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I lived and worked in Afghanistan for 6 years following 9/11 (non-military). The Afghans said they’d always need outsiders or they’ll start killing each other, even worse than they already do. Look at the civil war that broke out after the Russians were kicked out, that led to the people accepting the Taliban just to have peace.

The big problem is Afghanistan should not be one country, but at least three. For example, the British deliberately split the Pashtuns between Pakistan and Afghanistan instead of creating a more ethnically aligned Pashtunistan. I couldn’t tell the difference between ethnic groups and paid no attention to it, but the Afghans all knew what everyone was: Pashtun, Tajik, Hazara, Uzbek, etc. (There’s actually 50 ethnicities in Afghanistan.)

“I lived and worked in Afghanistan for 6 years following 9/11 (non-military). “

I’ve never been there, but I was supposed to go there in 1969 with the Peace Corps. They taught us Persian/Farsi/Dari. But they placed nearly everyone in Pashtu-speaking areas. Pashtuns don’t appreciate Farsi speakers. Everyone came back after one month in country. As you say Afghans know who everyone is—they are tribal by their nature.

They may say they need outsiders to keep them from killing one another, but they are able to unite to get rid of outsiders. In my opinion, “nation building” in Afghanistan is a fool’s errand.

All of the Afghans I got to know during Peace Corps training were nice, outgoing people. They did have a hard time following the humor on ‘Laugh-In’ though.