Withdraw from Afghanistan - Re-establish the Monarchy!

It is very sad news from Afghanistan: “Ten French soldiers killed in Afghanistan ambush” reported the media on 20th August 2008, “the deadliest ground attack on foreign troops here since the US-led war was launched in 2001. The shock ambush also left 21 French troops wounded. President Hamid Karzai's spokesman however rejected suggestions that insurgents were closing in on Kabul.”

Why are young men and women sacrificing their lives in a war that is unwinnable? The politicians should be blamed who are sitting in air-conditioned conference rooms while they decide on Afghanistan’s fate. And on the fate of young people. More than 180 have died in Afghanistan in 2008. Most of the French soldiers killed were barely 20 years old. What utter nonsense of Sarokzy to tell the mourning comrades "your work in Afghanistan is essential for the 'freedom of the world' and must continue" (according to The Age).

Asking for more troops – as the US president likes to do – only shows that none of the Western politicians understands Afghanistan. Their soldiers are no longer considered liberators as they might have been in 2001, but they are seen as occupying forces. And they are treated accordingly. There is a reason why Afghanistan was never conquered.

When French president Nicolas Sarkozy with all his usual pathos promised to send more soldiers to Afghanistan, he did not consider the cost of human lives. After all, after the attack on the French soldiers he spent just 6 hours in the country. None of his sons has joined the French army to help fulfilling their father's military promises. They have comfortable lives in Paris, learning the trade of political intrigues, of which their father has been a master. None of them is a Prince Harry who spent ten weeks in Afghanistan.

From the start the basic problem in Afghanistan has been that the Western powers installed former UNOCAL"consultant" Hamid Karzai as president and ignored the wish of the majority of the Loya Jirga members to put King Mohammed Zahir Shah back on the throne. The best the internatinal community could do to keep the Taliban forces at bay is to declare Crown Prince Ahmad Shah Khan next King of Afghanistan.

King Mohammed Zahir Shah did not fight to be restored to the throne and had to be satisfied to play the role of godfather — "Father of the Nation" — to the new regime, which is, in a way, a pity. For such a particularly diverse culture as Afghanistan's, a Constitutional Monarchy could have provided a focus of national unity instead of stirring the factional passions that are rising and rising.

Spiegel online reported Prince Mustafa Zahir (44) claimed 1,347 deputies out of 1,500 of the Loya Jirga had voiced their support in parliament for his grandfather as head of state. “Who exactly pushed his grandfather aside, he won't say -- what he means is that the Americans wanted Karzai and no one else from the very beginning. ‘But as a normal citizen,' he says now, he has been 'disappointed by the Karzai regime.’” Prince Mustafa Zahir might be a King in waiting, at present he heads the Afghan agency for environmental protection, "the same rank as a minister".

Bombing the whole country has failed as well as stationing 50,000 soldiers from Western countries to bring peace to Afghanistan. "By extending its participation in 'Operation Enduring Freedom', Germany is not making the world a safer place, said Deutsche Welle's Nina Werkhäuser. Isn't it time Berlin jumped ship?"

After everything else failed in Afghanistan - why not try the King?

Brendan Nelson: Living costs more important than republic
At least someone got it right. In an ABC interview.
Federal Opposition Leader, Brendan Nelson said he is against Australia becoming a republic and does not think it should be on the political agenda. "I mean the real priorities at the moment are petrol, groceries and home loan interest rates and making sure small business can survive."

And as someone who is depending on public transport, I should add that the misery of the train service is appalling and cries for an immediate solution. The agony of Melbourne's public transport is effecting hundreds of thousands of people while the absence of an Australian republic means, a millionaire is denied buying his/her way into the job.

The recent press speculation and statements of Mr Rudd regarding the possibility of an Australian republic are merely the latest round of the ongoing debate fostered for its own reasons by factions within the Labor party (especially as a diversionary tactic) and within a group that sees itself as an intellectual “elite”.

But like Brendan Nelson I am a Royalist and a Constitutional Monarchist not out of some nostalgic love of a long gone British Empire, but for the simple fact that a Constitutional Monarch provides a stable and bipartisan head of state as well a sense of continuity that republican forms of government struggle to find.

The media seems determined to portray Monarchists as old fashioned and worse just old fuddy duddies whereas in fact the polls show consistently that the core group for republicans are 30-40 year old males whilst the Monarchy has a greater level of support amongst a wider demographic.