Spare the Afghan people
Although certainly not unexpected, the combined American- British air and missile attack on targets inside Afghanistan nevertheless came as a shock to many people around the world. After all, nearly four weeks have passed since the September 11 terrorist attacks in New York and Washington with little more happening than a U.S. and British military buildup in areas around the South Asian subcontinent. It had looked as if the prospect of a peaceful resolution, however distant, was still possible.
Unfortunately, that was not to be. On Sunday night at around 9:00 p.m. (16:30 GMT), as residents in the Afghan cities of Kabul, Kandahar and Jalalabad were getting ready for their night's sleep, the first wave of attack planes and bombers roared in to unleash the first stage of the long-expected retaliation to the September 11 suicide attacks in the U.S. No less than 25 strike aircraft, 15 long-range bombers and cruise missiles were involved in this attack.
That was the first stage of what American officials in Washington have said is going to be an ongoing operation. The aim, to quote U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, is to cripple the Taliban's air defenses and "to remove threats to U.S. military forces from Taliban defenses and alter the military balance in Afghanistan by denying to the Taliban the offensive systems that hamper the progress of the various opposition forces".
Television viewers around the world, who are certainly familiar with the kind of precision bombing as was practiced in 1991 during the Gulf War against Iraq, may take some comfort in the knowledge that in this kind of operation the bombs or missiles are guided with deadly precision by satellite towards their targets. And surely the technology must have been perfected during the intervening years. That, at least, would avoid taking unnecessary casualties among innocent civilians.
Nevertheless, casualties cannot entirely be prevented. Although precise figures are hard to obtain, according to Taliban officials in Kandahar, at least two people were killed in the air and missile attacks and at least four others were injured in this southern Afghan city. Earlier, the Afghan Islamic Press reported that more than 20 people were killed around Kabul. The Taliban's Voice of Shariat radio, on the other hand, said that no material damage or casualties occurred in Kabul.
Whatever the case may be, we most deeply regret the fact that the United States and its allies have ultimately deemed it necessary, or appropriate, to unilaterally use military force against the Taliban in Afghanistan. The official Indonesian position has always been that, although this country supports the U.S. in its fight against terrorism, any action one sovereign country takes against another must be done under the aegis of the United Nations. It would also have been prudent for the U.S. government to share the "evidence" confirming Osama bin Laden's guilt it says it possesses with governments that support its stance against terrorism, such as Indonesia. This it has failed to do.
At this point, however, all this is water under the bridge as far as Indonesia is concerned. The more important thing for Indonesians to do at this stage is to watch out for any severe backlashes caused by the American-British attack on Afghanistan. Whatever the reactions here may be, they must not be allowed to push the nation back to the brink of economic disaster. Too much is at stake for the millions of Indonesians who have been deprived by the current economic crisis of their right to a proper income and employment and to proper health care and education for their children.
Had the U.S. and its allies sought the consent of the UN Security Council beforehand they would have been in a much stronger position to carry out their strikes.