Creating a “nation” from an amalgamation of tribes by drawing lines on a map, then expecting the result to be anything other than violent in an area run by warlords…
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Leaving Vietnam vs AFG
- Thread starter jmcquate
- Start date
That's a standard criticism of modern era euro imperialism and it's a valid one. Still, I gotta wonder where the appropriate places to draw the national borders when you leave a province. India shook out into three countries and there is at least as much diversity there as the region known as Afghanistan. Modern countries with more than one official language/unofficial language of commerce are the exception but there are some pretty successful ones. It's a bit of a catch-22 because yes, different peoples can get along and prosper when they're prosperous, but if they're short of necessities then scarce economic resources are a big ingredient for war.
I'm not sure the outcome would have been any more peaceful if the Brits had partitioned it into a Pashtun region and a Tajik region. I think nationalists within both groups would have created and dissolved alliances with ethnic cousins in neighboring countries and with allies of convenience (who were looking for foreign proxies).
In a separate discussion on current events, we were talking about the Northern Alliance in the early post-9/11 days. That entity and that road not taken would have been pretty messy, a different kind of mess and eventually publicly unpopular on the home front, though probably not nearly as bad as the present state of affairs.
Maybe... my speculation isn't any better than yours, it's just anybody's guess about what the world might have looked like.
I'm not sure the outcome would have been any more peaceful if the Brits had partitioned it into a Pashtun region and a Tajik region. I think nationalists within both groups would have created and dissolved alliances with ethnic cousins in neighboring countries and with allies of convenience (who were looking for foreign proxies).
In a separate discussion on current events, we were talking about the Northern Alliance in the early post-9/11 days. That entity and that road not taken would have been pretty messy, a different kind of mess and eventually publicly unpopular on the home front, though probably not nearly as bad as the present state of affairs.
Maybe... my speculation isn't any better than yours, it's just anybody's guess about what the world might have looked like.
This is a worthy read
www.justsecurity.org
CIA’s Former Counterterrorism Chief for the Region: Afghanistan, Not An Intelligence Failure — Something Much Worse
"While it’s certainly convenient to depict the shock and miscalculation U.S. officials claim over Afghanistan’s tragic, rapid fall to the Taliban as an intelligence failure, the reality is far worse."
www.justsecurity.org
Sure, but that’s not the proximal cause of the US decision to pursue the course that we did in Afghanistan. As you note, doing the line drawing didn’t appreciably impact the tribal nature of that society, so I would argue that Britain’s actions there actually had very little influence on anything at all.
I guess Iran didn't get this memo in 2019.
I am quite sure the vast majority of the people that benefited from the education, buildings, and institutions we built did what they could to secure a bright future for the country. Why wouldn't they? But not everyone that wanted a Taliban free country was in a position to pick up a rifle. It is a large country with many people who are agnostic about the Taliban at best. And those people did not send their kids to western schools or encourage their daughters to seek employment in the new buildings, or probably even live in the cities. Nearly 70,000 Afghan soldiers died in the last 20 years. That is more than the total membership of some coalition partner militaries. I am sure some Afghan military units fled because of Taliban sympathy or cowardice. But there is plenty of reporting that they did not have logistics (bullets) because the US supplied tail was gone. Some units did not know how to fight effectively without US air power. And some units were ordered to not fight because the government had fled making efforts pointless. Does any of this mean we "owe" them anything? Respect for those that did try whether entrepreneurs, educators, security forces, or civil servants would be fair. For those that worked closely and publicly with us, like interpreters, we owe them a way out. Dismissing the entire country and all it's people is unfair.
Taliban ‘shoots dead protesters’
Three people were reportedly killed and more than a dozen injured after Taliban militants opened fire during protests against the group in the Afghan city of Jalalabad.
www.news.com.au
Looks like the new Northern Alliance is already looking for some help…
Say what you will about the AFG leaders, corrupt as they were, but a generation of Afghans just grew up in a relatively open society far different from the one the Taliban first conquered. Keeping them in line may not be so easy.
I was literally just saying this to a coworker of mine who has a lot of time over there.
I don't mean to indicate no Afghans fought and died bravely trying to secure a brighter future for themselves. Don't think I said anything like that, but it wasn't my intention if I did. Also never intended to dismiss an entire country and all it's people. I agree we should help those who helped us, like the interpreters. Though I still wouldn't say we 'owe' them that. Ultimately, we were the ones helping them secure their own future, not the other way around. We also didn't owe their military ammo or air support. American taxpayers gave them planes, training, and tons of ammo for 2 decades.
We didn't give the Taliban any help, quite the opposite obviously, and they still won. That's because, on the whole, the Afghan people chose the Taliban. We shouldn't feel bad or act like we screwed over the portion of the population that rejected the Taliban. That's their problem, and we don't owe it to them to solve it for them. If anything, they owe us for harboring terrorists who attacked us unprovoked and then allowing our blood and treasure trying to help them be wasted.
Imagine having a dog that attacks a kid and hurts them. Then the parents come and demand you train your dog, and even pay for very expensive lessons for that dog. The training fails and the dog is still a danger, and they give up training it. What do the folks your dog attacked owe you?
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$169 Million of our taxpayer dollars.
Afghan President Ashraf Ghani reportedly fled Kabul with $169 million in cash
The latest Speed Read,/speed-reads,,speed-reads, breaking news, comment, reviews and features from the experts at The Week
theweek.com
@Mirage I am not sure what you think people are insisting we owe the Afghans. I am not even hearing we allow every Abdulla and Mohammed a Visa. Passed tense, I think we owed them something better than trying to mold them in our image. Basicly it was our way or the highway. As for here and now. We owe the many Afghans who did what they could, respect. You seem to agree. And we owe our close partners a way out to save their lives. And I bet you agree with that. Seems to me there are no serious arguements we owe Afghanistan to resist.
Resurgent Taliban pledges to honor ‘womenâs rights’ in charm offensive
Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid held a news conference to say that the insurgents would honor women’s rights, within highly restrictive Sharia law.
nypost.com
Resurgent Taliban pledges to honor ‘womenâs rights’ in charm offensive
Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid held a news conference to say that the insurgents would honor women’s rights, within highly restrictive Sharia law.
This is my shocked face ?