Free Republic

China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi made an unannounced surprise visit to Afghanistan Thursday, where he held talks in Kabul with Acting Deputy Prime Minister of the Afghan Interim Government Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar and Acting Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi. The visit comes seven months after the U.S. withdrew from Afghanistan, leaving behind a power vacuum that China is waiting to fill. China is especially interested in Afghanistan’s mineral wealth, which includes gold, precious stones, coal, oil and gas, lithium, copper and rare-earth minerals. China is not the only power taking advantage of the power vacuum that the U.S. withdrawal...

Retirement plans warn of a "penalty for early withdrawal." Might that also apply to the withdrawal of American and NATO forces from Afghanistan? If you set aside the victory by coalition forces that expelled Saddam Hussein's overmatched troops from Kuwait in 1991, the U.S. has not won a war since World War II. Not in Korea. Not in Vietnam and now, says President Biden, Afghanistan is a war we cannot win. Osama bin Laden predicted we didn't have the staying power and would ultimately tire of the conflict. President Biden claims "America's longest war is ending." It may only get...

The Taliban on Tuesday warned Turkey against extending its troop presence in Afghanistan when US-led forces leave the country, insisting the decision was “reprehensible”. Advertising “The decision... is ill-advised, a violation of our sovereignty and territorial integrity and against our national interests,” the group said in a statement, days after Ankara agreed with Washington to provide security for Kabul airport when foreign forces leave next month. “We consider stay of foreign forces in our homeland by any country under whatever pretext as occupation,” the Taliban said. As foreign forces wind up their withdrawal -- due to be completed by August...