Afghanistan - 20 years on

Tuppy_Glossop said:
IMO, the best way to achieve results would have been to not send troops, but to pay top dollar for the farmers' opiate supplies. Poppies are the highest value crop they can grow, and if the farmers are making money, the whole community is happier, healthier, better educated, richer, and they don't need to rely on the Taleban. Indeed, given the Taleban are anti-Poppy Farming, the farmers would fight back. The West could use the poppies medically, give free heroin to addicts to avoid 'fix money' crimes, or simply destroy them.

EDIT: plus you cut the criminal gangs and traffickers out of the equation!
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Way too sensible
 
Colonel_Klinck said:
I agree, the fact that Afghanis that helped the US and her allies are being left to fend for themselves is wrong. However if he invited several hundred if not thousands of Afghanis in the uproar on the right wing anti-immigration of anyone but white Christian would be deafening. He clearly thinks he has to spend his political capital elsewhere. Its a **** situation and something I would hope both sides could sit down and sort out. Fat chance.
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The news stories of the last few days suggest US policy is a swift withdrawal, and no more than that.

It will be very damaging in the medium term, as their former allies are murdered in their thousands.

I'd recommend Afghantsy, by Rodric Braithwaite, for a detailed read about the Soviet experience in Afghanistan. It's an excellent book. I found a lot of my preconceptions were wrong.
 
Malevolence said:
They already are. China has 30yr contracts in place to mine all manner of Rare Earth Elements in Afghanistan, so once the US has left expect a massive surge of Chinese.
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I'd guess the Chinese will face the same problems as everyone else in Afghanistan. Whether they can afford the cost of business there will be interesting to see.
 
potatolord said:
I'd guess the Chinese will face the same problems as everyone else in Afghanistan. Whether they can afford the cost of business there will be interesting to see.
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Beijing doesn't give a damn about who happens to be in charge, so that's one major obstacle out of the way.
 
potatolord said:
I'd guess the Chinese will face the same problems as everyone else in Afghanistan. Whether they can afford the cost of business there will be interesting to see.
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Not really. The Western forces had to fight with one hand tied behind their backs by the red tape of the Geneva Convention and other such human rights treaties. The Chinese don't give a **** about any of that rubbish, they'll kerb stomp the Taliban, and any civilians, if they start to cause any serious problems for them.
 
Malevolence said:
They already are. China has 30yr contracts in place to mine all manner of Rare Earth Elements in Afghanistan, so once the US has left expect a massive surge of Chinese.
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And if it's anything like their operations in Africa, they will properly bully the locals and bribe officials to get away with all sort of stuff they shouldn't be doing.

The Chinese government will not tolorate the Islamists once bit though. They don't even tolorate the moderate ones inside their own country. Afghans will be wishing the US never left.
 
Malevolence said:
Not really. The Western forces had to fight with one hand tied behind their backs by the red tape of the Geneva Convention and other such human rights treaties. The Chinese don't give a **** about any of that rubbish, they'll kerb stomp the Taliban, and any civilians, if they start to cause any serious problems for them.
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I doubt it. They'll need to protect their expensive investments on the ground. Their force projection hasn't been tested since the limited war with Vietnam in the late 70s.

And that's without the US and Russia using the Afghans for yet another proxy war.
 
The Taliban are hardy little cretins. You could argue they beat both the USSR and the US. The war was probably a cover to go into Iraq for the oil anyway, who knows why they went to war. China's rise to wealth and power has been incredible it will be interesting to see what the future holds. Surely a big war brewing though.
 
Nasher said:
Should never have bothered. We should have taken out the key threats and left it at that. We can't change the middle east. The only thing which has changed there in 1000s of years is they got hold of modern(ish) weapons from more advanced civilizations, the mentality is unchanged.
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Indeed. It's one of the most corrupt countries in the world, ideologically opposed to the West and saw us as an occupying force. It was always going to be a forever war when efforts to install Governments, make peace with the local war lords amounted to "how much will you keep paying me?".

Spoke to groups of young soldiers in the 2000's when out drinking who said it was hopeless, that it was like the stone age but with mobile phones and guns.

We call it Afghanistan but it's just really a rag tag place of lawless regions full of war lords loosely stitched together.
 
All that matters - is there is still a "private" presence that means if you even **** with a gas pipeline, you will get wrecked. What happens elsewhere no one cares. Eventually Russian interests will fund insurgent interests with decent enough kit to **** up the pipelines.
Afghanistans people have still not benefited in over 50 years of conflict.
 
If anyone can do it, China can. They've got endless experience locking up millions in "educational camps" within a few short years whilst working to wipe out an ethnic group they don't like. They have the resources to install infrastructure via huge work force, endless building capabilities both small & large, all the while giving zero concern for human life. They could lock down Afgan to the point of being one giant prison then carpet bomb the rest.

I don't see them bothering though, what for? Just keep it small scale, low ball stuff.
 
Tuppy_Glossop said:
IMO, the best way to achieve results would have been to not send troops, but to pay top dollar for the farmers' opiate supplies. Poppies are the highest value crop they can grow, and if the farmers are making money, the whole community is happier, healthier, better educated, richer, and they don't need to rely on the Taleban. Indeed, given the Taleban are anti-Poppy Farming, the farmers would fight back. The West could use the poppies medically, give free heroin to addicts to avoid 'fix money' crimes, or simply destroy them.

EDIT: plus you cut the criminal gangs and traffickers out of the equation!
Click to expand...

What would have been sensible is replacing the opium crops with cotton, perfectly viable crop for the region but the USA will not fund anything that will compete with its own farmers. So opium is the only thing they can grow and sell
 
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