OK, I am very glad that the Taliban were beaten and I hope that the entire insurgency is soon defeated but can we stop deluding ourselves that any great “victory” was won here?
Far from the impression of “well armed” “highly trained” enemy troops being defeated by plucky British infantrymen the fact is that the Taliban are militarily the underdogs here.
The Taliban are barely literate mountain dwellers armed with little more than Soviet era Kalasnikovs and home-made bombs. They were defeated on this occasion by a combination of air power, satellite guided missiles and heavily armoured vehicles. If one was neutral, and I hasten to add again I am not, one would have to concede that it is the Taliban who are showing the grit and fighting spirit.
If with all this damn hardware the Allies are still slogging through Afghanistan and the Taliban are still fighting back, when can we realistically see an end to the war? There’s only so many “great victories” we can claim before people start to ask why we haven’t won the war yet.
it is the Taliban who are showing the grit and fighting spirit
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They’re fighting for 72 virgins and paradise. It’s not hard to find recruits, when that’s the reward for fighting and dying.
The British, are fighting to go home to their wives, or worse.
You’ll eventually run out of unfortunately deluded Muslims looking for 72 virgins. First, the recruits dry up, then those who recruit will be forced to either hide, or go themselves.
If we’re smart, we’ll send missionaries after all the Taliban are cleaned up.
I don’t care how lob-sided the fight is I liked the outcome: Dead Taliban. The only good kind.
They may not know how to read but they have been at war all of their lives and they are probably average age in the mid to late thirties while our soldiers were probably in school a couple of years ago and average age is early to mid twenties.
We have training and equipment, they have maturity, experience, and home field advantage. Many of these people were born to fight. You can't defeat a way of life, you can only eradicate it.
“The Taliban are barely literate mountain dwellers armed with little more than Soviet era Kalasnikovs and home-made bombs.”
Have you ever fought the Taliban? I'm thinking...probably not. Any advantage a trooper in the field can utilize is paramount to survival and success. In a perfect operation the types of assets mentioned in the above article blow the enemy position into oblivion, and the infantry just picks through the ruble with their bayonets assessing battle damage. That's in a perfect world. Unfortunately, the Taliban “barely literate mountain dwellers” have proven to be a much more deadly foe than you appear to give them credit. I say take any advantage, and thank God for it.