The Frustrating Situation in Afghanistan

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The Frustrating Situation in Afghanistan

That sentence could have been written at various times in the last several hundred years.

In the 19th century. Both the Russians and the British.

In the early 20th century. The British.

In the late 20th century the Soviets.

In the early 21st century the Americans and the British and everyone else as well.

The Frustrating Situation in Afghanistan is going to change. A hundred years from someone else will write that line for much the same reasons.

The more things change the more they stay the same.

[eagl]

Seagoon has it right.

Musharraf basically took the military and told the country that they'd join the modern world, one way or another, by easing away from the strict decentralized religious rule that had stagnated them in a second or third world situation and moving toward a more "western" stance of modernization, governance, and rule of law.

The majority in the country will never forgive them because it moves power from the regional religious leaders to a largely faceless government.  The local leaders can inspire great popular support but variations in religious interpretations and a lack of coordinated goals has kept them from regaining the power they once had.  It's ironic that the situation they're fighting to overcome is perpetuated by the organizational structure they want to return to.  It's tough as hell for a movement based on local religious rule loosely coordinated by sectarian religious leaders, all of whom are rivals, to push out a government that has arguably done little harm other than allying with the US.

[genozaur]

Inflammatory/Troll/Annoying

[Boroda]

Originally posted by genozaur
Guys, all that play with Pkistan is the repetition of the "great" opera show with the King of Iran. I wonder why the proud America has to be  taught the same "through-the-arse" lesson once again ? I would strongly recommend to bring to justice those US officials who orchestrated that spectacle of stinger support for Muslim terrorists in Afganistan. Can the people of the United States at least hold a Senate hearing on the unamerican activities of the jerks who made the decision to supply filthy terrorists with Stinger missiles ?

Gena, I'd rather support a UN resolution against occupation of Iraq. I wonder when some "progressive countries" will start supporting Iraqi partisans directly, boasting about it on TV, then boycotte an Olympic games in US and start screaming on every corner about Americans givin bomb-toys to Iraqi kids and using poison gases.

Can anyone tell me why US complains about Russian military presence in Tajikistan (according to Commonwealth Collective Security treaty), when Russian 201st Motor-Infantry division supplied Northern Alliance with all nessesary armour, ammunition and other weapons they asked through 2 pontoon bridges, and Russian border guards are the only force that opposes drug-traffic to former USSR?

Look at the places of American activity, they are either oil or drug regions... Even Kosovo terrorists switched from slave-trade to drugs after 1999...

The stories about "allied" forces "controlling" Afghanistan are quite funny. They can't feel secure even in Kabul, while my friends who served there in the 80s said that they went on "unallowed absence" ("samovolka") without any problems.

Still happy about "destroying the Evil Communist Regime" (tm)? Still think that Soviet Army was on wrong side in Afghanistan?...

[Habu]

Hey the US gave weapons to the Afgans to protect themselves.

Just as the USSR supported any country in the past 50 years (up to the fall of the USSR) who wanted to overthrow a pro western government.

You made a big enemy and got your butt kicked. Get over it.

[Boroda]

Originally posted by Habu
Hey the US gave weapons to the Afgans to protect themselves.  

So, I suppose noone in the US will be against official weapons support to Iraqi partisans now?

At least Soviet presence in Afghanistan was not an open act of intervention, we were invited there by legitimate government. We also didn't "bomb them to stone age" as Americans did to Iraq.

Maybe it's time to rethink American assistance to terrorists? Oh, sorry, then you have to fire Chechen terrorists from DoS jobs and deport them to Russia, and it will be a "violation of human rights"

[Schaden]

Oookk I get it - this si obvious one of those "alternative realities" that everyone down at the physics club keeps going on about.

[Habu]

Originally posted by Boroda
So, I suppose noone in the US will be against official weapons support to Iraqi partisans now?

 

Well if that happens I am sure the US will quite happily arm whoever is fighting the people who arm thier enemys.

Maybe give them some nice helicopter killing stingers.

[Holden McGroin]

Originally posted by Boroda
At least Soviet presence in Afghanistan was not an open act of intervention, we were invited there by legitimate government.  

The Soviets were 'invited' to prop up a government which came to power in 1978 in a bloody coup which overthrew the government which came to power in 1973 in a military coup, which overthrew the Monarchy.

What was the foundation of 'legitimacy' of the government who did the inviting?

[Momus--]

Originally posted by Seagoon
No it most surely is not. Musharraf is a military dictator who seized power specifically to keep militant Islamists out of power and to maintain ties with the West. He is desperately unpopular with the Pakistani umma (the congregation of the faithful, i.e. faithful Muslims) and Mullahs and has already survived two separate assasination attempts by Al-Qaeda affiliated groups.

