"This war can be won only the People of Afghanistan"

Previous
Left arrow key Next
Right arrow key Close
Gen. Abdul Rashid Dostum disambur rousing thousands of supporters at the stadium of Kabul in 2004. Dostum believes that the victory of the Afghan war will be won by the people of Afghanistan. (News CAIRO)

Gen. Abdul Rashid Dostum disambur rousing thousands of supporters at the stadium of Kabul in 2004. Dostum believes that the victory of the Afghan war will be won by the people of Afghanistan. (News CAIRO)
jenderal_abdul_rashid_13

* Previously
* 1 of 2
* Next

KABUL (Reuters CAIRO) - General Abdul Rashid Dostum, a former Afghan warlord who controversially, warned Washington that sending more U.S. troops into Afghanistan would only hinder the war against the Taliban.

Only a solution that was led by Afghans who can bring victory, he believes.

His comments in an interview with The Daily Telegraph was made when U.S. Ambassador to Kabul, Gen. Karl Eikenberry, warns Obama not to send thousands of U.S. troops to prop up the regime of President Hamid Karzai.

General Dostum, an ethnic Uzbek, was a military leader in the center of the Northern Alliance that pushed the Taliban from Kabul in 2001.

He believes that past success is based on the Afghan-led troops are fighting for their own future families. Today, he said, the number of senior Afghan military casualties were ignored because of U.S. and NATO commanders said the shot.

"The failure of the Afghan army is a matter of commitment and passion for work: the more foreign and Afghan forces less way to see that this war belongs to them," he said. "In the last six years, I have not heard from one of the Afghan officials at the rank captain or other major ratings were killed in the fighting.

"During this same period hundreds of U.S. and other NATO troops have been killed. This is a big disgrace for the government of Afghanistan and its people.

He said the Afghan military leadership has become too dependent on Western powers, placing the U.S. and NATO personnel at greater risk.

General Dostum remains influential in Afghanistan, its support to help President Karzai was re-elected earlier this month, though in the midst of allegations of violations of human rights.

He was blamed for the death lemasnya around 300 Taliban prisoners when they are being transported from prison.

Since then, he was sacked as the supreme commander of the Armed Forces chief of staff to Afghanistan last year after his bodyguards kidnap a rival ethnic leader, an accused drug dealer, but has been restored.

He believes Western leaders erroneously thought that the Taliban could be persuaded of the leadership of Mullah Omar.

Western pressure for centralization of power in Kabul exclude local people from the key promises and billions of dollars in aid. It enriches the political elite but failed to reduce poverty, while the weakening of local initiatives, he said.

He said the West had also misunderstood the role of commander in the war-torn Afghan society. "Are all bad commanders, even those who fight against the Taliban and al-Qaeda and has been stripped? They demanded a unicorn in Kabul."

Unlike the UK and U.S. strategists, who supports the political "reconciliation" with "non-ideological" Taliban, General Dostum believes military victory was possible.

Abdul Rashid Dostum (born 1954) was a powerful warlord in Afghanistan.

Dostum was born in Khvajeh Do Kuh, Afghanistan. In 1970 he began working for gas filling in Sheberghan, Jowzjan Province. He joined the Afghan army in 1978, against the mujahideen in Afghanistan in 1980. He fought in a coalition with Ahmad Shah Massoud against Gulbuddin Hekmatyar in 1992. The Taliban seized Kabul in 1996, forcing Dostum to retreat into Mazar-i-Sharif. When his troops joined the Taliban in 1997, Dostum left Afghanistan and went to Turkey.

Dostum has served as deputy secretary of defense for Mr. Karzai in the national government in Kabul. In March 2003, Dostum established the North Zone of Afghanistan, against the will of interim president Hamid Karzai. On May 20, 2003, after nearly hit by an attempted assassination, Dostum held the position of "Chief of Staff to Commander of the Armed Forces of Afghanistan".

On March 1, 2005 President Hamid Karzai appointed him as Chief of Staff for Commander, although it is unclear whether this position has a real strength.