19 September, 2001.
A full week has gone by since the attacks to the World Trade Center in New York City, the Pentagon in Washington D.C. and the crashing of another hijacked airplane in Pennsylvania. Much has been said and written about what course of action should be taken by the United States and its allies in response to these attacks, from the pure military solutions to humanitarian alternatives.
At this point in time, declarations by U.S. government officials and media coverage seem to clearly indicate that retaliatory military action will be taken against one terrorist in particular (Usama Bin Laden) and a state that supports him: Afghanistan.
In the deluge of information and opinions expressed, there have been some aspects that -to the best of my knowledge- remain unexplored. Here I will try to present a possible socioeconomic alternative to military strikes against Afghanistan.
Immediately after the attacks, the U.S. House of Representatives passed bill H.R.2888: the 2001 Emergency Supplemental Appropriations Act for Recovery from and Response to Terrorist Attacks on the United States [1]. In it, U.S. $40 billion dollars are made available to fund a military operation that will most likely be against Afghanistan.
Afghanistan is a very poor, landlocked country, with a population of 27 million [2] and a GDP of U.S. $3 billion [3] - less than 8% of the amount that could pay for a strike against them. It is also a very young country, where the average life expectancy is of only 46 years and 43% of the population is under the age of 15 [4].
There exists much misunderstanding about women in Islam [5], but it is well known that in Afghanistan females face unsurmountable hurdles to their advancement and general well being [6]. In that part of the world, each woman gives birth on average to 5.8 children, 20% of which have low birth weights. Almost half the children under 5 are malnurished, and infant mortality (under 5) is of 147 per 1000 live births, compared to 85 in other developing countries [7].
As far as education goes, the literacy rate is of 29%, but a dismal 15% for women [2], and the country is listed as one of those with the lowest per-child spending on education [8].
Although the country's economy has been devastated by military and political conflict over several years, "Afghanistan has economic potential with considerable mineral wealth in unexploited hydrocarbons and gemstones. Additionally Afghanistan occupies a strategic geographical position as a transit route for Central Asian hydrocarbons to the Arabian Sea." [9]
Assuming a constant GDP in Afghanistan of US $3 billion [3], the money that the U.S. government has authorized to be used against them could effectively double their GDP for 13 straight years. It is true that the U.S. has provided humanitarian and monetary help (about $70 million in 1997) [2], but $40 billion is by far a more significant expense.
This kind of money could multiply their per-year educational spending [9] by 10 for more than six years, or increase their expenditure on health [10] one-hundred-fold for over four years, or buy the totality of their yearly exports (not including opium) [2] 500 times.
The U.S. government is ready to spend this money now, and everything indicates that it will be used to level Afghanistan's already flattened towns and cities. The cash is literally "burning our pockets" and it really could go up in flames... or it could be invested in transforming a society that right now is hopeless and has nothing left to lose.
Forty billion dollars are ready to be spent. Why not do so intelligently? Invest this money in Afghanistan's youth, especially their greatly disadvantaged girls and women. Think of the tremendously positive changes that could happen there if their women could participate more actively in their social, economic and political life. There's compelling evidence showing that a child's wellbeing is strongly associated with the mother's level of education [11]. Their girls [12] shouldn't be "collateral damage".
Others have already proposed some sort of Marshall Plan for Afghanistan [13][14], one in which the U.S. would "feed the starving", and "pour food and materials into the country". This is good, but I think of the old saying: Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day. Teach a man to fish and he will eat for the rest of his life.
This was in fact an attack on the civilized world (as opposed to the so called "Attack on America") and the perpetrators should be brought to justice for sure. These terrorists and their accomplices when captured, should face trial at the International Court of Justice, in The Hague [15] not in the U.S.A. After all, U.S. officials appropriately invoked NATO's Article 5 [16] when they correctly defined this crisis as an attack on all the civilized world.
So let the civilized world handle this crisis the way it should be handled, and I will not give any further opinion on that (at least not here). But also, let the U.S. do another great service to humanity by utilizing this money that has already been set apart to lift a whole country from the ashes. Their religion and system of beliefs is good, Islam does not promote hate, terrorists do. Let's celebrate their culture and even learn from it, while helping to bring Afghanistan under the wing of the international family of civilized nations.