Fighting for Freedom – Or is It Merely for The Power?

On October 7th 2001, The U.S and U.K military launched ‘Operation Enduring Freedom’ by advancing on Afghanistan. However, including the word ‘freedom’ in this title is not only ironic, but is ever so slightly hypocritical. After reading an article on the topic recently; I found that the first two paragraphs alone contain the words: ‘destroy’, ‘fighting’ and ‘control’, hardly fitting the bill for an operation with such a name.

Firstly, the word ‘freedom’ itself is defined as, ‘The state of being free or at liberty rather than in confinement or under physical restraint.’ in my opinion, does not represent the current situation in the Middle East. Although supporters of the war may argue that the aims of the war were to free the Afghan civilians from the terrorist control of Al-Qaeda, The Taliban; it is difficult to venture from the suspicion that this war will only end when the nation is under complete control of the U.S government, begging the question, are they really free, or just under the ‘confinement’ or ‘restraint’ of an alternative power?

The media constantly portrays the Taliban as terrorists or ‘the bad guys’ as it were. Well, the fact of the matter is, that since an estimated 4,500 Afghan civilians were killed by Air Strikes and such attacks in the first six months of the war alone, we start to wonder, who is really striking fear and terrorising innocent members of the public. People like you and I, with no intention of harming anyone. So who are the real terrorists? Those many thousands who can’t go to the shops in the morning for fearing their lives? Or those whom they are afraid of?

With no concrete evidence of ever finding ‘weapons of mass destruction’ in Iraq; and not exactly finding the guy we were after in Afghanistan, isn’t it about time we came home? For a start, the total casualties in Afghanistan are staggering. A Total 20,000 people have been recorded as dead during the war, with a further 50,000 injured. For what? Ask yourself, what have we actually achieved? Freedom? Not a chance.

Plus, you have to question the motives behind the wars. Was Saddam Hussein different from the likes of Robert Mugabe? Dictatorships cause the deaths of many innocent people all the time, corruption, killing and oppression is a common pattern. Yet in Zimbabwe they lack one vital ingredient that would spell their freedom… i’ll give you a clue, three letters, beginning with O, ending with L and an I in-between. In 2007 Iraq exported 1.67 billion barrels a day of oil and a main target of the afghan war was to cease opium production… But I won’t go there.

So I say, bring the troops home from Afghanistan and stop wasting time, money and most importantly, the lives of so many people. The Soviets tried it in the late seventies – early eighties, and they failed. It’s just another case like the race to the moon. An egotistical conflict between U.S and Soviet politicians, and there will be no sharing of the spoils that’s for sure.