Why aren't we helping them?

[classical_hero]

Link to video.

The situation is that situation with translator in both Iraq and Afghanistan are being held up in bureaucracy madness when they should be helped to get out of the mess for the help they did in saving lives.

 

[JollyRoger]

there a 109 verses in various Muslim holy books that advocate violence against those who aren't Muslim. http://www.thereligionofpeace.com/quran/023-violence.htm
If you want to verify them you can just go here and look up each one. http://www.usc.edu/org/cmje/religious-texts/home/ So clearly Islam is a peaceful religion.

You want easy immigration for those who worship violence?

 

[Arwon]

Link to video.

The situation is that situation with translator in both Iraq and Afghanistan are being held up in bureaucracy madness when they should be helped to get out of the mess for the help they did in saving lives.

Unless they flee here by boat, of course. Then since they'll be unauthorised maritime arrivals we might just dismiss their fears and send them back to be tortured.

 

[Hygro]

It's a travesty. I just don't understand.

 

[Commodore]

It's a travesty. I just don't understand.

It's because most of these local interpreters don't pass our screening process. Part of my job as a contractor in Afghanistan was to do counter-intelligence interviews and investigations on local interpreters who applied for visas. There were so many that I simply could not recommend for approval* because there were strong indicators of ties to extremists forces or foreign intelligence agencies. That is why so few visas were actually issued to these interpreters despite the work they did for us



*I want to make it clear that I was not the approval authority for their application. The interviews/investigations I would conduct were just one part of the process and I only made recommendations to the real approval authorities. It was ultimately up to them whether or not to listen to my recommendation, but I can say the number one reason I saw for visa denial was failure to pass counter-intelligence screening.

 

[Agent327]

You want easy immigration for those who worship violence?

AFAIK theren't too many people around that worship violence. And even fewer that advocate it based on religious texts. It's quite unnecessary to resort to religious text to do so, in either case.

 

[CavLancer]

Let me get this straight. Some people help Americans fight extremists and so the extremists want to kill them. Okay, why are they helping Americans? Could it be that they care about their country and want liberty to prevail? Are they going to advance that cause by leaving? Certainly they don't agree with the extremists...their actions oppose extremists after all. Why not take that a step further and get with the other translators and like minded people, get some weapons, and go kill some extremists? Why cut and run?

If you want to help those who put their lives on the line for your country then help yourself by killing the enemy before they kill you. It just makes sense. That guy said someone told him that bad men are looking for him. Okay, describe them. Where do they live? Etc...

 

[Arwon]

Ok wow

 

[Commodore]

Let me get this straight. Some people help Americans fight extremists and so the extremists want to kill them. Okay, why are they helping Americans? Could it be that they care about their country and want liberty to prevail? Are they going to advance that cause by leaving? Certainly they don't agree with the extremists...their actions oppose extremists after all. Why not take that a step further and get with the other translators and like minded people, get some weapons, and go kill some extremists? Why cut and run?

Nah it has nothing to do with helping their country, at least not for most of them. Most of the interpreters I interviewed said they took the job because they thought it would be their ticket out of Afghanistan. Not that I blame them, of course.

The problem though is most of them have some sort of ties to either extremist groups or foreign intelligence services. Most of the ties are pretty shaky at best, but when interviewed they cannot reasonably explain away those ties, thus they fail and their application is denied.

 

[CavLancer]

They don't care about their country? That doesn't inspire me to make them into Americans.

 

[Hygro]

It's because most of these local interpreters don't pass our screening process. Part of my job as a contractor in Afghanistan was to do counter-intelligence interviews and investigations on local interpreters who applied for visas. There were so many that I simply could not recommend for approval* because there were strong indicators of ties to extremists forces or foreign intelligence agencies. That is why so few visas were actually issued to these interpreters despite the work they did for us



*I want to make it clear that I was not the approval authority for their application. The interviews/investigations I would conduct were just one part of the process and I only made recommendations to the real approval authorities. It was ultimately up to them whether or not to listen to my recommendation, but I can say the number one reason I saw for visa denial was failure to pass counter-intelligence screening.

But what constitutes ties to extremists or foreign intelligence? I imagine in a country as poor as Afghanistan, it would be common for English speakers to have connections with the greater nation, which would include members of the previous regime (Taliban) or fighters against the Soviets (foreign intelligence connection). I can't help but get the vibe this was like firing all the baathists in Iraq for being tied to Saddam.

