Monkeys trained as battlefield killers in Afghanistan

Afghanistan's Taliban insurgents are training monkeys to use weapons to attack American troops, according to a recent report by a British-based media agency.

Reporters from the media agency spotted and took photos of a few "monkey soldiers" holding AK-47 rifles and Bren light machine guns in the Waziristan tribal region near the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan. The report and photos have been widely spread by media agencies and Web sites across the world.

According to the report, American military experts call them "monkey terrorists."

As a form of cruel political means, wars are launched to meet political goals through conquest, devastation, assaults and other means.

In a sense, the emergence of "monkey soldiers" is the result of asymmetrical warfare. The United States launched the war in Afghanistan using the world's most advanced weapons such as highly-intelligent robots to detect bombs on roadsides and unmanned aerial vehicles to attack major Taliban targets. In response, the Taliban forces have tried any possible means and figured out a method to train monkeys as "replacement killers" against American troops.

Analysts believe that apart from using "monkey killers" to attack the American troops, the Taliban also sought to arouse Western animal protectionists to pressure their governments to withdraw troops from Afghanistan.

An American official responded that the Taliban forces have started training "monkey soldiers" after suffering heavy losses, implying that they have exhausted their tricks. Nevertheless, the Taliban believe that the emergence of "monkey soldiers" indicates that they have found smarter and more effective ways to cope with American troops.

Ironically, the initiators of "monkey soldiers" are the Americans. Between the 1960s and the 1970s, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) trained massive "monkey soldiers" in the Vietnam War and dispatched armed monkeys to dangerous jungles to launch assaults on Vietnamese soldiers. Today, the Taliban forces have given the American troops some of their own medicine.

When armed animals enter interpersonal wars, what kind of world will we face? This cannot but arouse our reflections and concerns.

By People's Daily Online