way: the American way.
“I now realise that I am a European, not an American. We managed to get on better…with our European partners and at times with the Arabs than with the Americans. Europeans chat to each other, whereas dialogue is alien to the US military… dealing with them corporately is akin to dealing with a group of Martians.
“If it isn’t on the PowerPoint slide, then it doesn’t happen.”

They detail how the Americans attacked the Medhi Army and the whole of the British sector dissolved into violence and bloodshed. Even worse :-

Gen Stewart added: “I spent a significant amount of my time ‘consenting and evading’ US orders

So we have British generals openly saying that the execution of the war was mishandled. I'm no expert on military matters, quite the opposite, but it is crystal clear to me that if the generals are carrying on like this, guys in the field will die. Our soldiers have been put in harms way by the lack of cohesion. I don't know if 1, 10 or 100 British Servicemen died as a result of all of this. What I do know is this. The whole Iraq war was based on dishonesty and executed (at a political level) by incompetents. The price was paid in blood by ordinary soldiers. If we can't work with our allies, we shouldn't have been there at all. I suspect that when the dust settles on the situation in Afghanistan, then a similar pattern will emerge. I heard Gordon Brown say earlier in the week that the purpose of the Afghanistan campaign was "to damage Al Qaeda's morale". "What are we fighting for Lads?" - "To give Osama Bin Laden the hump". It's completely bonkers.