Birthday with the ANA

Had an interesting day at the ANA today. Steve decided to have a cake made because we had my birthday, my terp Zak's was also today and Steve's is coming up. It started as the three of us, but kept growing as we figured out that seven of us including terps and the ANA had birthday's this month. It went from a small party to an all out party with singing, cake and of course tea. it was fun. Nothing horribly exciting, but more than I expected. Pictures here. Yes, that is a Kiwi cake.

We had an interesting talk the other day from a professor at the Naval Postgrad school who came to visit. He is an expert in Afghan history and has done piles of research on the future of Afghanistan and what it will truly take to defeat the Taliban. I will spare the boring details, but essentially, he is saying we have the wrong mindset here, and that the tribal nature of the culture just can't be won over with the way we in the west think. It's just not possible. The tribes have a term - Badal (revenge) which basically to them means that if we kill one person from a village, they feel like they have to kill ten to make up for it, and of course in real terms it means we have lost the support for the village forever. The Taliban knows this and does everything it can to put us in that situation. He mentioned a phrase the Taliban use - The Americans have the watches, we have the time. Interesting. This place is going through an Iraqization and I have a feeling this will be an incredibly telling year for the future of Afghanistan.

Gary