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2008-10-05 Afghanistan

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Posted by Fred 2008-10-05 00:00|| || Front Page|| [2 views ] Top
File under: Taliban

#1 It is a Muslim news source, so why would it make sense?

Posted by Shieldwolf 2008-10-05 00:42|| 2008-10-05 00:42|| Front Page Top

#2 Actually, it makes perfect sense. The current government presiding over Afghanistan is a typical American style faux-democracy. Karzai is Afghanistan's Chalabi, he was simply installed successfully.

When the Western troops that protect him leave - the Afghans will have it out (again) and whatever emerges from the rubble will prevail. Hopefully this time we won't completely ignore the situation, as we did last time after creating it in the first place.

With our support, proponents of civil society (which existed in Afghanistan before Reagan saved it) may prevail - it certainly is a better plan than continuing to support the Warlords and war criminals for whom we've successfully secured the seat of government through our ignorance and bumbling.

Posted by Criminoboy 2008-10-05 15:18|| 2008-10-05 15:18|| Front Page Top

#3
Good to know that the commenter from British Columbia sees this as a joint effort, despite his sneer about 'typical American faux ....'

What he misses, however, are other developments behind the scenes which are laying the groundwork for longer-term success. Among them the national military academy which has begun producing professional officers with an allegiance to the country as a whole rather than to the tribe.

It will take a while.

Posted by lotp 2008-10-05 15:38|| 2008-10-05 15:38|| Front Page Top

#4 Actually, it makes perfect sense.

That statement is entirely dosage-dependent.

The current government presiding over Afghanistan is a typical American style faux-democracy. Karzai is Afghanistan's Chalabi, he was simply installed successfully.

I prefer to think of it as a "training wheels democracy." When the Talibs departed Kandahar in the dead of night after agreeing to surrender, Afghanistan had a legitimate president: Bahanuddin Rabanni. It had a legitimate government in the Northern Alliance. They were the recognized goverment at the UN and most other places, whilst the Talibs under Mullah Omar were recognized by Pakistain, from whence they came, the UAE, and Soddy Arabia, if I remember correctly. The current Afghan government was the product of a series of jirgas, which are Afghanistan's indigenous attempt at oligarchy, if not democracy, culminating in the Bonn conference, where pretty much everybody but Mullah Omar and Hekmatyar had a say. Rabanni very graciously -- and unfairly, I thought at the time -- stepped aside for the Karzai government, which was designed and built to give the Pashtuns (40 percent of the population) a representation in the government disproportionate to the amount of their contribution to getting rid of first the Soviets and then the Taliban. Afghanistan has in fact held elections that were mostly honest, or as honest as elections can be in a country that's never had them.

Karzai came before Chalabi. The idea was to make Chalabi the Iraqi Karzai, not the other way around. Had we done so, operating him as a true puppet, and had we written Iraq's constitution and imposed it, it's likely things would have gone differently than they actually did -- I don't know if the end result would have been better or worse and neither do you.

When the Western troops that protect him leave - the Afghans will have it out (again) and whatever emerges from the rubble will prevail.

Not necessarily. Karzai's turned out to be a better politician than people gave him credit for. There are other capable people who're close to or in positions of power. Under the monarchy the country was relatively civilized, with the exception of most of the Pashtun regions, where people are nutz by preference. Even at this moment the Pashtun areas of Afghanistan are in many places more peaceful than are the Pashtun areas of Pakistain.

Hopefully this time we won't completely ignore the situation, as we did last time after creating it in the first place.

We didn't create it. The situation was created when the Russers installed their puppets in Afghanistan and then, when that didn't work really, really well, invaded the country in December, 1979.

With our support, proponents of civil society (which existed in Afghanistan before Reagan saved it) may prevail...

Russia gobbled up yet another independent country on its periphery. The Afghan resistance wasn't our creation, initially. Return with us now, to those thrilling days of yesteryear, in 1980, when Tadjiks were literally dropping big rocks off the sides of mountains onto Soviet APCs and trucks. Eventually, givent the bureaucracy of the CIA and antiwar tendencies of Congress, we ended up equipping and partially financing the Tadjiks, who put together an alliance with the Uzbeks, Hazaras, Turkmen, and eventually with Pashtuns, though not with all of them. Additional financing was lined up through Soddy Arabia and supply lines were established through Pakistain -- still the only way into the country. As it turned out, both the Soddies and the Paks were playing their own games, but the divergence from common cause wasn't as pronounced at the time.

