Afghanistan

andyhinch said:
Probably the terrorist threat but your not wrong.
Click to expand...

It's also a problem we created.

We've been fucking up Afghanistan for 200 years for our own benefit, and all of the original leaders of the Taliban were bankrolled and trained by the UK and US.

We gave these guys the power and the weapons with which they took that power and the damage and death they do is blood on our hands.

It's very hard IMO to make an argument that the country would be doing worse if we'd not interfered and left the communists to fall apart on their own slowly without a western armed and trained extremist militia to fight.
 
domalino said:
It's also a problem we created.

We've been fucking up Afghanistan for 200 years for our own benefit, and all of the original leaders of the Taliban were bankrolled and trained by the UK and US.

We gave these guys the power and the weapons with which they took that power and the damage and death they do is blood on our hands.

It's very hard IMO to make an argument that the country would be doing worse if we'd not interfered and left the communists to fall apart on their own slowly without a western armed and trained extremist militia to fight.
Click to expand...
No argument from me, only know one lad on the ground over there and he’s a gun with suit, hated the shit show going on.
 
Mazzarelli's Swiss Cheese said:
The hunting terrorists and nation building thing was always bollocks to sell military action to the public. It was all about slapping the Taliban on the wrists and letting them know that the consequence of allowing transnational terrorists to set up shop on their patch and attack the west would be bad times, disruption of their medieval fiefdom and their lucrative opium business. It's very much mission accomplished for the US, and as you were for the Islamist nuts, just so long as they play ball in the future. The Taliban have no interest in terrorism (aside from terrorising their own population), and no interest in the rest of the world aside from supplying our heroin addicts. They don't want a global caliphate like Isis - they just want to be backward fundamentalists and run their stone age nation according to their version of Islam.
Click to expand...
Bang on the money.
 
Mazzarelli's Swiss Cheese said:
The hunting terrorists and nation building thing was always bollocks to sell military action to the public. It was all about slapping the Taliban on the wrists and letting them know that the consequence of allowing transnational terrorists to set up shop on their patch and attack the west would be bad times, disruption of their medieval fiefdom and their lucrative opium business. It's very much mission accomplished for the US, and as you were for the Islamist nuts, just so long as they play ball in the future. The Taliban have no interest in terrorism (aside from terrorising their own population), and no interest in the rest of the world aside from supplying our heroin addicts. They don't want a global caliphate like Isis - they just want to be backward fundamentalists and run their stone age nation according to their version of Islam.
Click to expand...
You’ve put that better than I could have, chapeau
 
Interesting story in the Guardian today interviewing women, saying that they're already receiving abusive comments from men in the streets about how they'll be back in a burkha soon. And I suspect that's why there's seemingly not a lot of opposition to this Taliban takeover, because you've got a pretty sizeable chunk of the male population who are pretty happy with the idea of women returning to being second-class citizens.

Genuinely reminded me of the flashback scenes from The Handmaid's Tale where misogynists gradually get bolder and more abusive until one day all the women realise that their credit cards and bank accounts no longer work.
 
I'm With Stupid said:
Interesting story in the Guardian today interviewing women, saying that they're already receiving abusive comments from men in the streets about how they'll be back in a burkha soon. And I suspect that's why there's seemingly not a lot of opposition to this Taliban takeover, because you've got a pretty sizeable chunk of the male population who are pretty happy with the idea of women returning to being second-class citizens.

Genuinely reminded me of the flashback scenes from The Handmaid's Tale where misogynists gradually get bolder and more abusive until one day all the women realise that their credit cards and bank accounts no longer work.
Click to expand...
It’s hard to put western morals into a middle aged culture and ultimately is it our job ?
 
BlueAnorak said:
If they weren't interest in exporting their ideology and support Islamic terrorists they woukd have kicked Al Quidia out after 11/09.
Click to expand...
They offered to do that but the Americans weren’t interested, just like they’ve arrogantly refused every attempt to come to a negotiated settlement with the Taliban over 20 years - ending in this failure
 
domalino said:
It's also a problem we created.

We've been fucking up Afghanistan for 200 years for our own benefit, and all of the original leaders of the Taliban were bankrolled and trained by the UK and US.

