Obama's State of the Union and U.S. Foreign Policy Read more: Obama's State of the Union and U.S. Foreign Policy | STRATFOR

By George Friedman

Obama's State of the Union and U.S. Foreign Policy is republished with permission of STRATFOR.

U.S. President Barack Obama will deliver the State of the Union address tonight. The administration has let the media know that the focus of the speech will be on jobs and the economy. Given the strong showing of the Republicans in the last election, and the fact that they have defined domestic issues as the main battleground, Obama’s decision makes political sense. He will likely mention foreign issues and is undoubtedly devoting significant time to them, but the decision not to focus on foreign affairs in his State of the Union address gives the impression that the global situation is under control. Indeed, the Republican focus on domestic matters projects the same sense. Both sides create the danger that the public will be unprepared for some of the international crises that are already quite heated. We have discussed these issues in detail, but it is useful to step back and look at the state of the world for a moment.

Photo taken from Obama's speech in Chicago

Afghanistan

The United States remains the most powerful nation in the world, both in the size of its economy and the size of its military. Nevertheless, it continues to have a singular focus on the region from Iraq to Pakistan. Obama argued during his campaign that President George W. Bush had committed the United States to the wrong war in Iraq and had neglected the important war in Afghanistan. After being elected, Obama continued the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq that began under the Bush administration while increasing troop levels in Afghanistan. He has also committed himself to concluding the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq by the end of this year. Now, it may be that the withdrawal will not be completed on that schedule, but the United States already has insufficient forces in Iraq to shape events very much, and a further drawdown will further degrade this ability. In war, force is not symbolic.

This poses a series of serious problems for the United States. First, the strategic goal of the United States in Afghanistan is to build an Afghan military and security force that can take over from the United States in the coming years, allowing the United States to withdraw from the country. In other words, as in Vietnam, the United States wants to create a pro-American regime with a loyal army to protect American interests in Afghanistan without the presence of U.S. forces. I mention Vietnam because, in essence, this is Richard Nixon’s Vietnamization program applied to Afghanistan. The task is to win the hearts and minds of the people, isolate the guerrillas and use the pro-American segments of the population to buttress the government of Afghan President Hamid Karzai and provide recruits for the military and security forces.

The essential problem with this strategy is that it wants to control the outcome of the war while simultaneously withdrawing from it. For that to happen, the United States must persuade the Afghan people (who are hardly a single, united entity) that committing to the United States is a rational choice when the U.S. goal is to leave. The Afghans must first find the Americans more attractive than the Taliban. Second, they must be prepared to shoulder the substantial risks and burdens the Americans want to abandon. And third, the Afghans must be prepared to engage the Taliban and defeat them or endure the consequences of their own defeat.
Given that there is minimal evidence that the United States is winning hearts and minds in meaningful numbers, the rest of the analysis becomes relatively unimportant. But the point is that NATO has nearly 150,000 troops fighting in Afghanistan, the U.S. president has pledged to begin withdrawals this year, beginning in July, and all the Taliban have to do is not lose in order to win. There does not have to be a defining, critical moment for the United States to face defeat. Rather, the defeat lurks in the extended inability to force the Taliban to halt operations and in the limits on the amount of force available to the United States to throw into the war. The United States can fight as long as it chooses. It has that much power. What it seems to lack is the power to force the enemy to capitulate.

Iraq

In the meantime, the wrong war, Iraq, shows signs of crisis or, more precisely, crisis in the context of Iran. The United States is committed to withdrawing its forces from Iraq by the end of 2011. This has two immediate consequences. First, it increases Iranian influence in Iraq simply by creating a vacuum the Iraqis themselves cannot fill. Second, it escalates Iranian regional power. The withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq without a strong Iraqi government and military will create a crisis of confidence on the Arabian Peninsula. The Saudis, in particular, unable to match Iranian power and doubtful of American will to resist Iran, will be increasingly pressured, out of necessity, to find a political accommodation with Iran. The Iranians do not have to invade anyone to change the regional balance of power decisively.

