TSR: "Highway #1 is now a
mark of the American mission in crisis."
Monday, September 07, 2009
Length: 3:34
LARGE (41.2 MB)
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Michael is in Kabul and talks to Suzanne
Malveaux about the disputed election results (still
disputed; it is Afghanistan, after all...) and
gives a bit of a preview on his report tonight
about the Kabul-Kandahar road that had been one of
the American success stories but now has fallen to
the Taliban.
SUZANNE
MALVEAUX: Weeks after Afghanistan's elections, there
are growing allegations of fraud and intimidation.
Our CNN's Michael Ware, he's been taking the pulse in
Afghanistan.
He joins us live from Kabul. Michael, we are hearing
reports, lots of reports of suspicious vote totals
and these polling stations, the neatly rounded
numbers in favor of Karzai.
What are people telling you?
MICHAEL WARE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, no one's
really surprised. I mean, hello, Suzanne, it is an
Afghan election. I mean the smoke and mirrors of
these corruption allegations, any vote-rigging that
did or did not go on, to a degree, is kind of
meaningless. What rested on this election wasn't even
the outcome, because as far as the Afghans are
concerned, it's essentially one bunch of crooks for
another bunch of crooks or one bunch of politicians
with their warlord backers versus another bunch of
politicians with their warlord backers. No one
actually expects to be getting electricity or roads
or hospitals in their village any time soon.
So what's important here is the fact that it's
dragging out, that it's become messy. If you could
have stolen the election quickly and clinically,
that, arguably, would have been better than what's
happening now.
This is robbing the election of any hope of
legitimacy that it may have possibly had -- what tiny
shred. And, of course, this blows back on the U.S.
mission. The U.S. mission had very little to gain
from this election. If it went smoothly, it's the
crooks for the crooks. If it went badly -- if there
was violence, if people couldn't vote or if there
was, you know, if it becomes mired in allegations of
corruption, all of which has happened -- then that
does not look very well upon the American mission or
the international mission here, that has supported
this government and these elections -- Suzanne.
MALVEAUX: And, Michael, you have traveled down this
very dangerous highway from Kabul to Kandahar. This
is really the heartland of the Taliban, and Americans
paid hundreds of millions, basically, to repave this.
It was seen largely as a symbol of success.
Is it now a symbol of what's going wrong in the
country?
WARE: Yeah. The Highway 1 is now a mark of the
American mission in crisis. I mean it's just one very
simple symbol of what's going on here in the country.
Now, this is one of the country's major highways --
this Highway 1 linking the capital, Kabul, with the
former imperial capital of Kandahar and the heartland
of the Taliban and the heart of the fight. So it's
vitally important.
Now, I remember when I was living here, that took a
torturous 12 hours to travel. But in 2004, U.S. aid
money saw reconstruction on the road. Bridges were
rebuilt. Asphalt was laid. It became a five or six
hour journey. Now, that journey is back up to nine or
10 hours.
Why? Because it's pockmarked with Taliban land mines
and craters; because the bridges that were built have
been destroyed again; and because the Taliban own
that road -- not America, not the International
Security Assistance Forces, not the Afghan security
forces. There are Taliban checkpoints on the road.
They pull buses over, sift through the passengers and
execute who they don't like.
So for many Afghans, who are now forced to take
flights instead of driving -- flights they can't
afford, that are rarely so late, it's quicker to
drive anyway -- this is the symbol of America's
mission in crisis in Afghanistan -- Suzanne.
MALVEAUX: All right. Michael Ware in the middle of it
all in Afghanistan.
Thank you, Michael.