good luck sir keep it up.

When I said, “Beware the guardians of Pashtunwali!!”, I wanted to evoke precisely the type of sentiment articulated in your comments.

I alluded to global warming polluting our environment because money is ‘heartwarming’ some ethnic Pashtuns, they part with Pashtunwali with pleasure. Reasons range from need to greed.

Late Ayub Khan used to say, “Take gun from them, hand them a yard stick for cloth trade”. He did precisely that with Afridis, you see them trading in Bara close to Peshawar.

I think that was correct strategy. They must be provided with prospects of advancement in fields other than they are caught up.

Sir,

I find more than a grain of truth in your comment. Especially when you say that money matters have dented ‘Pashtunwali’.

But look at it this way sir. Fighting among themselves or with outsiders has been a way of life with these unruly tribes for eons. Plus, there being no other occupations so to speak of, gun slinging comes naturally to them, whether for hire or for a cause. Furthermore, and here it gets really interesting, there is money to be found in resisting American occupation of their homeland. They made money when they resisted the Soviets, Americans and the Arabs paid them by the bundles. Now they are making money resisting the Americans, there being no dearth of countries in the region wanting to see America humbled. What is more, even the Americans are trying to buy them off, as you also suggest. Where else would you find such a happy marriage of a cause and a trade craft? Offering a few thousand lives of the wretched foot soldiers, always the foot soldiers whichever the army, in the bargain matters not a fig to them. Both of us have witnessed the palatial mansions and posh styles of Yunus Khalis, Abdurab Rasool Siyaf, Gulbudin Hikmatyar, Burhanuddin Rabbani et al–the so called leaders of the Soviet ‘Jihad’ time. In the melee, however, a code of conduct is still required by them to regulate their affairs. It is here that ‘Pashtunwali’, or whatever is left of it, continues to come in handy.

Perhaps you speak more of the Pakistani Taliban. They are a bunch of cuthroats as I have explained in my article ‘Taliban Defined’. The only code that they live by is nothing more than that of religiously inspired killing. Even the ‘war of national liberation’ of the Afghan warlords, as I then suggested, will turn as blood red as the inside of a Kandahari pomegranate when the mad rush for capturing Kabul begins in the aftermath of Americans and their sidekicks exiting the region.

But that is a subject for another time.

Anwaar

How does this apply to this situation is somewhat difficult to predict, or understand rather, but I believe it has all to do with what Anwaar has written in this piece of art, we are there to both understand who is who, and who matters, and to get everyone at each others throat. Once this has been accomplished it is merely setting things in motion to get your desired result, that is if it goes according to their plans.

Industrialization, besides causing global warming, brought about a phenomenon called pursuit of economic well being which meant possession of money. Morality, in ensuing hot pursuit to secure money, slowly got relegated to far lesser a level than it belonged. Ends started justifying means more than ever before. Pashtunwali has not been an exception! Money has done wonders in our beloved rugged lands. Drug trade, ransom money are considered legitimate. Aimal Kansi was sold by his own blood relations to be extradited, judicially killed.

Obama has deliberated a sufficient amount before declaring surge, has made known an exit date in the same breath. Is he planning to win militarily? No sir, he is going to employ tactics, tools far more potent this time around to complement military operation; environmental warming by employing green back thus creating conducive situation to pull out in a face saving manner.

Beware the guardians of Pashtunwali!!

Americans are in for a licking, no matter what they do on the battlefield. That is because they are doing something illegal. The only way out of this quagmire is OUT of Afghanistan.

Anwaar, a very incisive and, as usual, a scathingly honest piece.

I appreciate the educational post. The Pashtunwali code has more than a few similarities to the belief system of the Shi’a, especially with regard to revenge and retribution. I have a dear Shi’a friend in the U.K. and he has patiently educated me regarding some of these very issues. The Shi’a still cry out for revenge for events which happened centuries ago. (Think Yazid,the story of Lady Zaynab, Ashura, etc. and the many couplets of poetry which speak of these things, tears and revenge.) I cannot internalize such a thought within my own make-up, that of an eternal family grudge, but do acknowledge its existence within other cultures.

Tammy Swofford

It’s a huge mix that we are burdened with. Only few humans have the intelligence to get over it.