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On leaving Afghanistan...


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We're leaving Afghanistan.  And what are we leaving...?

 

According to these British reporters, quite a lot.  :huh:

 

 

 

 

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I have mixed emotions on this, 20 years is a long time and I'm glad our boys are coming home. On the other hand keeping the Taliban at bay is pretty important. Hmmmm...................

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Sorry.  We should have been OUT of Afghanistan 20 Years ago.  There was no real reason to be there in the first place.  A never-ending conflict based on political crap.

 

Keeping the Taliban at bay is NOT our problem.  It is THEIR problem.  20 years of propping up the Afghan Politic and Military and they fold up and run faster than ice cream in Texas.  If they aren't willing to fight for their country they deserve what they get.  

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2 minutes ago, Colorado Coffinmaker said:

Sorry.  We should have been OUT of Afghanistan 20 Years ago.  There was no real reason to be there in the first place.  A never-ending conflict based on political crap.

 

Keeping the Taliban at bay is NOT our problem.  It is THEIR problem.  20 years of propping up the Afghan Politic and Military and they fold up and run faster than ice cream in Texas.  If they aren't willing to fight for their country they deserve what they get.  

I agree. 
 

 

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All that material was left to the Afgan military as part of the withdraw process. They are the ones that abandoned it.

 

I hear China has its sights on Afghanistan. They think they can exploit the vast mineral deposits in the country. 

 

Guess they are no better than the British Empire, Russians, or Americans when it comes to learning from history.

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24 minutes ago, Sedalia Dave said:

Guess they are no better than the British Empire, Russians, or Americans when it comes to learning from history.


I expect if the Chinese go to Afghanistan the British, Americans, Russians and the Taliban will get schooled on what unrestrained and brutal military action looks like.  The Chinese will not play nice.

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10 minutes ago, J-BAR #18287 said:


I expect if the Chinese go to Afghanistan the British, Americans, Russians and the Taliban will get schooled on what unrestrained and brutal military action looks like.  The Chinese will not play nice.

The Afghans have never played nice. To them, war is a way of life. If they’re not fighting outside invaders, from Alexander the Great to the United States, they fight among themselves between tribes. 
 

The Chinese will face the same fate as the last 2000 years of armies.  

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14 minutes ago, J-BAR #18287 said:


I expect if the Chinese go to Afghanistan the British, Americans, Russians and the Taliban will get schooled on what unrestrained and brutal military action looks like.  The Chinese will not play nice.

 

Exactly, Chinese will show exactly how war's should be fought. No one, and exactly no one will survive. Unless you want to feed them your supply of rice.

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Afghanistan =  Where great empires go to die. Many "empires" have tried to occupy or conquer what is today known as Afghanistan, none have been successful for any real length of time.

 

I'm glad that we are pulling our troops out of that God forsaken place. 

 

The Chinese only want Afghanistan for one reason, it's huge mineral deposits. The Country is rich in copper, gold basalt and many other natural resources. That is one of the real reasons the US stayed there so long, the lithium deposits. The Afghan lithium deposits are quite possibly the largest in the World. Lithium has a wide range of modern uses, as you might know, such as lithium batteries and nuclear bomb fuel. Gee, I wonder why China would want those items? 

 

The Chinese will be ruthless and inhumane, just they always have been. The World will bitch, moan and threaten sanctions. The Chinese, like always, will care less what the World thinks of their military tactics. They, like all who came before, will not succeed in conquering Afghanistan and they will withdraw....but not before getting what they came for.

 

It's premature yet but....Welcome Back Home Troops and Thank You. :FlagAm:

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The U.S. didn't learn from the mistakes we & the French made in Vietnam and the mistakes the Russians made in Afghanistan.  It is virtually impossible  to defeat an insurgent force if they have safe havens that can not be attacked.  As long as the Taliban could cross back over the border ( a border they don't recognize) into Pakistan, the Taliban were not going to be defeated.  Even if Pakistan was willing to take on the Taliban in their country, it is likely the Pakistani would have faced the same drawn out conflict that the U.S. was facing.

 

The British never really tried to conquer Afghanistan, there was nothing there worth the effort, so the British never really "failed" in Afghanistan.  The British approach to the situation was to bribe whoever was in charge in Kabul a sum of money each year to discourage the raids into British India .  In return the British would be allowed to assign a Resident (part ambassador, part spy) and have access to the major north/south passes to make sure the Russians were not trying to move south.

