Imagine life in Afghanistan on Sunday night. You look up into the sky to see fire raining onto the horizon. Bombs explode around you, and there, by your feet, sits a carefully wrapped package. It features an American flag, a picture of a smiling face, and the words "This food is a gift from the United States of America." The so-called "bomb and butter" attack initiated by US-led forces this weekend represents an unprecedented attempt at "humanitarian bombing."
According to the Boston Globe, 37,500 rations were dropped by two American cargo planes in opposition-controlled areas of Afghanistan, well out of reach of the Taliban. Each nutritionally sound ration includes enough food to nourish one person for one day. The effort went so far as to make the rations sensitive to religious beliefs - none include animal products.
The drop also supplied the Afghan people with medicine, including anti-diuretic drugs and antibiotics. It represents only one of many planned humanitarian efforts for Afghanistan by the US government, which hopes to shower the nation with 50,000 tons of food each month. But to do so, the US needs ground access to the country - something that will be virtually impossible during wartime.
The Bush administration hopes to demonstrate to the Afghan people that they are not the targets of US-led attacks against their rulers. On a larger scale, many feel the US is working to solidify Muslim resistance to the current regime.
Humayun Hamidzada, a humanitarian assistance major at Tufts' School of Nutritional Sciences, is an expert on aid projects such as this one. Hamidzada left Afghanistan ten years ago after finishing his undergraduate work; he has family living in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Through his work with the UN, he has been travelling frequently between Afghanistan, Pakistan, and the US.
Hamidzada keeps in touch with his family on a regular basis, but has not been able to telephone since Sunday's bombings. He did, however, receive an e-mail from his family ensuring that they were all right.
"Certainly this is a moment of confusion and distrust - this is not an easy time to be living in Afghanistan," he said.
According to Hamidzada, the Taliban has banned many forms of education, excepting religious training for men. The women of Afghanistan are expected to stay at home. Men must grow beards and wear turbans, and the Taliban has prohibited all forms of entertainment. This includes music and sports of every inclination, "from football to kite-flying."
"We don't have any freedom of expression," Hamidzada said, adding that minorities are specifically targeted by terrorists there.
Through his work with the UN and his collegiate studies, Hamidzada has an edge on understanding such situations.
"My field is purely humanitarian. It doesn't have much to do with politics. It tells you how to manage the design of humanitarian interventions," Hamidzada explained. "Humanitarian assistance is responding to manmade disasters and reaching out to those people who are in need."
However, in his ten years of work in the humanitarian field, Hamidzada said that he has never seen an effort on par with the current US relief mission, and therefore cannot predict its outcome. Because the bombs and foods are coming at the same time, he said, people will not be rushing to the rations.
"How are you going to trust that it's not poisonous?" he asked.
Hamidzada said that the Afghanistan's distrust of US efforts stems in part from deceptive tactics used by the Soviet government following its 1979 invasion of the mountainous country.
Although he recognizes and appreciates the American efforts to assure the Afghans that they are not targets of attack, Hamidzada disagrees with the use of violence at this stage.
"The use of force can jeopardize negotiated settlement," Hamidzada said. "We should let all ethnic groups and people of all political opinions present their opinions. On the military front, we have reached the pinnacle, but I don't see the progress on the political front."
Hamidzada believes that the US is focusing too much effort on dealing with the symptoms of extremism, instead of attacking the "root" of terrorism. He believes the key is gaining the trust of the country's people.
"[The US] should empower the Afghan civilians to make their own decisions and become a part of the international effort to remove the extremists and fanatics that hold power in Afghanistan," Hamidzada said, adding that the will of the Afghan people must determine a new government structure if the Taliban are removed.
But the people need a government structure without interruption, he added. If the US disbanded the Taliban, Hamidzada said, people would try to take the law into their own hands and it would have disastrous results. "Especially in a country [such as Afghanistan] where a lot of people are armed, it could be very dangerous," he said. "That vacuum of power should be filled immediately."
Hamidzada believes Americans can play an active role in the conflict in Afghanistan from home. By voicing their opinions to policy-makers, Hamidzada is certain that US citizens can affect change and assure that the government takes a just course of action. In fact, it is this element of democracy that Hamidzada wants to eventually see in practice in Afghanistan.
The deconstruction of the Taliban is supported by the people of Afghanistan, according to Hamidzada. But he fears that the US is rushing to support the opposition Northern Alliance, and will eventually substitute one evil for another.
"The international community is now trying to support one of the factions in the North - the Northern Alliance - just because they oppose the Taliban," Hamidzada said. But he argues that the Northern Alliance is no better than the Taliban, and that it represents less than ten percent of the Afghan population. Bringing them to power, he believes, would make life for Afghan civilians worse than it is today.
Of course, overpowering the Taliban will not be easy. Hamidzada acknowledges the power and manipulation of the regime.
"The Taliban will try to stop people from leaving their places and going to other countries. They will use them as human shields against further attacks," he said.
But until this war is over, the country cannot move beyond its current state of conflict, and the people of Afghanistan will continue to suffer for the actions of the terrorist regime.
"I'm glad that the president and the secretary of [defense] made it clear that this is not a war against Afghanistan but a war against terrorism. But the people of Afghanistan will only believe that when the US shows this in action, not just in words," Hamdizada said.