- it certainly is a better plan than continuing to support the Warlords and war criminals for whom we've successfully secured the seat of government through our ignorance and bumbling.

Those "warlords and war criminals" are the guys who actually fought the Soviets, bub. Some of them are war criminals and some -- the majority, in my perhaps rosy-memoried opinion -- were heroes. It was a war of singular brutality, against a ruthless enemy. Have a look at Chechnya to see the tactics that the Sovs tried to apply in Afghanistan. You might even want to google KhAD, the Afghan secret police, that were a wholly owned subsidiary of the Russers.

Rather than dismissing the heroes of Afghanistan as "warlords and war criminals," you might want to read up on them as well. Start with Ahmed Shah Masood, but also have a look at Ismail Khan, Mojadeddi, and even (when he was sober and on the right side) Dostum. You want to read about some villains? Try Rasool Sayyaf and Gulbuddin Hekmatyar.

And I'll remind you: the Taliban weren't involved in the war against the Soviets at all -- a "talib" is a student, and most were warm and cozy in the madrassahs in Pakistain while their betters were fighting commies. Mullah Omar was a pretty small-potatoes commander. Jalaluddin Haqqani was a better commander, and in those days seemed more tightly wrapped than he does now. And Hekmatyar spent as much time canoodling with the Soviets against the Tajdiks as he did actually fighting.

You're making the assumption that we were ignorant and bumbling because you expect us to always be ignorant and bumbling. The people I knew who were involved were neither ignorant nor bumbling, and some of them were frighteningly competent. It's real easy to sit back at the U of BC and criticize, but I'm pretty sure that if you were ever given the assignment to accompany a platoon-sized team of Tadjiks to blow the Salang tunnel in the dead of the Brutal Afghan Winter™ your toilet paper consumption would spike regularly and you'd screw at least one thing up an hour.

Crap. You'd probably do worse than that real-life scenario.

Posted by Fred 2008-10-05 15:56|| 2008-10-05 15:56|| Front Page Top

#5 "you'd screw at least one thing up an hour"

You're being magnanimous today, Fred. I'd have gone with one per minute. ;-p

Great summary of the Afghan situation, by the way. Thanks.

Posted by Barbara Skolaut">Barbara Skolaut 2008-10-05 16:56|| http://ariellestjohndesigns.com/]">[http://ariellestjohndesigns.com/] 2008-10-05 16:56|| Front Page Top

#6 I see the Brits still haven't learned that the things they tried as an EMPIRE a hundred years ago, STILL don't work. We may have to do this one without the "help" of the Brits. Their soldiers are excellent, their "leadership" is still colonial.

Posted by Old Patriot">Old Patriot 2008-10-05 17:17|| http://oldpatriot.blogspot.com/]">[http://oldpatriot.blogspot.com/] 2008-10-05 17:17|| Front Page Top

#7 It's worse than that OP. Cowper-Coles may well have been speaking on behalf of the UK prime minister.

Gordon Brown detests most of what Blair clearly saw to be necessary actions to preserve Western freedom. Brown's best buddy and jr. Foreign Minister Mark Malloch Brown is and has for a long time been a wholly owned subsidiary of Soros -- the latter gave MMB a sweetheart rent deal in Manhattan while he served as Deputy Secty General at the UN. Malloch Brown's contempt and dislike WRT the US is known to any reasonably literate 3rd grader who googles the news. (Obama thinks MMB's great BTW.)

Gordon Brown signalled just where he stands when he appointed MMB to his cabinet of ministers.

And then there's Gordon Brown's intentional starving of the royal armed forces of all that would allow them to function effectively, both in terms of kit and equipment for deployment OTOH and in terms of health care etc. when they return.

Posted by lotp 2008-10-05 17:31|| 2008-10-05 17:31|| Front Page Top

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