Yeah, how about no?
8/11/12 12:52![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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talkpoliticshttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/faheem-younus/give-afghanistan-schools-today-or-dont-blame-islam-tomorrow_b_2059098.html
This article has at its core one noble sentiment, namely that the USA, having broken Afghanistan further than it was already broken by a civil war that had lasted 20 years and counting in 2001 has a responsibility for the mess there now. It then goes on to argue that this should mean the USA should dedicate itself to nation-building, i.e. imperialism for those too squeamish and cowardly to use the proper word that actually belongs to this concept. The problem with this is that both the UK and Russia in varying forms, two societies nobody can accuse of cowardice or cutting and running also tried this. That the country's now in its 33rd year of a civil war indicates that the attempts before this one were utter, complete failures.
Now granted, whenever the US military in all its esteemed wisdom settles down somewhere, it only leaves if it's literally hurled out of there like the Hulk on Loki. This is a rather annoying pattern of US power politics that is less dodgy when there's no ongoing war in a particular region and the trade component of those bases at least ensures that it's not costing the USA necessarily as much as a sustained war in Central Asia would. We've waged this war for over 11 years and the lump sum of our efforts is that the Afghans have gone from wanting to blow up the Bamiyan Buddhas by themselves to using China's help in order that another pair are likely to be blown up.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/nov/15/mining-threatens-afghanistan-buddhist-treasures
If after 12 years of wasting money on a war that started for one reason but now straggles on for the sheer inertia of war and the US military's twin inabilities to ever leave a place it arrives in and necessity to justify its perpetual stays, that's all we've managed to do, I would say that perhaps we'd best just quit while we're ahead and not have a repetition of Saigon when it turns out that the Taliban, now aided by ten years of war against us and once more consisting of 50% or more Pakistani Army regulars take over Afghanistan again and the Karzai regime's feckless and incapable of sustaining itself.
Enough is enough. The USA should just quit this war before it hurts itself and Afghanistan worse than what's already going on.
This article has at its core one noble sentiment, namely that the USA, having broken Afghanistan further than it was already broken by a civil war that had lasted 20 years and counting in 2001 has a responsibility for the mess there now. It then goes on to argue that this should mean the USA should dedicate itself to nation-building, i.e. imperialism for those too squeamish and cowardly to use the proper word that actually belongs to this concept. The problem with this is that both the UK and Russia in varying forms, two societies nobody can accuse of cowardice or cutting and running also tried this. That the country's now in its 33rd year of a civil war indicates that the attempts before this one were utter, complete failures.
Now granted, whenever the US military in all its esteemed wisdom settles down somewhere, it only leaves if it's literally hurled out of there like the Hulk on Loki. This is a rather annoying pattern of US power politics that is less dodgy when there's no ongoing war in a particular region and the trade component of those bases at least ensures that it's not costing the USA necessarily as much as a sustained war in Central Asia would. We've waged this war for over 11 years and the lump sum of our efforts is that the Afghans have gone from wanting to blow up the Bamiyan Buddhas by themselves to using China's help in order that another pair are likely to be blown up.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/nov/15/mining-threatens-afghanistan-buddhist-treasures
If after 12 years of wasting money on a war that started for one reason but now straggles on for the sheer inertia of war and the US military's twin inabilities to ever leave a place it arrives in and necessity to justify its perpetual stays, that's all we've managed to do, I would say that perhaps we'd best just quit while we're ahead and not have a repetition of Saigon when it turns out that the Taliban, now aided by ten years of war against us and once more consisting of 50% or more Pakistani Army regulars take over Afghanistan again and the Karzai regime's feckless and incapable of sustaining itself.
Enough is enough. The USA should just quit this war before it hurts itself and Afghanistan worse than what's already going on.
(no subject)
Date: 8/11/12 22:01 (UTC)Then there's the part where you can't really accuse the average person there of being such a savage.
(no subject)
Date: 8/11/12 23:44 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/11/12 23:49 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 9/11/12 00:22 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 9/11/12 01:54 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 9/11/12 03:07 (UTC)and treat all other would-be allies like Quislings that they are. The end goal after all is not to conquer the country but to destroy their culture and replace it with one more compatible with our own.
(no subject)
Date: 9/11/12 12:34 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 9/11/12 13:47 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 9/11/12 14:28 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 9/11/12 18:54 (UTC)Kind of like using the term "Kinetic Operations" in place of "Military Intervention" or "Bomb all the brown people!"
(no subject)
Date: 12/11/12 00:56 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 12/11/12 19:16 (UTC)