Resistance is what Euro-American armed forces and culture face in Afghanistan not “insurgency” which is political opposition to a specific governmental or civil authority, structure, and operations. Insurgency has specific and identifiable objectives and borders and can be isolated and engaged with political tactics such as incorporation in the government, co-optation, or the appropriation of government by insurgents. Realistically there is no insurgency in the country and surrounding region. There is no government in, for, by, and of Afghanistan. The apparatus at the Afghan center is organized, controlled, and subsidized from top to bottom by the United States and its NATO allies. As such what is labeled insurgency by the American military machinery and its propaganda partners in the media is at core resistance that uses all means available to it. Resistance is a cultural construct that is fluid and elusive and cannot be isolated. Like other cultural phenomenon resistance reproduces itself. The numbers of its articulators, carriers and operators steadily increase or at least remain relatively constant—its human losses are replaced by those who come of age inside and outside Afghanistan.

Inspired by deep seated hatred, disrespect, and contempt for the violent American imperial presence, local culture and Islam—separately and together—inspire and equip participants in the Afghan resistance. Resistance in Afghanistan will disappear when domination, occupation and occupier disappear.

On July 16, 2009 the American visual media circulated moving pictures in which we see an expression-less, heavily armored giant-size American soldier with dark goggles seated on the ground with five local Afghan boys ostensibly discussing the fate of a captured American soldier in eastern Afghanistan. The Paxtu script accompanying this picture reads: “One of our American guests is lost”!!

Slippery grip-less power is historically marked by confusion and aimlessness accompanied by pangs of delusion and hallucination.

It was interesting to see, but rather thin, almost as if they are running out of steam. They have pretty well said everything they possibly can in their own defense, so I would be surprised to see a really new twist in their self-representations.

The media, in the meantime, will continue loving stories about “smart” wars…and what else could a war be that enlists academics? ;-)

‘Cultivating Afghanistan: Anthopologists and the Insurgency’

http://www.newsmatters.org/cultivating-afghanistan-anthopologists-and-the-insurgency/

The myth of a living Ben Laden is produced by the American war machine so that it can continue polishing up its military technology and tactics for population-centered use of organized violence against civilians. But again, in the remote chance that BL might be alive, I would put my money on under or around the big cube in Mecca or the remote regions of northern Pakistan or western China. If this scenario holds, the state systems in all three locations have powerful reasons to keep the imperial American beast freaked out, confused, growling, guessing, hallucinating, and otherwise wasting away.

By the way, aside from Benazir Bhutto’s very unexpected remark in an interview that she knew who had assassinated Bin Laden, do we have anything else to suggest that he may be dead?