In the extreme, but not unimaginable, case that Iran turns Iraq into a satellite, Iranian power would be brought to the borders of Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Syria and would extend Iran’s border with Turkey. Certainly, the United States could deal with Iran, but having completed its withdrawal from Iraq, it is difficult to imagine the United States rushing forces back in. Given the U.S. commitment to Afghanistan, it is difficult to see what ground forces would be available.

The withdrawal from Iraq creates a major crisis in 2011. If it is completed, Iran’s power will be enhanced. If it is aborted, the United States will have roughly 50,000 troops, most in training and support modes and few deployed in a combat mode, and the decision of whether to resume combat will be in the hands of the Iranians and their Iraqi surrogates. Since 170,000 troops were insufficient to pacify Iraq in the first place, sending in more troops makes little sense. As in Afghanistan, the U.S. has limited ground forces in reserve. It can build a force that blocks Iran militarily, but it will also be a force vulnerable to insurgent tactics — a force deployed without a terminal date, possibly absorbing casualties from Iranian-backed forces.

Iran

If the United States is prepared to complete the withdrawal of troops from Iraq in 2011, it must deal with Iran prior to the withdrawal. The two choices are a massive air campaign to attempt to cripple Iran or a negotiated understanding with Iran. The former involves profound intelligence uncertainties and might fail, while the latter might not be attractive to the Iranians. They are quite content seeing the United States leave. The reason the Iranians are so intransigent is not that they are crazy. It is that they think they hold all the cards and that time is on their side. The nuclear issue is hardly what concerns them.

The difference between Afghanistan and Iraq is that a wrenching crisis can be averted in Afghanistan simply by continuing to do what the United States is already doing. By continuing to do what it is doing in Iraq, the United States inevitably heads into a crisis as the troop level is drawn down.
Obama’s strategy appears to be to continue to carry out operations in Afghanistan, continue to withdraw from Iraq and attempt to deal with Iran through sanctions. This is an attractive strategy if it works. But the argument I am making is that the Afghan strategy can avoid collapse but not with a high probability of success. I am also extremely dubious that sanctions will force a change of course in Iran. For one thing, their effectiveness depends on the actual cooperation of Russia and China (as well as the Europeans). Sufficient exceptions have been given by the Obama administration to American companies doing business with Iran that others will feel free to act in their own self-interest.
But more than that, sanctions can unify a country. The expectations that some had about the Green Revolution of 2009 have been smashed, or at least should have been. We doubt that there is massive unhappiness with the regime waiting to explode, and we see no signs that the regime can’t cope with existing threats. The sanctions even provide Iran with cover for economic austerity while labeling resistance unpatriotic. As I have argued before, sanctions are an alternative to a solution, making it appear that something is being done when in fact nothing is happening.
There are numerous other issues Obama could address, ranging from Israel to Mexico to Russia. But, in a way, there is no point. Until the United States frees up forces and bandwidth and reduces the dangers in the war zones, it will lack the resources — intellectual and material — to deal with these other countries. It is impossible to be the single global power and focus only on one region, yet it is also impossible to focus on the world while most of the fires are burning in a single region. This, more than any other reason, is why Obama must conclude these conflicts, or at least create a situation where these conflicts exist in the broader context of American interests. There are multiple solutions, all with significant risks. Standing pat is the riskiest.

Domestic Issues

There is a parallel between Obama’s foreign policy problems and his domestic policy problems. Domestically, Obama is trapped by the financial crisis and the resulting economic problems, particularly unemployment. He cannot deal with other issues until he deals with that one. There are a host of foreign policy issues, including the broader question of the general approach Obama wants to take toward the world. The United States is involved in two wars with an incipient crisis in Iran. Nothing else can be addressed until those wars are dealt with.
The decision to focus on domestic issues makes political sense. It also makes sense in a broader way. Obama does not yet have a coherent strategy stretching from Iraq to Afghanistan. Certainly, he inherited the wars, but they are now his. The Afghan war has no clear endpoint, while the Iraq war does have a clear endpoint — but it is one that is enormously dangerous.
It is unlikely that he will be able to avoid some major foreign policy decisions in the coming year. It is also unlikely that he has a clear path. There are no clear paths, and he is going to have to hack his way to solutions. But the current situation does not easily extend past this year, particularly in Iraq and Iran, and they both require decisions. Presidents prefer not making decisions, and Obama has followed that tradition. Presidents understand that most problems in foreign affairs take care of themselves. But some of the most important ones don’t. The Iraq-Iran issue is, I think, one of those, and given the reduction of U.S. troops in 2011, this is the year decisions will have to be made.