We gave these guys the power and the weapons with which they took that power and the damage and death they do is blood on our hands.

It's very hard IMO to make an argument that the country would be doing worse if we'd not interfered and left the communists to fall apart on their own slowly without a western armed and trained extremist militia to fight.
Click to expand...
Yep. We have also just signed a £5bn deal to sell arms to Saudi, despite the crisis in Yemen. We never learn because we put profit before humanity and that is the bottom line.
 
Blue Mist said:
Why are you concerned about Afghanistan? No one is arsed that Boko Haram is running wild in Africa or that Burma is slaughtering its citizens. The Rohinga are being raped tortured and murdered but no one bats an eye lid.
Click to expand...

Libya, burma, chilie, yemen all say hi.
 
Last edited:
Mazzarelli's Swiss Cheese said:
The hunting terrorists and nation building thing was always bollocks to sell military action to the public. It was all about slapping the Taliban on the wrists and letting them know that the consequence of allowing transnational terrorists to set up shop on their patch and attack the west would be bad times, disruption of their medieval fiefdom and their lucrative opium business. It's very much mission accomplished for the US, and as you were for the Islamist nuts, just so long as they play ball in the future. The Taliban have no interest in terrorism (aside from terrorising their own population), and no interest in the rest of the world aside from supplying our heroin addicts. They don't want a global caliphate like Isis - they just want to be backward fundamentalists and run their stone age nation according to their version of Islam.
Click to expand...

Pretty much, if they make sure terror groups cannot train in their mountains and hide there and don't both the west, then the west won't bother them.

Putin with have no interest in the place and china tend to keep out of stuff unless it affects them.

Give it a month or two and this won't be heard on the news.
 
KPXBLN said:
They offered to do that but the Americans weren’t interested, just like they’ve arrogantly refused every attempt to come to a negotiated settlement with the Taliban over 20 years - ending in this failure
Click to expand...
Do you think the Taliban were interested in compromise?
 
I heard an interesting interview with the Head of the American University in Afghanistan this morning, who had also worked for the Obama Government. It helped
to clarify one or two misconceptions.

For example, US service personnel haven’t been losing their lives in Afghanistan for yonks (I guess there’s been a small number of fatalities. Also, US armed forces overseas are heavily dependent on contractors, from servicing aircraft to intelligence gathering. This was ending with the pull out (although the end of political support was probably more telling in the capitulation of Afghani forces).

Basically, there wasn’t the political will to stay in Afghanistan and the fighting capability of the Afghani forces were undermined by the withdrawal of the US forces in numerous ways. I’m not sure we should have been there anyway and likewise with US forces. However, the end really has been a shambles and there wasn’t the immediate military pressure to mitigate this.
 
BobKowalski said:
The US signed a peace deal in February 2020. In return the Taliban got a commitment that the US would withdraw by May 2021. In effect, the US handed the country to the Taliban.

If the US reneged on the deal, then the Taliban would have resumed hostilities and that would have meant putting in more troops and back to square one.

The real failure is the zero impact the US and it’s Allies made in twenty years in pulling Afghanistan away from the Taliban and putting in place structures and governance that had a reasonable chance of lasting. Instead it all melted away in about twenty minutes.

This end game was set in stone once the US signed the peace deal. In truth, this was all pretty much inevitable when we first invaded twenty years ago.
Click to expand...
You do know that Biden accelerated the withdrawal?
 
Sadly one aspect that will get little coverage or if it does will be a side article is the use of contractors especially military private firms to look after some operations.

Once it isn't worth their while why would they have stayed to carry on working with the Afghan army.

Seems an insult to those from many nations globally that have sacrified themselves to have 20 yrs reversed in a day.
 
Absolutely predictable that this shit would happen.
The US & UK have been obsessed with lockdowns and stupid graphs for the past 15 months and have taken their eye off the ball on other matters.
Yesterday Boris was busy partying with the Olympians and Raab, our foreign secretary is on holiday.
Unbelievable.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Unread Posts

Don't have an account? Register now and see fewer ads!

SIGN UP
Back
Top