Posted on 02/04/2019 2:50:58 PM PST by Eleutheria5
It was reported recently that the USA and the Taliban have reached a peace agreement on Afghanistan that will allow US forces to leave that country 17 years after they invaded it on October, 2001, less than a month after 9/11.
Al Qaeda.....
A large number of the terrorists that filled the country were killed, some were captured and some escaped to other countries. The impression left by the swift operation was that the Taliban would never gain back its strength and that Afghanistan would never again be a terror state. And then last week it was reported that America reached an agreement - with whom? The Taliban, that same Islamic organization which turned Afghanistan into a terror state. What changed to make this problematic organization into a partner to an agreement with the USA? How could America, the strongest power on Earth, after waging a bitter war for 17 years against this not exactly immense organization, end up accepting it as a partner to an agreement?
As background, let me point out that the source of Afghanistan's problems is the fact that the state is composed of ten distinct ethnicities which have never coalesced into a unified, cohesive nation The groups are: The Pashtun, Tajik, Uzbek, Aymak, Gujjar, Kirgiz, Baluche, Turkmen, Nuristani and Pamiri.
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(Excerpt) Read more at israelnationalnews.com ...
Just sold the circus, so . . . not our monkeys.
Sold the circus to the troublemaking roustabout with the mean streak and the drinking problem, who should have been sent packing.
I’m sorry. This is bad foreign policy, and it will ultimately bite the US in the ass, which is still tender from the last big chomp taken 17.5 years ago. I remember that day all too well, and it was caused by leaving crazed, goat-smelling fanatics free to take over after kicking the Russians out. Not only did they attack the United States, but—SURPRISE!—they’re genocidal monsters as well.
Who will they annihilate next? I don’t care. They kill each other just fine.
The Hazara are still around in Afghanistan, in numbers ranging from 3m to 5m. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hazaras The Taliban aren’t unique, historically-speaking, in conducting exemplary massacres, either within Islam, Afghanistan or even the world at large. I suspect the Deir Yassin massacre, inadvertent as it was, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deir_Yassin_massacre was instrumental in getting large numbers of Palestinian Arabs to leave Israel, sparing it even bigger demographic problems than it embraced when it retook the Gaza Strip and the West Bank in 1967. It was part of the success of the Korean units in Vietnam - they massacred the civilian supporters of the Vietcong in areas that they patrolled. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Korea_in_the_Vietnam_War
People conduct exemplary massacres not because they’re blood drinkers, although there are scattered individuals who get a charge out of it. They do it because they value their men more than the lives of any party that threatens them, including those of the civilians who feed and house the enemy. That was the rationale behind the city bombings conducted by the Allies against Japan and Germany during WWII. It’s also pretty much a requirement for rapid victories against enemy guerrillas.
Here’s an excerpt from Quora about what Chinese forces did against the Vietnamese civilian supporters of the militia during their invasion of Vietnam in 1979, killing an estimated 100K civilians in a matter of weeks:
https://www.historynet.com/war-of-the-dragons-the-sino-vietnamese-war-1979.htm
Genghis Khan, probably the greatest conquerer ever, never had a problem with guerilla warfare, even though the lands he conquered included Afghanistan. Why? Because his army simply slaughter all civilians, including their babies, who dare to fight against them.
In the Vietnam war, the Americans struggled against the Vietcongs. When China fought Vietnam, China simply romped through North Vietnam (north of Hanoi), transport removable factories/infrastructure back to China while destroying those that they cannot bring back. One crack Vietnamese division that was rushed back from Cambodia wisely decided to settle into prepared defensive positions near Hanoi instead of reinforcing the surrounded troops north of Hanoi. Why didn’t China has problem with Vietcong guerilla fighters?
When I first visited China in the 1990s, a retired veteran bitterly told me that his Major was killed by a ~6 year old Vietnamese kid holding a secret pistol when he was giving out food to the kid. Apparently, this is not an isolated incident. Very soon, they enacted Genghis Khans strategy. North Vietnamese villagers encountered were simply labeled as civilian militia, treated as combatants and showed no mercy. PLA never encounter anymore guerilla problems because there were no civilians left to provide the guerilla with information, shelter and food!
In the 1980s, there is no internet and no international reporter who has access to report on this. Chinese body counts, which included civilian militia combatants, concluded that enemy casualties were in excess of 10 times PLA losses.]
So we should stay there forever?
Where have I seen this movie before?
Oh yeah, in 1975 when the NVA rolled into Saigon and the S. Vietnamese regime we were supporting collapsed.
Despite that, we should have left Afghanistan years ago.
There are plenty of Hazara left in Afghanistan - they are the majority around Bamiyan.
They are the descendants of the old Mongol occupation garrison force. The name “Hazara” means “thousand”, the Mongol term for a Military unit of that size. To this day, they still play at wrestling in the unique Mongol way, and most have Asian eye folds.
They were some of the biggest winners of the American liberation, enjoying much greater opportunity than the harsh prejudice they endured before.
The Taliban had a slogan, to ethnically cleanse Afghanistan, and consolidate their ethnically Pashtun control: Tajiks to Tajikistan, Uzbeks to Uzbekistan, and Hazaras to Goristan (Land of the Dead - the Graveyard).
Part of the historical oppression that the Hazara were subjected to also flows from the fact that they are mostly Shi’ite Muslims. The hatred can be just under the surface, even now.
[The original sin in Afghanistan is that of the British, who, a century ago in 1919 - created this artificial state with all its many ethnic components, without its citizens possessing even a common language with which to administer the state.]
Hi.
Dateline says March 2 2019.
The ability to tell the future. Can I have the Power ball numbers for this Wednesday?
Thanks.
5.56mm
I know, day 3 month 2.
5.56mm
I know, day 3 month 2.
5.56mm
The Russians caused that double post.
5.56mm
Americans? Or will they just allow Al Qaeda to flourish again and plot terrorist acts against the US?
Thanks for the history here...
A peace agreement with a 9th century s*hole country.
I forget which British-Afghan war it was. The Brits in Kabul were promised safe conduct out of the country. As they were headed to the Khyber Pass, they were wiped out, including women and children. One man made it back alive. No invader has stayed in Afghanistan for long. In fact, we’ve done better than most. But sooner or later, every invader leaves. It’s time for us to leave too.
Bad policy was going into Afghanistan when it was Saudis who did 911. Its not our business to save people from their nutty cultures.
Thanks Eleutheria5. If Snuffleupagus had continued to bang his drum, showing the US servicepeople killed during the week -- he stopped it as soon as Zero won the 2008 election -- it might have made a difference. But he didn't. I hope he and his entire family are the next victims of a terrorist attack. And I hope it's televised.
Now Afghanistan will go back to being Iran's and Pakistan's problem.
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