Female Engagement Teams

 I had stumbled into this topic on weak recollections from my Course of Actions research and of my admiration for David Petraeus and his command of the Surge during the 2nd Gulf War.

I watched this youtube video, which at least interviewed the women being trained, even though the audio quality was somewhat shaky. This in turn lead me to write-ups in military online journals: Raymond Kareko's article or Pottinger's explanation of their support. I did not peruse Ashley's War, but felt intrigued to look into it.

All of that ran quickly however into Sippi Azarbaijani-Moghaddam's criticism of the background assumptions, based on a more detailed analysis of the sociological and anthropological setup that she was able to provide as a university-trained anthropologist and a long-term collaborator of the aid organisations working in Afghanistan. Both in larger context contributions from 2009 and specific analyses from within the conflict (2012) she gave clearer models of the complexities of interaction that cast doubt on FET aspirations.

Her later work for the Conversation (here and here) she discussed the symbolic communication on violence that the Taliban used but that the west did not appreciate or understand either.

Aventinus' simile for the big wall

When Aventinus describes the stone blocks that Alexander used to fill in the moat around the city of Tyre during its investure, Aventinus thinks of Regensburg and its old city wall:

Then Alexander thought of an unbelievable thing, had no one for that, who could have suggested this: mobilized land and people, let them bring there big trees, that is with their branches still, the same big stones, square mined pieces (just as they are in Regensburg at the old wall) || from an old broken city nearby, sunk them in the sea, banked up from the land to the city, so that he would be able to move dry and straight from the land toward the city with the might of his army. (own translation)

Da unterstuend sich Alexander eines ungleublichen dings, het niemant darfür, das es geratten solt: pot land und leuten auf, lies zuehin pringen groß päum also ganz mit esten, dergleichen gros stainene vierecket außgehauen stuk (wie zu Regenspurg an den alten mauern sein) || von einer alten zerprochen stat daselbs, versenkts in das mer, macht vom land pis in die stat ein beschüt, das er truckens und ebens fues auf dem land mit herskraft für die stat mocht ziehen.

(Bavarian Chronicle, Bk I, Cap 158; p.347 and p.348 in the Academy edition)