Afghanistan - 20 years on

Swedish and Dutch embassies seem to have screwed over their local staff:


Malevolence said:
The Taliban, a brutal, totalitarian Islamist terrorist organisation that treats women worse than dirt and murders gays, are on Twitter yet Trump, an idiot, but a legitimately elected idiot, is banned. That says a lot.
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LOL, yup rather inconsistent in their approach there!
 
GreatAuk said:
There were reports of widespread 'deals' and bribery of local officials, so it may well have seemed like there was a big organised plot to those seeing it play out in person.

I did think it was an interesting thread, and hope there will be more stories like that from different people to help flesh out what happened. However, part of that particular story doesn't make much sense to me: he "somehow" got pushed onto a military plane by his colleagues without any prior arrangement? It sounds like the military are being pretty tight about who gets on their planes, but he 'somehow' just gets on? Doesn't feel like he's telling the truth about that aspect.
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Largely just face saving exercise though some interesting information in there.
 
Looks like it mirrors the first occupancies of the second world war where hitler marched into countries without a fight.

Seems history repeats itself again though, kind of reminds me of vietnam.

I know the taliban are been active in the news and on social media this time but I dont think for one moment brutality and human rights abuses wont happen.
 
Rroff said:
Can't see the Taliban invading any of the surrounding countries though hah.
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Yup, they've gone for the name Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan not Caliphate. Despite the northern neighbours having provided assistance to the US coalition over the past 20 years there probably isn't a desire to do much beyond Afghanistan's borders in that region.

Uzbekistan shot down one Afghan military plane and has arrested a bunch of pilots & soldiers who have fled, noises about them possibly being handed back to the Taliban (which one US Senator is trying to get the US State Department to stop).

Seems that Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan were already holding friendly talks with the Taliban, Tajikistan, however, hasn't so far been friendly, has complained about terrorist groups at its border posts and has taken in some Afghan soldiers.
 
dowie said:
Tajikistan, however, hasn't so far been friendly, has complained about terrorist groups at its border posts and has taken in some Afghan soldiers.
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IIRC they have strong Russian links and are not at all friendly towards the Taliban - and if the Taliban moved against them that is unlikely to end well.
 
Listening to Biden tonight, I agree with a lot he has to say. But surely the intelligence had to have been there that this would all fall apart and fast as soon as the military was pulled out?

This will be a rinse and repeat when there is another attack on US soil.
 
Rroff said:
IIRC they have strong Russian links and are not at all friendly towards the Taliban - and if the Taliban moved against them that is unlikely to end well.
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The Russians have a semi-top secret deep space monitoring station (Okno) just over the border in the Tajikistan. And also, the Russians have recently brokered a deal with the Tajik government to lease four bases (I think it's four) for 29 years in return for fully modernising them, a steady supply of modern Russian arms, intelligence sharing and training the Tajik military officers in Russia.

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So Russia will more than likely defend the Tajikistan border with everything it's got if the Taliban start to try their luck there. I'm still saying that if the Taliban do try to encroach past their borders, then my guess would still be the Pakistan tribal areas of Waziristan, which I believe is referred to as the Islamic Emirate of Waziristan by the Pakistan Taliban.
 
StriderX said:
The huge refugee numbers in 'Islamic' countries defies this statement.

I think the statement might continue to be true for countries that make up the Arab Peninsula, which is aggravating considering their immense wealth, but I suppose it's understandable that refugees aren't likely to choose (if they even have a choice) a desert over more arid countries like Lebanon or Turkey.
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You mean the bordering countries that they pass thru on route to the west.

Why don't they ever go east? Or South?
 
BowdonUK said:
In a poll in 2017 99% of Afghanistan people wanted Sharia law.

https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-ta...key-findings-in-the-u-s-and-around-the-world/ (scroll half way down the screen). It was the highest percentage of any country.

The Taliban wouldn't have been able to sweep across the country if they didn't have support from the ordinary people.
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Yes ordinary people, women children and old unarmed men standing up to armed battle hardened religious fanatics.

Please, think before posting
 
2StepSteve said:
Listening to Biden tonight, I agree with a lot he has to say. But surely the intelligence had to have been there that this would all fall apart and fast as soon as the military was pulled out?

This will be a rinse and repeat when there is another attack on US soil.
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Biden has absolutely zero credibility.

He said in July there was little chance of exactly all this happening.

 
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Colonel_Klinck said:
And do what? As soon as the Taliban start doing something the troops don't like what do they do? How long before the soldiers start getting abused and then attacked? It would just take one incident to kick it off, a few people on each side get shot and then we right back in it. We are either fully in or fully out. Its time to get fully out. If they request our help that is a different matter. Can't see it happening though.
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Taliban had no opportunity during our last few year of limited deployment there. Small costs and presence influence in the region. Air support for the ANA. We weren't fully in since 2015... unless you know different ?

The issues started with this new cut and run policy using empty slogans like "20 years is enough" "end endless wars"

Unless there is a grand plan behind all this, have influence with the taliban. Maybe that's why we are using language like waiting to see what their women's rights policy is before recognising them. On face value it just looks like it was a political decision for a maybe a few extra votes for Biden as ultimately he "brought the troops home".

Edit. On another note, it asks questions on us as in the UK, should we try have more of an independent foreign policy instead blindly following the US? And if so we need to redesign our plans for future MoD investment. This shows how projection of personnel is just as important as "cyber" which seems to be the main effort for the bean counters.
 
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Malevolence said:
The Taliban, a brutal, totalitarian Islamist terrorist organisation that treats women worse than dirt and murders gays, are on Twitter yet Trump, an idiot, but a legitimately elected idiot, is banned. That says a lot.
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Trump fully deserved his ban for encouraging an insurrection and fashioning the Big Lie to undermine the legitimate election that he lost but his ego couldn't accept, a lie he still continues to this day.
 
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