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Mατωμένα σύνορα : Πως θα φαινόταν μιά καλύτερη Μέση Ανατολή

Σκέψεις ενός (ακραίου?) εκπροσώπου της Αμερικανικς ρεαλπολιτίκ γιά ξαναμοίρασμα των οικοπέδων στην Μέση Ανατολή, από Τουρκία μέχρι το Πακιστάν...μας αφορά άμεσα!

Blood borders: How a better Middle East would look

By Ralph Peters
http://www.armedforcesjournal.com/2006/06/1833899/

International borders are never completely just. But the degree of injustice they inflict upon those whom frontiers force together or separate makes an enormous difference — often the difference between freedom and oppression, tolerance and atrocity, the rule of law and terrorism, or even peace and war.

The most arbitrary and distorted borders in the world are in Africa and the Middle East. Drawn by self-interested Europeans (who have had sufficient trouble defining their own frontiers), Africa’s borders continue to provoke the deaths of millions of local inhabitants. But the unjust borders in the Middle East — to borrow from Churchill — generate more trouble than can be consumed locally.

While the Middle East has far more problems than dysfunctional borders alone — from cultural stagnation through scandalous inequality to deadly religious extremism — the greatest taboo in striving to understand the region’s comprehensive failure isn’t Islam but the awful-but-sacrosanct international boundaries worshiped by our own diplomats.

Of course, no adjustment of borders, however draconian, could make every minority in the Middle East happy. In some instances, ethnic and religious groups live intermingled and have intermarried. Elsewhere, reunions based on blood or belief might not prove quite as joyous as their current proponents expect. The boundaries projected in the maps accompanying this article redress the wrongs suffered by the most significant “cheated” population groups, such as the Kurds, Baluch and Arab Shia, but still fail to account adequately for Middle Eastern Christians, Bahais, Ismailis, Naqshbandis and many another numerically lesser minorities. And one haunting wrong can never be redressed with a reward of territory: the genocide perpetrated against the Armenians by the dying Ottoman Empire.

Yet, for all the injustices the borders re-imagined here leave unaddressed, without such major boundary revisions, we shall never see a more peaceful Middle East.

Even those who abhor the topic of altering borders would be well-served to engage in an exercise that attempts to conceive a fairer, if still imperfect, amendment of national boundaries between the Bosporus and the Indus. Accepting that international statecraft has never developed effective tools — short of war — for readjusting faulty borders, a mental effort to grasp the Middle East’s “organic” frontiers nonetheless helps us understand the extent of the difficulties we face and will continue to face. We are dealing with colossal, man-made deformities that will not stop generating hatred and violence until they are corrected.

As for those who refuse to “think the unthinkable,” declaring that boundaries must not change and that’s that, it pays to remember that boundaries have never stopped changing through the centuries. Borders have never been static, and many frontiers, from Congo through Kosovo to the Caucasus, are changing even now (as ambassadors and special representatives avert their eyes to study the shine on their wingtips).

Oh, and one other dirty little secret from 5,000 years of history: Ethnic cleansing works.

Begin with the border issue most sensitive to American readers: For Israel to have any hope of living in reasonable peace with its neighbors, it will have to return to its pre-1967 borders — with essential local adjustments for legitimate security concerns. But the issue of the territories surrounding Jerusalem, a city stained with thousands of years of blood, may prove intractable beyond our lifetimes. Where all parties have turned their god into a real-estate tycoon, literal turf battles have a tenacity unrivaled by mere greed for oil wealth or ethnic squabbles. So let us set aside this single overstudied issue and turn to those that are studiously ignored.

The most glaring injustice in the notoriously unjust lands between the Balkan Mountains and the Himalayas is the absence of an independent Kurdish state. There are between 27 million and 36 million Kurds living in contiguous regions in the Middle East (the figures are imprecise because no state has ever allowed an honest census). Greater than the population of present-day Iraq, even the lower figure makes the Kurds the world’s largest ethnic group without a state of its own. Worse, Kurds have been oppressed by every government controlling the hills and mountains where they’ve lived since Xenophon’s day.

