Letters: Afghanistan, Gibbons

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MICHELE NORRIS, host:

Time for your letters. And several of you wrote in about yesterday's hour-long special report on the war in Afghanistan. We try to examine the progress and the failures the U.S. has made so far and what to do next?

ROBERT SIEGEL, host:

Robert Abbet(ph) of Gilbert, Arizona, was grateful for our efforts. He writes: I wanted to complement you and your staff on its excellence as well as to thank you for providing the country with the detailed analysis of what's at stakes in Afghanistan. If we can educate ourselves on this issue, I think, we're less likely to tear ourselves apart politically, and that's well worth the effort it takes to get our minds around the complexities.

NORRIS: But some of you thought we missed at least one detail on our coverage where we presented four different U.S. policy options for Afghanistan.

Michael Fogler(ph) of Lexington, Kentucky, writes: there is a fifth idea, militarism does not work. He continues, if we want to help make Afghanistan a better place, why not help them build schools, infrastructure? Help them with democratic procedures, et cetera. Why do we have to fight? How does fighting help? Your four ideas ranged from far right to the middle. Where are the left ideas? They're out there. But you act like they don't exist.

SIEGEL: And from Afghanistan to the rainforest of Sumatra. On Wednesday, we heard from filmmaker Andrew Goldberg who went in search of gibbons.

Well, he never did actually spot the hard-to-find ape, but at one point, he thought he heard its call.

(Soundbite of gibbons)

Mr. ANDREW GOLDBERG (Filmmaker): Success.

(Soundbite of gibbons)

NORRIS: Unfortunately, says listener, Diane Davidson(ph) of Portal, Arizona, that was not what he heard. Ms. Davidson continues, after conducting field research in Borneo for decades, I can tell you what Andrew Goldberg heard was an Argus pheasant and definitely not a gibbon. His guides clearly misled him.

SIEGEL: Well, we took this to our reporters at the science desk and they played the story for Dr. David Edwards, an ornithologist at the University of Leeds in England and an expert on Southeast Asian birds. And he confirmed of our email that it was an Argus pheasant.

NORRIS: That ain't so.

SIEGEL: Hmm.

NORRIS: However, all is not lost, he wrote. And he pointed to the section of the story where Goldberg was listening to the many bird species in the forest. He says: listen carefully to the rising whistles just after the woodpecker drumming.

(Soundbite of birds)

SIEGEL: That whistle is likely the sound of the white-handed gibbon, Edwards says. And he sent us this recording of the call; we'll let you be the judge.

(Soundbite of gibbon whistling)

NORRIS: That is exactly the same. Could you hear the difference?

SIEGEL: I'm totally stumped. I think, if someone in the audience knows if Andrew Goldberg, in fact, recorded a white-handed gibbon, they should drop us a line with, don't you think?

NORRIS: I think so. In fact, they should drop us a line anyway. We appreciate your letters. Please, please, keep them coming. You can write to us by visiting npr.org and click on: Contact Us.

(Soundbite of gibbon)

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