Two Washington witnesses reported on meetings of foreign villagers hostile toward US programs to improve their communities. Both villages eventually supported the programs. One witness believes support will evaporate and the other believes support will continue. I think they’re both right. 

   One witness is Steve Tupper, a Viet Nam veteran and former Washington legislator. Until February, 2010 he worked for an NGO contracted to build strategic provincial roads in Afghanistan as the third tactic in NATO’s clear, hold and build strategy. He was chief of public relations charged with winning local support. Tupper describes a meeting where an Afghani provincial official encouraged villagers to support road building.

   Villagers complained, “Those are your roads, not ours.” Since construction started 2 years ago, Taliban attacks have killed over 60 workers causing bulldozers to sit idle for several days while villagers mourn. The official convinced villagers that Americans were preferable foreigners compared to Iranians, Indians, and Russians. Tupper wrote,” I think most are merely sitting on the sidelines, accumulating as much money as possible while it flows, and then see who is still sticking around a decade from now.” 

   NATO can’t last a decade. Its Afghanistan enemy is funded by drug traffic, Al Queda fund raising and aid from nations like Iran. These sources appear sustainable and are strategically applied to maim military and community programs that are far more expensive. Financial and fiscal problems in NATO and the US will ultimately doom our current approach. Better methods are needed that block money flows, destroy Al Queda terrorist operations and punish nations that offer support.

   Contrast the Afghani village meeting with one described by Sue Rose, retired banker and former Wenatchee Rotary president. In February 2010 she rode with other US citizens over dirt roads to deliver the first textbooks ever used in a mountaintop village in Guatemala. The textbooks are donated to schools in indigenous villages through the Guatemala Literacy Program after parents agree to pay into a fund for five years to replace the textbooks.  Rose said the presentation was delayed an hour because opponents of the textbooks demanded a meeting to reconsider.  

   Opponents feared Spanish textbooks threatened their village dialect and way of life. Suspicion lingers from a civil war between indigenous insurgents assisted by communist nations such as Cuba on one side, and government forces assisted by US supplied weapons from the Iran-Contra scandal on the other. A UN investigation labeled the conflict genocide since 95 percent of 200,000 deaths were unarmed villagers attacked by government forces. Civilian elections ended the war in 1986 and all sides signed a UN peace agreement in 1996, but distrust and lawlessness still exist. Rose’s group was escorted by armed guards because bandits operate along remote roads.

   GLP representatives won over villagers by explaining once again that the voluntary program includes teacher training and support for five years. After GLP’s effort over the last decade, 193 schools pay for textbooks and 43 schools operate self-funding computer centers. Rose said, “The whole village turned out as we delivered the textbooks. It was marvelous.”

   When Karen and I accompanied a textbook delivery, the chief who received the textbooks told everyone he remembered when people gave them guns and said their safety was in the guns. “Today we are given books and told our future lies in these books. We believe in these books.”

   The GLP approach to gaining village support is similar to one described in Three Cups of Tea, co-authored by Greg Mortenson. His Central Asian Institute’s program has built more than 50 schools at the invitation of local villages in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Ahmed Rashid, best selling author of Taliban: Militant Islam and Oil in Central Asia said, “The work Mortenson is doing, providing the poorest students with a balanced education, is making them much more difficult for the extremist madrassas to recruit.”

    We Clear Skies villagers build communities with nonviolent methods that are sustainable, economical and spiritual. We need to support similar approaches for US programs in foreign villages.