The U.S. and its coalition partners missed a glorious chance to begin to correct this injustice after Baghdad’s fall. A Frankenstein’s monster of a state sewn together from ill-fitting parts, Iraq should have been divided into three smaller states immediately. We failed from cowardice and lack of vision, bullying Iraq’s Kurds into supporting the new Iraqi government — which they do wistfully as a quid pro quo for our good will. But were a free plebiscite to be held, make no mistake: Nearly 100 percent of Iraq’s Kurds would vote for independence.

As would the long-suffering Kurds of Turkey, who have endured decades of violent military oppression and a decades-long demotion to “mountain Turks” in an effort to eradicate their identity. While the Kurdish plight at Ankara’s hands has eased somewhat over the past decade, the repression recently intensified again and the eastern fifth of Turkey should be viewed as occupied territory. As for the Kurds of Syria and Iran, they, too, would rush to join an independent Kurdistan if they could. The refusal by the world’s legitimate democracies to champion Kurdish independence is a human-rights sin of omission far worse than the clumsy, minor sins of commission that routinely excite our media. And by the way: A Free Kurdistan, stretching from Diyarbakir through Tabriz, would be the most pro-Western state between Bulgaria and Japan.

A just alignment in the region would leave Iraq’s three Sunni-majority provinces as a truncated state that might eventually choose to unify with a Syria that loses its littoral to a Mediterranean-oriented Greater Lebanon: Phoenecia reborn. The Shia south of old Iraq would form the basis of an Arab Shia State rimming much of the Persian Gulf. Jordan would retain its current territory, with some southward expansion at Saudi expense. For its part, the unnatural state of Saudi Arabia would suffer as great a dismantling as Pakistan.

A root cause of the broad stagnation in the Muslim world is the Saudi royal family’s treatment of Mecca and Medina as their fiefdom. With Islam’s holiest shrines under the police-state control of one of the world’s most bigoted and oppressive regimes — a regime that commands vast, unearned oil wealth — the Saudis have been able to project their Wahhabi vision of a disciplinarian, intolerant faith far beyond their borders. The rise of the Saudis to wealth and, consequently, influence has been the worst thing to happen to the Muslim world as a whole since the time of the Prophet, and the worst thing to happen to Arabs since the Ottoman (if not the Mongol) conquest.

While non-Muslims could not effect a change in the control of Islam’s holy cities, imagine how much healthier the Muslim world might become were Mecca and Medina ruled by a rotating council representative of the world’s major Muslim schools and movements in an Islamic Sacred State — a sort of Muslim super-Vatican — where the future of a great faith might be debated rather than merely decreed. True justice — which we might not like — would also give Saudi Arabia’s coastal oil fields to the Shia Arabs who populate that subregion, while a southeastern quadrant would go to Yemen. Confined to a rump Saudi Homelands Independent Territory around Riyadh, the House of Saud would be capable of far less mischief toward Islam and the world.

Iran, a state with madcap boundaries, would lose a great deal of territory to Unified Azerbaijan, Free Kurdistan, the Arab Shia State and Free Baluchistan, but would gain the provinces around Herat in today’s Afghanistan — a region with a historical and linguistic affinity for Persia. Iran would, in effect, become an ethnic Persian state again, with the most difficult question being whether or not it should keep the port of Bandar Abbas or surrender it to the Arab Shia State.

What Afghanistan would lose to Persia in the west, it would gain in the east, as Pakistan’s Northwest Frontier tribes would be reunited with their Afghan brethren (the point of this exercise is not to draw maps as we would like them but as local populations would prefer them). Pakistan, another unnatural state, would also lose its Baluch territory to Free Baluchistan. The remaining “natural” Pakistan would lie entirely east of the Indus, except for a westward spur near Karachi.

The city-states of the United Arab Emirates would have a mixed fate — as they probably will in reality. Some might be incorporated in the Arab Shia State ringing much of the Persian Gulf (a state more likely to evolve as a counterbalance to, rather than an ally of, Persian Iran). Since all puritanical cultures are hypocritical, Dubai, of necessity, would be allowed to retain its playground status for rich debauchees. Kuwait would remain within its current borders, as would Oman.

