The world must retaliate!

Afghanistan is in chaos. A few Indian leaders have been justifying the happenings in Afghanistan, equating with the Indian freedom struggle against the British. However, they miss the point that the Afghan battle is between a democratically elected government and a few armed-to-their-teeth mercenaries.

Like many other religious extremist outfits, the Taliban are a radical Sunni Islamic outfit that believes in Jihad, holy war against non-believers and countries. For them, women are merely a commodity, ordained for procreation. The deep-set ideologies will not change anytime too soon, which does not augur well for the world.

People are hanging on the undercarriage of the aircraft, ignorant of the heat it produces while taking off and landing, the sub-zero, often reaching to minus 40 degrees Celsius while the hydraulics are retracted into the fuselage. Many Afghans want to escape the Taliban’s barbarism by taking refuge in the Kabul airport, guarded by the US troops, who are merely there to take the Americans away from Afghanistan!

Heart-rending scenes are near the high-walled Kabul airport, where mothers, who cannot scale the walls, are throwing their children, across the wall, into the airport side. The mothers fervently hope that Allah, the most benevolent and merciful, will prevail over the American soldiers to grab the children and offer them refuge. Such is the case of lost hopes in Afghanistan.

Many innocent people, women, and girl children have been overnight rendered as second-class citizens in Afghan politics. Denial of education, music, sports to women is now the Taliban’s predictable scheme of things. Summary executions and lashings are in public display to instil fear.

Regardless of their justification of exiting Afghanistan, the US has timed it wrong, including the abruptness, which is merely playing to their domestic gallery. The Af president Ghani and his commanders have failed their state by abdicating their constitutional duties towards their country and citizens. They must be tried and suitably sentenced to ensure that such repetition does not take place anywhere in the world.

Islam is not about violence and cruelty. It is a few hardline outfits, which espouse intolerance for non-believers of their faith. It is time the Islamic nations come together to isolate all extremist elements from their fold. It is important to identify and boycott terror-supporting and funding countries like Pakistan. Will the Islamic nations dare to take the first step in that direction?

A tolerant and peace-loving Islam would usher growth to all humanity. However, the world must retaliate now, or else the sacrifices of the Afghan mothers, forsaking their children, will be in vain.

Sampath Kumar

Intrépide Voix

In pic: An Afghan child sleeps on the cargo floor of a US Air Force C-17 Globemaster III.

fghanistanAU.S. Central Command Public Affairs