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| Afghanistan |
| AFG Assessment from a friend |
| 2021-08-20 |
| Now that the Afghan government has fallen, I believe I am free to talk about what I do know. I met with the government on neutral ground in Thailand. I was invited to give lectures there but just never found the time to make that trip. As I have said before, most governments have heard of Socrates. After all, it has been putting out economic and geopolitical forecasts since 1977. From my discussions with them in Thailand, what I can say is that the Taliban are largely self-funded, yet have been warmly protected by Pakistan which is the ONLY nuclear nation in that region. Pakistan has supported the Taliban, not for religious agreement, but because of their enemy, the Afghans, we friends with Pakistan’s enemy India. In that sense, there is a deep-seated religious conflict that goes back to the creation of Pakistan in 1947. The peak in our model on the region took place in 2019 when any hope of some sort of peace treaty with the Taliban collapsed. Military operations between Afghan and US government forces and the Taliban then intensified in 2019 resulting in more than 8,000 civilian casualties. That was precisely on target being 72 years from 1947 which was the real period of the rise in militant Islam. A standard 2-year reaction was in play which has brought us to this point in 2021. But this is the start of a 13-year cycle of rising tensions which will also peak in 2032. Pakistan is aligned with China and the idea has been that China will invest in Afghanistan and that may help to satisfy the Taliban. But that is perhaps wishful thinking. Religiously, they are more akin to Iran. Nevertheless, the Taliban has been a movement of religious students (talib) from the Pashtun areas of eastern and southern Afghanistan. They were actually educated in traditional Islamic schools in Pakistan. Keep in mind that Pakistan can be very authoritarian. Pakistan is blocking cell phones to compel people to be vaccinated. |
| Posted by:Besoeker |
| #3 They're not really dependable in case of war with China. When China attacked Tibet, India instantly recognized it as Chinese territory. India also never formally supported Taiwan to try and not piss off China. We supplied AFG with ammo for arty and meds and evacced some Afghan businessmen but that's it. India keeps its overt engagements at the economic, cultural and soft-diplomacy level. Due to the mostly leftist civil leaderships in India, it remains a singularly defense oriented power; non-aligned, non-committal. It's leaders live in a bubble where they believe the military will keep protecting the palaces at New Delhi, and as long as that is fine the world can go fcuk itself. |
| Posted by: Dron66046 2021-08-20 16:04 |
| #2 /\ Excellent point. I wonder how trade relations and Mil-to-Mil support stand btwn India and Taiwan, India and Japan ? |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2021-08-20 06:55 |
| #1 ..yet have been warmly protected by Pakistan which is the ONLY nuclear nation in that region. Sort of forgets India. Take with a grain of salt. India has developed and possesses weapons of mass destruction in the form of nuclear weapons. Although India has not released any official statements about the size of its nuclear arsenal, recent estimates suggest that India has 160 nuclear weapons and has produced enough weapons-grade plutonium for up to 161–200 nuclear weapons. - wiki |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2021-08-20 06:50 |