In each case, this hypothetical redrawing of boundaries reflects ethnic affinities and religious communalism — in some cases, both. Of course, if we could wave a magic wand and amend the borders under discussion, we would certainly prefer to do so selectively. Yet, studying the revised map, in contrast to the map illustrating today’s boundaries, offers some sense of the great wrongs borders drawn by Frenchmen and Englishmen in the 20th century did to a region struggling to emerge from the humiliations and defeats of the 19th century.

Correcting borders to reflect the will of the people may be impossible. For now. But given time — and the inevitable attendant bloodshed — new and natural borders will emerge. Babylon has fallen more than once.

Meanwhile, our men and women in uniform will continue to fight for security from terrorism, for the prospect of democracy and for access to oil supplies in a region that is destined to fight itself. The current human divisions and forced unions between Ankara and Karachi, taken together with the region’s self-inflicted woes, form as perfect a breeding ground for religious extremism, a culture of blame and the recruitment of terrorists as anyone could design. Where men and women look ruefully at their borders, they look enthusiastically for enemies.

From the world’s oversupply of terrorists to its paucity of energy supplies, the current deformations of the Middle East promise a worsening, not an improving, situation. In a region where only the worst aspects of nationalism ever took hold and where the most debased aspects of religion threaten to dominate a disappointed faith, the U.S., its allies and, above all, our armed forces can look for crises without end. While Iraq may provide a counterexample of hope — if we do not quit its soil prematurely — the rest of this vast region offers worsening problems on almost every front.

If the borders of the greater Middle East cannot be amended to reflect the natural ties of blood and faith, we may take it as an article of faith that a portion of the bloodshed in the region will continue to be our own.

• • •

WHO WINS, WHO LOSES

Winners —

Afghanistan

Arab Shia State

Armenia

Azerbaijan

Free Baluchistan

Free Kurdistan

Iran

Islamic Sacred State

Jordan

Lebanon

Yemen

•

Losers —

Afghanistan

Iran

Iraq

Israel

Kuwait

Pakistan

Qatar

Saudi Arabia

Syria

Turkey

United Arab Emirates

West Bank

Ο (Ελληνιστικός) πολιτιστικός πλούτος του Αφγανιστάν

ΚΑΘΗΜΕΡΙΝΗ - ΠOΛITIΣMOΣ
Hμερομηνία δημοσίευσης: 27-06-10


Της Μαριας Pηγουτσου
http://news.kathimerini.gr/4dcgi/_w_articles_civ_1_27/06/2010_405751

Λεπτοδουλεμένα διαδήματα, απεικονίσεις της Αφροδίτης, του Διόνυσου και της Αριάδνης σε αριστοτεχνικά σμιλεμένα χρυσά βραχιόλια και δαχτυλίδια, δράκοι που στρογγυλοκάθονται σε λεπτούτσικα σκουλαρίκια, χτένες από πολύτιμο ελεφαντόδοντο, είναι κάποια μόνο από τα εντυπωσιακά εκθέματα που απλώνονται σε μια σκοτεινή, φειδωλά φωτισμένη αίθουσα του Μουσείου Τέχνης της Ομοσπονδιακής Γερμανίας στη Βόννη. Πρόκειται για ένα μικρό τμήμα από τους θησαυρούς που έφερε στο φως η ανασκαφική ομάδα υπό τον ελληνικής καταγωγής αρχαιολόγο Βίκτορα Σαρηγιαννίδη. Ο γεννημένος το 1929 στην Τασκένδη επιστήμονας ανακάλυψε μια βασιλική νεκρόπολη στην πόλη Τιλία Τεπέ του Αφγανιστάν και έφερε στο φως 20.000 χρυσά αντικείμενα. Πρόκειται για μια ανακάλυψη, η οποία θεωρείται από πολλούς ως η σημαντικότερη αρχαιολογική ανακάλυψη του 20ού αιώνα.

