failure

"The Americans have failed to convince Afghans that they should want them to stay, and Afghans certainly have not been convinced of Karzai’s legitimacy. There are just too many blunders. In September 2009 a British plane dropped a box of leaflets that failed to open. The box landed on a girl and killed her. Given that most Afghans are illiterate, its contents would have made no difference anyway. Material goods will not outweigh anger over civilian casualties and eight years of humiliation. In Iraq it took the trauma of the civil war to make the Americans look better, yet Iraqis still overwhelmingly want them out. Obama is not Bush, but for Afghans it is the same occupying country—the America of Iraq, Guantánamo, Abu Ghraib; the America seemingly at war with Islam." (thanks Nir)