Ok wow

Yep. That happened.

 

[Commodore]

They don't care about their country? That doesn't inspire me to make them into Americans.

They just have different loyalties than we are typically used to. To most Afghans family and tribe mean a hell of a lot more to them than the idea of Afghanistan as a nation. In fact most of the Afghans I talked to wouldn't even refer to themselves as Afghan, but by either their tribe or their ethnicity. It's kind of hard to build a stable nation when your population doesn't even believe in the existence of that nation.

I do see your point though; if they can't identify with the nation they were born in, what reason do we have to believe they will be able to identify with the land the emigrate to?

 

[Hygro]

I do see your point though; if they can't identify with the nation they were born in, what reason do we have to believe they will be able to identify with the land the emigrate to?

Because American culture is the unbeatable juggernaut

 

[Commodore]

But what constitutes ties to extremists or foreign intelligence? I imagine in a country as poor as Afghanistan, it would be common for English speakers to have connections with the greater nation, which would include members of the previous regime (Taliban) or fighters against the Soviets (foreign intelligence connection). I can't help but get the vibe this was like firing all the baathists in Iraq for being tied to Saddam.

Those who were Mujahedeen against the Soviets were okay as long as they never provided any kind of assistance to the Taliban while we were there.

It wasn't the witch hunt that Iraq was, but I can't really post too much about it here. If you are interested I can tell you a little more via PM. All I will really say here is that we were looking for either current or very recent ties to extremists or foreign intelligence services.

 

[Old Hippy]

TIL interpreting is not as good career choice as rocket scientist

 

[Flying Pig]

They just have different loyalties than we are typically used to. To most Afghans family and tribe mean a hell of a lot more to them than the idea of Afghanistan as a nation. In fact most of the Afghans I talked to wouldn't even refer to themselves as Afghan, but by either their tribe or their ethnicity. It's kind of hard to build a stable nation when your population doesn't even believe in the existence of that nation.

I do see your point though; if they can't identify with the nation they were born in, what reason do we have to believe they will be able to identify with the land the emigrate to?

Do we expect immigrants to buy into the nationalist myth? I thought we just expected them to know how things work, pay taxes and behave themselves.

 

[Agent327]

Let me get this straight. Some people help Americans fight extremists and so the extremists want to kill them. Okay, why are they helping Americans? Could it be that they care about their country and want liberty to prevail? Are they going to advance that cause by leaving? Certainly they don't agree with the extremists...their actions oppose extremists after all. Why not take that a step further and get with the other translators and like minded people, get some weapons, and go kill some extremists? Why cut and run?

If you want to help those who put their lives on the line for your country then help yourself by killing the enemy before they kill you. It just makes sense. That guy said someone told him that bad men are looking for him. Okay, describe them. Where do they live? Etc...

Umm, so what exactly is it that you are arguing?

They don't care about their country? That doesn't inspire me to make them into Americans.

A good thing it isn't up to you then...

 

[Cutlass]

Let me get this straight. Some people help Americans fight extremists and so the extremists want to kill them. Okay, why are they helping Americans? Could it be that they care about their country and want liberty to prevail? Are they going to advance that cause by leaving? Certainly they don't agree with the extremists...their actions oppose extremists after all. Why not take that a step further and get with the other translators and like minded people, get some weapons, and go kill some extremists? Why cut and run?

If you want to help those who put their lives on the line for your country then help yourself by killing the enemy before they kill you. It just makes sense. That guy said someone told him that bad men are looking for him. Okay, describe them. Where do they live? Etc...

Except the extremists have already won....

 

[CavLancer]

Umm, so what exactly is it that you are arguing?



A good thing it isn't up to you then...

Its a good thing almost everything isn't up to me, just look how well the world is doing with 'ol Cav sidelined.

Are you a politician by any chance? I ask because while you did write stuff you didn't actually say anything on the topic.

 

[Commodore]

Do we expect immigrants to buy into the nationalist myth? I thought we just expected them to know how things work, pay taxes and behave themselves.

And that is all we really should reasonably expect from immigrants. However, being able to actually identify with the society in which you live rather than just existing within it does help with integrating into your new community and greatly helps with getting your new neighbors over any prejudices they may have about you.