I am not usually one who takes an interest in international politics. But I’m a writer and I do research. And I’m tired of hearing about wars, so let’s talk about Afghanistan in the news right now.
The US has been in that country for 20 years. By the end of 2019 the US military effort had spent over two trillion dollars to fight the Taliban according to The New York times (see source below). $2,000,000,000,000 US dollars has a lot of zeros.
This spending was a huge mistake. Why? Because it HASN’T WORKED. Not since President Bush sent the first troops over in 2001. The American military pressured President Obama and then President Trump to increase their forces in Afghanistan. The US Defense Department declassified information admitting that in a sampling of three recent years, they spent 60% of that two trillion on armoured vehicles, fuel and facilities, transportation of troops by air and sea, and the training of more and more Afghanistan soldiers because of casualties and desertions.
In fact, the US spends more money on military efforts around the world than all other nations combined and still, they want to increase that each year. BUT IT DOES NOT HELP WORLD PEACE.
So you have to ask yourself, who benefits from spending that much money in Afghanistan? Can you imagine how much profiteering there was by big military contractors every year? Even hippies in the 1960’s pointed that out. Well, the big MILITARY INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX is still alive and doing very well.
And where did the rest of it go?
Only $30 billion of that went to reconstruction projects, skimmed off by corruption, into hospitals, schools and military bases, some that were never built. No, the quality of life for civilians in Afghanistan has not improved. But what has improved in those same two decades?
According to the United Nations data, before 2001 when the Taliban was in power, Afghanistan had almost closed down its OPIUM PRODUCTION!
Only 84,000 hectares were cultivated in 2002.
BUT after the US went in to ‘save’ the country there were 328,000 hectares of opium growing profusely by 2017.
Hmmm… Opium makes heroin. In fact, in 2010 Afghanistan made 80% of the heroin in the world and the US is still one of the biggest consumers.
Did the great military might of the US concern itself with Afghanistan’s poor? Did it free the prisoners from harsh regimes? Did it address the horrendous health problems for the blind, the diseased, the starving? Did it free women from degrading oppression? No, every government in the world has failed those goals. Yet Jesus proclaimed a future for humanity where this becomes true! This was his message:
“The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to set the oppressed free…” Luke 4:18 NIV Bible
One type of government will make this happen! Jesus proclaimed the coming Kingdom of God. And a kingdom is a type of government! Each individual, and each country can live by the laws of God’s government right now!
In the Lord's Prayer, he asked us to pray 'thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven'.Jesus was referring to a government based on the laws of charity, compassion, integrity, honesty, and humanitarian love for each other. Those attributes WILL BUY PEACE for any nation in the world. That will create WORLD PEACE.
So if we want to stand in our city streets and demonstrate, let’s demand our governments and our leaders uphold these values!
Jesus went through all the towns and villages, teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and healing every disease and sickness. Matthew 9:35 NIV Bible
Sources: New York Times article Dec. 9th, 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/12/09/world/middleeast/afghanistan-war-cost.html
#Afghanistan #AfghanistanBiden #AfghanistanTaliban #WorldPeace #compassion #spirituality #ChristianPolitics #globalpeace
Jane Catherine Rozek 
Your critic is well put together. Bush started a war, and now Biden is being blamed for finishing it after 20 years. It is so sad for all those who died at the bidding of Bush and his friends.
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War is a sad thing… If the same amount of money was spent on enriching the lives of the citizens in underprivileged countries, maybe their governments would evolve to care for their own people. Thanks for sharing your thoughts!
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Thank you so much. I absolutely agree about military and war. How we shift this balance and these ideas about the world, I am not sure, but I appreciate what you do and say.
Marilyn
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That is the difficulty when everyone is “fighting for peace”. Isn’t that a strange contradiction?? I grew up when college students and long haired hippies demonstrated to stop the war in Vietnam. We stopped the fighting in that one! Thanks so much for commenting.
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