«Οι θησαυροί που σώθηκαν» είναι ο τίτλος της έκθεσης, που φιλοξενεί μέχρι τις 3 Οκτωβρίου το γερμανικό μουσείο. Πρόκειται για σπάνιους καλλιτεχνικούς θησαυρούς που κατάφεραν να γλιτώσουν οι συνεργάτες του Εθνικού Μουσείου της Καμπούλ από τα χέρια των Σοβιετικών και των Ταλιμπάν.

230 αντικείμενα παρουσιάζονται σε οχτώ ειδικά διαμορφωμένες σκοτεινές και φωτεινές αίθουσες. Οι σκοτεινές αίθουσες φιλοξενούν τα πολύτιμα εκθέματα από τέσσερις πόλεις του Αφγανιστάν όπου έγιναν ανασκαφές: τις Τέπε Φουλόλ, Αϊ Κανούμ, Τιλία Τεπέ και Μπεγκράμ. Οι φωτεινές αίθουσες φιλοξενούν τεράστιες οθόνες αφής με τη βοήθεια των οποίων ο επισκέπτης μπορεί να πάρει πληροφορίες για τη μακραίωνη ιστορία της χώρας, τις ανασκαφές και τα εκθέματα.

Κίονες, αγαλματίδια, αγγεία, γυάλινα σκεύη, πολύτιμα κοσμήματα μαρτυρούν πως κάποτε η περιοχή ήταν ένα μεγάλο σταυροδρόμι πολιτισμών, όπου ενώνονταν οι δρόμοι του μεταξιού, εκτεινόταν από τη βόρεια Ινδία μέχρι την κεντρική Ασία και ο Μέγας Αλέξανδρος είχε αφήσει ανεξίτηλη τη σφραγίδα του.

Οι πολύτιμοι θησαυροί κατάφεραν σε μεγάλο βαθμό να σωθούν χάρη στην εχεμύθεια των συνεργατών του Εθνικού Μουσείου της Καμπουλ. Ενός μουσείου το οποίο ιδρύθηκε το 1922 και το οποίο κάποτε διέθετε περί τις 100.000 εκθέματα. Η σοβιετική εισβολή στο Αφγανιστάν το 1979 κατέστρεψε ένα μεγάλο μέρος των υποδομών. Ενα χρόνο πριν από την αποχώρηση των Σοβιετικών, το 1989, επικρατούσε στη χώρα ένα πολιτικό χάος το οποίο ευνόησε την άνοδο των μουτζαχεντίν το 1992. Τα χρόνια εκείνα, οι κλοπές, οι λεηλασίες και οι καταστροφές πολιτιστικών αγαθών ήταν καθημερινότητα. Το 2001, οι Ταλιμπάν αποφάσισαν να καταστρέψουν όλα τα αγάλματα του Εθνικού Μουσείου της Καμπούλ και περίπου 2.000 κομμάτια αφανίστηκαν. Η προνοητικότητα και η εχεμύθεια των συνεργατών του Εθνικού Μουσείου κατάφεραν να σώσουν ένα κομμάτι της πολιτιστικής κληρονομιάς της χώρας. Το 1988 είχαν μεταφέρει στο θησαυροφυλάκιο της κεντρικής τράπεζας, το οποίο βρισκόταν στα υπόγεια του προεδρικού μεγάρου, σημαντικά κομμάτια. Οταν οι πολιτικοί προϊστάμενοι ρωτούσαν τους συνεργάτες του μουσείου πού πήγαν οι αρχαιολογικοί θησαυροί και κυρίως τα κοσμήματα, εκείνοι απαντούσαν πως εκλάπησαν πιθανότατα για να τα λιώσουν και να τα πουλήσουν. Μια πολύ αληθοφανής και πιστευτή απάντηση, αφού στην πράξη έτσι γινόταν.

Μόλις το 2004 η κυβέρνηση στην Καμπούλ παραδέχθηκε ότι οι πολύτιμοι θησαυροί δεν είχαν χαθεί και με διεθνή υποστήριξη στάθηκε δυνατόν από το 2006 να παρουσιαστούν κατ’ αρχάς στο Παρίσι και στη συνέχεια στο Τορίνο, το Αμστερνταμ, στην Ουάσιγκτον, στο Σαν Φραντσίσκο, το Χιούστον και στην Οτάβα.

