Afghanistan Blog #7

Although Dr. Vespers talk to us about the short and long-range prognosis was very brief it was filled with a load of information. He told us about the controversies over the expulsion of the Governor of the Kunar province (Said Hyder Akbar’s father), and what the future of Afghanistan should look like. He said that there was a lot of speculation over why he was truly relieved of his duty. In his book Hyder is vague with what he says about his father “leaving” office in Kunar. Hyder makes us think that his father quit because he didn’t have enough support from Kabul (the central government). Despite what Hyder said, Dr. Vesper told us that he was relieved of duty because he was not able to stop or slow the smuggling operations under control, and that he was also suspected of being involved in the smuggling operations. Dr. Vesper also told us about the future of Afghanistan. He said that for Afghanistan to become a stable third world country we would need to be there for at least twenty more years. He says that for a country to support itself it has to have at least one generation of educated workers. He said that sending more troops to Afghanistan wont help except for the fact that it would become slightly more stable.