 

The tribal areas were on both sides of the border and the tribes didn't recognize either the Afghan government or the British government.  This led to cross border raids and a couple of small wars from 1838 until the British left India in 1947.  The frequent skirmishes caused the Gurkha & Indian soldiers to become very experienced light infantry, especially in rugged terrain and led to their successes in WWI & WWII. 

 

As an aside, the British were the only major power that won their "Vietnam".  First during the Malaya Emergency (1948-1960) and against Indonesia (1963-1966).

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Since Korea we've been trying to win wars without killing anyone. Can't be done. That and battle plans being determined at the White House.

I remember seeing a photograph of Johnson, McNamara and Kissenger looking at a map on a table in the Oval office. They were discussing the bombing strategy for Hanoi.

You go to war you tell the commanders do whatever you need to win and let them alone.

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I seem to recall that the Russians didn't play nice when they tried exploiting Afghanistan. Didn't do them much good.

 

Wonder which countries will send the Taliban arms to thwart China's plans to exploit the natural resources.

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7 minutes ago, Sedalia Dave said:

I seem to recall that the Russians didn't play nice when they tried exploiting Afghanistan. Didn't do them much good.

 

Wonder which countries will send the Taliban arms to thwart China's plans to exploit the natural resources.

The Russians definitely did not play nice, they even targeted children with explosives inside of toys and the Russian Army does not have fond memories of Afghanistan, what little I've read suggests that Russian troops who served in Afghanistan were treated as bad or worse than returning American troops who served in Vietnam.

 

Putin isn't stupid and I would be surprised if he DIDN'T help the Taliban against the Chinese, he has to think that sooner or later Russia and China are going to end up as adversaries.

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1 hour ago, Sedalia Dave said:

I seem to recall that the Russians didn't play nice when they tried exploiting Afghanistan. Didn't do them much good.

 

Wonder which countries will send the Taliban arms to thwart China's plans to exploit the natural resources.


I doubt it would/will last long enough for outside help to make a difference.  There aren’t going to be any news reports from Afghanistan after the Chinese arrive.  A quick massive takeover from top to bottom.  The Chinese will not differentiate between Taliban and non-Taliban.  Every person there will be at risk.  There won’t be enough native Afghanies left to resist.  There are plenty of Chinese nationals to send into the country to repopulate it.

 

I think the Chinese are smart enough to learn from everyone else’s experience.  Go in fast and overwhelming and they can stay or leave as they desire.

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2 hours ago, J-BAR #18287 said:


I expect if the Chinese go to Afghanistan the British, Americans, Russians and the Taliban will get schooled on what unrestrained and brutal military action looks like.  The Chinese will not play nice.

But in the end....they too will give up and go home.

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Here’s a situation I could see happening with the inept morons in government (and this is regardless of party in power).

China invades Afghanistan and the US supplies arms and aid to the Taliban. 
 

Why? There’s no money to be made off of our bad guys being dead. 

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14 minutes ago, Pat Riot, SASS #13748 said:

Here’s a situation I could see happening with the inept morons in government (and this is regardless of party in power).

China invades Afghanistan and the US supplies arms and aid to the Taliban. 
 

Why? There’s no money to be made off of our bad guys being dead. 

I wish you were wrong.  We supplied the tribes who became the Taliban while they were fighting the Soviets. 
 

An enemy of my enemy is my “friend”.  This philosophy can make for strange bedfellows. 

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4 hours ago, Pat Riot, SASS #13748 said:

Here’s a situation I could see happening with the inept morons in government (and this is regardless of party in power).

China invades Afghanistan and the US supplies arms and aid to the Taliban. 
 

Why? There’s no money to be made off of our bad guys being dead. 

Sounds like we're arming the Taliban pretty well. The stuff is just there for the taking.

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I just hope we remember the American lives lost and ruined by horrific injuries. I hope we don't forget them!:FlagAm:

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Good, bad or indifferent we went in and thousands of people relied on us.  Just like Viet Nam and a few other places we pull out and tens of thousands get slaughtered.  The length of time in country is irrelevant.  We have been in Korea since 1950,  We still have thousands of troops in Germany.  You cannot win a war with indigenous guerilla fighters.  I guess our polititians have not figured that out.

