Taliban regaining hold on Afghanistan, report says

I.
Taliban regaining hold on Afghanistan, report says
CNN Washington D.C.
http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/asiapcf/04/30/terrorism.afghanistan/index.html
April 30, 2008

II.
Recent alarming information has come out of the nations capital regarding the power of the Taliban in the newly stabilized country, Afghanistan. Despite constantly losing troops from suicide bombings and conflict, the Taliban, with the help of Pakistani supporters, have been carrying out more complicated and hostile plans. Kidnappings and terror attacks that have become more effective with better weaponry, have increased greatly between 2006 and 2007 and show no sign of slowing down and actually may speed up as a result of the easy recruiting of Pakistani and al Qaeda extremists. Recently the uniting of Afghanistan under one democratic government by American administrators has been slow but effective. This much debated topic is in serious trouble if these increasingly bold attacks continue to rattle Afghanistan and U.S. officials are worried. U.S. defense secretary, Robert Gates testified before the Senate with a few colleagues stating that they need up to 12,000 more troops to protect Afghanistan, especially the south where the most unease is. This amount of troops will most likely not be sent overseas by NATO (the U.S. alliance that stands for North Atlantic Treaty Organization), who have a total of 25 allies within and have only four of those countries or groups contributing to this fight against terror.

III.
a. This article relates to the AP world history theme impact of interaction among and within major societies because the United States (part of NATO), Afghanistan, and the Taliban are all indeed major societies in the world and have conflicted with each other in recent times. The U.S. helped Afghanistan become a democracy and have continued to protect them from the horrible acts of the Taliban.
b. After the terror attacks on the World Trade Centers in 2001, the United States government sent troops into Iraq and Afghanistan to confront this issue of terrorism coming from the area. American troops have helped Afghanistan rebuild itself slowly into a form of democracy and now the group the U.S. took Afghanistan away from, the Taliban, is becoming stronger and is attacking the country with more force more often which raises the red flag for U.S. officials who have to react and protect what they helped build.
c. Multiple authors contributed to this article, both male and female, who were all American insiders who got their information directly from Washington D.C. from the people who either told or heard what was going on in Afghanistan first-hand.
d. Throughout the article there are subtle hints that show the authors’ points of view, for example when an official said the Taliban was growing bolder, which is normally a good thing, he was actually describing how the attacks from the terror group were becoming more violent and vicious. The authors’ point of view made it seem like the United States is superior to all others involved in some way, big or small.
e. I would need to hear from, although highly unlikely, a member of the Taliban because he could justify the severity of his groups actions and be able to tell me if they are advancing towards more harsh and brutal measures.
f. I believe that after we as a country have invested so many lives and so much money into the growth and protection of Afghanistan up until now that we can’t pull out and just stop our aid for them. We have to protect and ultimately end the progress of such forces as the Taliban in order to have a stable place in Afghanistan.