Εκθέματα εντυπωσιακά, τα οποία «στόχο έχουν να δείξουν πως το Αφγανιστάν δεν είναι μόνο μια χώρα φτωχή όπου γίνονται πόλεμοι και δρουν οι Ταλιμπάν», όπως μας είπε σε άπταιστα ελληνικά ο κ. Ομάρ Σουλτάν, υφυπουργός Πολιτισμού. Ο ίδιος σπούδασε αρχαιολογία στη Θεσσαλονίκη με καθηγητή τον Μανόλη Ανδρόνικο και όπως μας επισημαίνει, σε όποια αίθουσα της έκθεσης κι αν στρέψεις το βλέμμα σου, θα συναντήσεις την Ελλάδα. Ο κ. Σουλτάν μάς λέει πως είναι πολύ υπερήφανος που τόσο πολλά αρχαιολογικά ευρήματα, που έλκουν την καταγωγή τους από την Ελλάδα, βρίσκονται στην πατρίδα του. «Η παρουσία της Ελλάδας ξεκίνησε με τον Μέγα Αλέξανδρο στο Αφγανιστάν. Σε όποια αίθουσα και να πάτε θα δείτε την Ελλάδα. Και πρώτα από όλα στην πόλη Αϊ Κανούμ, είναι η Αλεξάνδρεια επί του Ωξου. Αν πάτε εκεί, θα νομίζετε ότι είστε στην Ελλάδα», μας λέει ο υφυπουργός Πολιτισμού.

Ο κ. Σουλτάν ελπίζει η ελληνική κυβέρνηση να προσκαλέσει την έκθεση και δεν παραλείπει να ευχαριστήσει την Ελλάδα για τη συμβολή της στη διάσωση του Εθνικού Μουσείου της Καμπούλ. «Η Ελλάδα μάς βοήθησε, όταν ήταν υπουργός Πολιτισμού ο κ. Βενιζέλος. Μας έδωσε 750.000 δολάρια και φτιάξαμε το μουσείο. Επίσης το Αριστοτέλειο Πανεπιστήμιο –εκεί όπου εγώ σπούδασα– μας δίνει υποτροφίες. Εχουμε οχτώ φοιτητές που σπουδάζουν αρχαιολογία», τονίζει ο κ. Σουλτάν.

Η έκθεση και η αποστολή

Η έκθεση για τους θησαυρούς που σώθηκαν στο Αφγανιστάν έχει και μια ιδιαίτερη σημασία για τη Γερμανία. Το τελευταίο διάστημα υπάρχει στη χώρα μια μεγάλη συζήτηση για το εάν και πόσο η γερμανική στρατιωτική αποστολή θα πρέπει να παραμείνει στο Αφγανιστάν. Πρόκειται για τη μεγαλύτερη γερμανική στρατιωτική αποστολή στο εξωτερικό μετά τον B΄ Παγκόσμιο Πόλεμο και η κοινή γνώμη είναι ιδιαίτερα ευαίσθητη στο θέμα. Η κυβέρνηση προσπαθεί να πείσει με κάθε τρόπο πως η γερμανική στρατιωτική παρουσία είναι απαραίτητη. Ο Ρόμπερτ Φλεκ, διευθυντής του μουσείου στη Βόννη, είναι πάντως σαφής και θέλει να τονίσει, όπως μας λέει, πως τα κριτήρια της έκθεσης είναι καθαρά καλλιτεχνικά και ουδόλως πολιτικά. Στόχος της έκθεσης είναι να παρουσιάσει τα πολύτιμα αρχαιολογικά ευρήματα και να καταδείξει πως αυτή η τόσο μακρινή για μας χώρα ήταν κάποτε στο επίκεντρο ενός πολιτισμού και ενός κόσμου που γνώριζε μεγάλη άνθηση.

Η έκθεση, η οποία θα παραμείνει στη Βόννη μέχρι τον Οκτώβριο, είναι άγνωστο εάν και πότε θα επιστρέψει στην Καμπούλ, λόγω των επικίνδυνων συνθηκών που συνεχίζουν να επικρατούν.