Quote:
Originally Posted by Giorgio
excellent comparison, lunecat. The Irish conflict is great bedside reading for any of you who want to see what the dividends of tough, long-term negotiation can be. The real IRA were terrorists, too, as despicable and radical as the next, to most's eyes. Of course, they were white, and spoke english with pretty accents, so it was hard to label them 'animals', as has been so viciously propounded around this board. But we can, and should negotiate with the Taliban, even if it will take a long time and a lot of frustration.
As has been said, they remain popular in Afghnanistan. Wiping them out or excluding them would only serve to alienate and radicalise their supporters, which would make building a stable democracy more difficult than it already is.
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Would you have had the US negotiate with the KKK in the post civil war era simply because they were supported, even tacitly, by a majority of southerners? No, of course not. Certain behaviors are unacceptable and must be punitively dealt with.
The taliban could be a part of the government in Afghanistan (if they wanted to) by peacufully proctoring a political adgenda that provides more relief to the Afghan people than the government of President Karsi. So could atta in Iraq for that matter. Both, however, choose to act like warlords and tyrants and only derive their "authority" at gun-point.
Certainly the taliban have their supporters and I even suspect that some of that support is sincere. I do however wonder how many of those "supporters" are simply doing so because they have a 7.62x39 bullet about 10" from the back of their skull. (That's an AK-47's standard round by the way)