[kawhill]

My wife tells me that the mistake we made in Afghanistan was we armed and trained the men who were basically still hardcore Islamic extremists. She says we should have armed and trained the women who had been subjugated, deprived, denigrated and treated like lesser human beings for centuries. If we would have done that and empowered those ladies that sh!thole would be a lot different now. I think she’s correct.

[hanamizu]

“She says we should have armed and trained the women ...”

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An interesting idea, but no, you don’t change centuries of culture with a few weeks of firearms training. It was the rough men of the countryside who drove out the Brits in the 19th century, the Soviets in the 20th, and us in the 21st.

The young women who attended university in the 60s, if still alive, now wear the chador if they’re allowed outside.