Jeff Goldsmith on Holy Warriors?

Maureen Dowd is wicked smart.  In her commentary on our problems in Iraq and Afghanistan, she gets right to it:

“We invaded two countries, and allied with a third — all renowned as masters at double-dealing. And, now lured into their mazes, we still don’t have the foggiest idea, shrouded in the fog of wars, how these cultures work. Before we went into Iraq and Afghanistan, both places were famous for warrior cultures. And, indeed, their insurgents are world class.”

“The British Empire prided itself on discovering warrior races in places it conquered — Gurkhas, Sikhs, Pathans, as the Brits called Pashtuns. But why are they warrior cultures only until we need them to be warriors on our side?  Then they’re untrainably lame, even when we spend $25 billion on building up the Afghan military and the National Police Force, dubbed “the gang that couldn’t shoot straight” by Newsweek.”

“Maybe we just can’t train them to fight against each other. But why can’t countries that produce fierce insurgencies produce good standing armies in a reasonable amount of time? Is it just that insurgencies can be more indiscriminate?”

What I’d be asking is:  how important is “country” to tribal folk, vs., say, clan, religion or culture.  http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/28/opinion/28dowd.html?_r=1&hp