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9 hours ago, J-BAR #18287 said:


I doubt it would/will last long enough for outside help to make a difference.  There aren’t going to be any news reports from Afghanistan after the Chinese arrive.  A quick massive takeover from top to bottom.  The Chinese will not differentiate between Taliban and non-Taliban.  Every person there will be at risk.  There won’t be enough native Afghanies left to resist.  There are plenty of Chinese nationals to send into the country to repopulate it.

 

I think the Chinese are smart enough to learn from everyone else’s experience.  Go in fast and overwhelming and they can stay or leave as they desire.

Bingo. The taliban won’t be safe in Pakistan or anywhere else once the Chinese take over. 

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11 hours ago, J-BAR #18287 said:


I expect if the Chinese go to Afghanistan the British, Americans, Russians and the Taliban will get schooled on what unrestrained and brutal military action looks like.  The Chinese will not play nice.

I agree. China will not play nice and will not have Rules of Engagement. 

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"When you're wounded and left on Afghanistan's plains,
And the women come out to cut up what remains,
Jest roll to your rifle and blow out your brains
An' go to your Gawd like a soldier...."

 

 

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I imagine if the Chinese government cannot harness and direct the activities of the Islamists, there will be a new genocide.

Any bets?

 

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4 hours ago, Cold Lake Kid, SASS # 51474 said:

I imagine if the Chinese government cannot harness and direct the activities of the Islamists, there will be a new genocide.

Any bets?

 

 

Genocide against Islam may result in a few other Islamic countries getting involved. The aid doesn't have to just be military troops. OPEC can cut off exports to China and hit them where it hurts big time. China is no longer oil independent and relies heavily on oil imports.

 

China has lots of shiny new military toys that have never been battle tested. Based on conversations I have had with people that have done business in China, they are very good at copying via industrial espionage. However, the quality of their copies is not very good.

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A thing that is really embarrassing me as a Canadian is the inaction of our current government and our Prime Minister, in it's failure to ensure the safety of the Afghans who worked with Canadian troops and are now in grave danger through Canadian government inaction.

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I think the Chinese will only focus on the northern region for their Belt & Road Initiative. The Chinese already had their hooks into some mining initiatives when I was there in 2009/2010, but they never really took off...most likely the security challenges. The country is very undeveloped and quite corrupt. Most will change their mind on a subject based upon where the money is on a given day. Western values were never going to take hold over there, especially in 95% of the country which is beyond third world. I would not be surprised to see China move into Bagram AFB (paying the Afghan government handsomely for it and promising to keep them in power) and use that as their HQ to try and keep their Road & Belt Initiative open and extend their reach over the region...but I don't think the Chinese will bother with anything in the southern 2/3's of the country...I think they will just leave that to the Taliban and the Warlords to sort out and the control of the Afghan government will be greatly diminished until such time as the Chinese might decide to wring their hands of it.

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3 hours ago, Cold Lake Kid, SASS # 51474 said:

A thing that is really embarrassing me as a Canadian is the inaction of our current government and our Prime Minister, in it's failure to ensure the safety of the Afghans who worked with Canadian troops and are now in grave danger through Canadian government inaction.

My government appears to be being just as inactive on the subject too   :(

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So I am pretty close to this topic right now and I think we are all better off out of there.

 

It will be messy for a while but self interest will out in the end and I am sure there will be compromises made all round.

 

So far as China going in, that could be the best thing for all of us (not the Afghans).

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On 7/15/2021 at 3:13 PM, Cold Lake Kid, SASS # 51474 said:

I imagine if the Chinese government cannot harness and direct the activities of the Islamists, there will be a new genocide.

Any bets?

 

I wouldn't bet a wooden nickel concerning that place. No the ChiComs won't play nice. From what I gather neither do the Afghans. Every superpower in history that have drawn cards in that game have left with their tail between their legs. History would seem to tell us the ChiComs may well be no different. Quien sabe?

JHC

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A key similarity between Vietnam and Afghanistan is that we were forced to spend billions of dollars and waste thousands of lives to prop up a dysfunctional and corrupt government that couldn't stand on its own without us. The moment we leave they'll fold as fast as a lawn chair in a hurricane, just like the South Vietnamese did.

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I’m of the mindset of Jean Baptiste Alphonse Karr on this one.

“Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.”

So, that part of the world matters not to me. Sort of like Chicago.

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