This isn't quite correct. Musharraf siezed power after the prime minister of Pakistan (Nawaz Sharif) tried to have him replaced as Pakistani chief of staff. Sharif was the leader of the Pakistani Muslim League which despite the name was by current standards a relatively moderate group of the political centre-right that had operated for years in conjunction with the military dictatorship, Sharif being a minister under a previous dictator, General Zia. The background to the dispute between Sharif and the military was connected to the so called Kargil Conflict, where militants backed by the pakistani army tried to destablilize Kashmir at a time when Sharif was engaged in peace talks with India.

There was actually a long association between the Pakistani military and the region's islamic extremists. Largely at the urging of the British and the US, Musharraf's predecessors made common cause with the pakistani deobandis from the 1970's all the way into the post cold-war period. The rationale for this was partly to limit the influence of left-wing populist movements that might have followed a more pro-USSR or non-aligned foreign policy that was anathema to the western powers at the time. Another reason was that the pakistani military and especially the ISI were a very useful proxy force to use for the post 1979 intervention in afghanistan.  The natural result of this alliance was the Taliban, who were very much an ISI creation.

Part of the ongoing problem in Pakistan is the fact that the military and in particular the ISI (military intelligence) is still very heavily penetrated by the islamists, hence the ongoing problems with securing the afghan border and reigning in the ISI-backed militants in Kashmir.

The South Asia Analysis Group  has a wealth of information on the background to this written mainly from an Indian perspective. From a secular Pakistani perpective, a book called The Clash of Fundamentalisms: Crusades, Jihads and Modernity by Tariq Ali has some excellent first hand accounts and supporting information.

[Boroda]

Originally posted by Holden McGroin
The Soviets were 'invited' to prop up a government which came to power in 1978 in a bloody coup which overthrew the government which came to power in 1973 in a military coup, which overthrew the Monarchy.

What was the foundation of 'legitimacy' of the government who did the inviting?

All governments were recognised by United Nations and were supported by RSFSR/USSR since 1920. In fact - Soviet Russia was the first state that recognised Afghanistan in 1920.

So - we had a nice, 50+ years old tradition.

As history showed - it could be much better if a bloody, prehistoric and mass-murdering regime of the King could remain in power

OTOH - US violated all possible international agreements and laws invading into a souverign country, who's government simply couldn't be found "illegal", especially by the US that co-operated with Saddam, not only in weapon-supplies but in interesting things like murdering all Iraqi Communists in mid-70s.

So - I think that international sanctions agaisnt US are an obvious decision, especially when we remember their actions against legitimate Afghani government. Who'll be the first to start openly supplying arms to Iraqi partisans and open training-camps for them?

[Yeager]

its always interesting reading boroada thoughts.  kind of scary, but interesting.  I sometimes wonder if the US wasted 50 trillion smaks fighting the coldwar, I guess the jury will never truly come out of deliberations but reading borodas thoughts gives me comfort the money was well spent.

I wonder if china will step up to the plate as the next global superpower and contain russian strangeness since the us is obviously on the way out as the worlds only superpower.

 Someone had better step up to the plate or the world will get squeezed from two nasty directions.  russian strangeness being one and islamic fanaticism being the other.

[john9001]

boroda, USSR lost, USA won, give it up, time to move on.

[Boroda]

Originally posted by john9001
boroda, USSR lost, USA won, give it up, time to move on.

You mean - to start shipping weapons to Iraqi partisans?

Please, notice: it's your suggestion, not mine.

[Boroda]

Originally posted by Yeager
its always interesting reading boroada thoughts.  kind of scary, but interesting.  I sometimes wonder if the US wasted 50 trillion smaks fighting the coldwar, I guess the jury will never truly come out of deliberations but reading borodas thoughts gives me comfort the money was well spent.

Yeager, I started to "troll" in this thread because the thread about some loonies in DC teaching Russia what to mention in school history classes got closed, after Toad as usual showed complete absence of common sence

I'm just too pissed off by the "brave new world" (if you understand what I mean and read not only Orwell but Huksley too), where coca-cola is a measure of democracy, and it's delivered by cruise missiles and bayonets. Looks like we surrendered too fast.

Originally posted by Yeager
I wonder if china will step up to the plate as the next global superpower and contain russian strangeness since the us is obviously on the way out as the worlds only superpower.

Chinese "strangeness" will be much "stranger" for you then Russian. They are much more different from us then you are, and Russia is a "bridge" between East and West for 1000 years now...

Originally posted by Yeager
Someone had better step up to the plate or the world will get squeezed from two nasty directions.  russian strangeness being one and islamic fanaticism being the other.

So far the world gets squeesed in one direction, and it's what frightens me.

I seriously think that if not US but USSR had won the Cold War it couldn't do any good to the world and (especially) my country. What we got now has IMHO the same influence on the world and the US.

Did I succeed in my attempt to show obvious hypocricy of Western attitude to affairs in Afghanistan and Iraq?...

Edit: I studied logics and discussion only in ordinary Soviet high school (there was no special course), so I tried good old "ad absurdum" method. I wonder if it was my lame English that prevented some people from understanding my intentions?...