Strider     Magazine

No 3

Bridging the gap 

INNOCENCE HAS A FACE

The sun is still low in the sky as a middle-aged man trudges from his small family home in rural Afghanistan towards the field he used to be proud to call his own. His shoulders are hunched and his head hangs low as he approaches the modest plot of land; sadly there will be precious little work done today. The seed that was hand-sowed several weeks ago still lies atop the parched soil, and the man spends the morning kneeling, praying to Allah to send much-needed rain to the land. This small piece of level ground, nestled amongst the towering mountains of central Afghanistan, is the man’s livelihood. He has no other source of income, and he doesn’t dare ponder how he will feed his family should this crop fail. Of greatest concern to him are his three children. They deserve a better chance in life than he is able to give them, and it frustrates him immensely. As he sits quietly by his barren field, he ponders what their lives could have been like had they been born elsewhere, perhaps in the United States of America or Great Britain. He wishes he could make things better.

An unfamiliar sound off in the distance breaks the man’s train of thought. He looks to the south, squinting in the harsh sunlight, and reassures himself that it is nothing to be concerned about. It is getting louder however, and that does worry him. Whatever is making that noise is airborne and approaching fast. Soon he will be able to see it, but that offers him little comfort. Nervously he gets to his feet.

Suddenly a tomahawk cruise missile comes into view, descending at an alarming rate. In fear he tries to run, but knows that this is the end. The missile impacts less than 10m from where he had been sitting, missing its intended target by over a kilometre. That target lies high on the mountainside behind the field in the form of a cave, where a group of Taliban soldiers have been hiding out for the past fortnight. The soldiers emerge from their cave after hearing the explosion, and decide to flee in anticipation of another attack.

At home the man’s wife has been busy all morning. Looking after three young boys is a tiresome and full-time job, but she does not complain. After feeding them breakfast she sends them outside to play, leaving her free to do housework. The boys have no real toys to play with; three years of drought in the land have ensured that there is no money to spend on such luxuries. Instead they must make do with what they have. The two eldest boys play war games with sticks for rifles and stones for hand grenades, while the youngest flies a plane his Dad made for him out of wood and twine. He holds it at arms length and makes a whooshing sound as he swoops the aircraft low to the ground. Something catches his attention from the corner of his eye and he swings around quickly to see what it is. Excitedly he calls out to his brothers, gesturing madly to look up into the sky. They all stand silent, completely captivated as the long white object rockets past overhead. This fascination turns to fear and confusion in a matter of seconds however as the object slams into the ground, exploding in a huge fireball. The boys know something is horribly wrong when their mother runs from the house in the direction of their Dad’s field, screaming his name over and over again. The youngest drops his plane and starts to cry.

The boys are sitting quietly by the roadside when their Mum is ushered back to her home by caring neighbours. They are concerned for her safety. Under Taliban law she is forbidden to go out in public without her husband by her side, and would face execution if caught away from her home.  She calls the boys inside and sits down with them, too weak herself to stand. Trying to explain to them what has happened at a time when she herself is yet to come to terms with the enormity of their loss, is almost impossible. She struggles to get the words out between fits of uncontrollable sobbing. How do you tell a 3 year-old that he will never see his Dad again? The boy is too young to understand death. The eldest boys understand however, and their grief rapidly becomes overshadowed by anger towards their faceless attacker.

It is the beginning of a new day in the United States, and the daily paper has hit the newsstands. People rush to buy a copy, eager to read the figures from the latest Allied strikes in Afghanistan. The public mood is far more positive now than it was a month ago when the front page was covered with the faces of innocent Americans killed in terrorist attacks. The paper reports that overnight strikes killed 46 people in Afghanistan and destroyed 24 strategic targets associated with the Taliban military and terrorist training camps. The people rejoice; now they are getting results. Payback time has come. There is a common satisfaction that justice is being done.

The paper makes no mention of the Afghan farmer killed by the stray cruise missile. And why should it? His death is merely collateral damage; unfortunate yes, but these things happen when war is waged. There is no need to put his picture in the paper, the people of America are happy for the first time in weeks. Why cause them to question the actions of their leaders at such a time? Give them the figures - the deaths, the strategic targets destroyed – and let the American people rest easy in the knowledge that they are doing the world a favour.

And where in all these figures and statistics is the story of the widow and her children? They weren’t even killed, so there is nothing to report. Sure their situation is far, far worse than the families who lost loved ones in the terrorist attacks in the United States, but printing their heart-wrenching story would only unsettle the American people. It is more appropriate to feature innocent US citizens struck down in their prime and then mention collateral damage as an unavoidable part of the retaliatory war against terrorism. For this poor widow there will be no public fund established, no telethon and no monetary donations. In life innocence has a face, but sometimes its easier to just ignore that face. Sometimes that face doesn’t say what we want it to. Better then to push it to the back of our minds and pretend it doesn’t matter. We have our lives and our freedom, who are we to question the means by which these basic rights are upheld.

As the late afternoon shadows creep across the arid Afghanistan landscape the small group of Taliban soldiers, flushed from their hiding place in the mountains, make their way along the road back to Kabul.  The three boys, now sadly left to survive without their father, sit in silence outside their home.  The soldiers offer them a friendly greeting as they pass by, but the boys are in no mood for smiling.  Inside, their widowed mother goes about preparing dinner, but she has no idea how she will be able to provide for her children in the long term. She isn’t allowed to work as her husband did - Taliban law prohibits this - and even if she could work, who would look after her children? They are too young to be left alone. In despair she collapses on the floor, her whole life torn to pieces by a single stray missile.