In its waning days, the Soviet Union made the bad strategic mistake of invading Afghanistan. As fans of Rambo III are aware, the United States armed and supported a group of Afghan fighters against the Soviet Union, fighters who became the Taliban. Now, several generations later, the Taliban are about to take over Afghanistan. This is a disaster for the half of the population that happens to be female but it was entirely predictable. The “fall” of Afghanistan will be an embarrassing debacle for America and for Biden but it will, I think, be nothing more in American politics then a nine days wonder.
Meanwhile, the inexorable progress of the Delta variant has
now filled the emergency rooms and ICUs in red America and will in the next
week or two produce a spike in deaths and chaos as schools open. Can DeSantis
survive the disaster he has inflicted on Floridians? We shall see.
Even a mild case of Parkinson’s being what it is, I do not
think I can participate in marches but I feel the need to act and the only
thing I can think to do is to donate to progressive candidates and
organizations around the country. We need to do everything we can to survive
the next 10 years. As Kierkegaard observes in his magnificent preface to the
Philosophical Fragments:
“When Philip threatened to lay siege to the city of Corinth
and all its inhabitants hastily bestirred themselves in defense, some polishing
weapons, some gathering stones, some repairing the walls, Diogenes seeing all
this hurriedly folded his mantle about him and began to roll his tub zealously
back and forth through the streets. When he was asked why he did this he
replied that he wished to be busy like all the rest, and rolled his tub lest he
should be the only idler among so many industrious citizens.”
24 comments:
The United States has, by my count, managed to successfully end two wars - the Revolutionary War and WWII. Aiding the Mujahideen was yet another Cold War blunder. The SU, while on its last legs, was still fully capable of doing what was needed in Afghanistan while we aren't. Saudi Arabia is more the actual enemy here - forget baby Hitler and go back a little further and strangle baby al-Wahhab. The coming Covid caused death counts and school opening fiascos will lead to reporting on Afghanistan being neglected.
My spidy sense tell me that blow-back against the right over Covid will be a thing ( also the dead don't vote). Rather then contributing to "progressive candidates and organizations around the country," it might be better to target the left-most viable candidates in critical districts and states. You might also consider the coming recall in California (more Progressive Era foolishness) which has the potential to change the Senate as well as screw up the world's fifth largest economy.
Yes to all of that
It seems the Taliban are sweeping through Kabul as we speak. Read here:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fall_of_Kabul_(2021)
The USA is sending 3,000 troops & the British are sending the second largest contingent of 600 troops. I believe Italy & Germany are sending some paratroopers. BTW I was thinking about what Herman Melville wrote when he said 'BLOODY BATTLE IN AFGHANISTAN' in the First Chapter of Moby Dick. In A Dictionary of the English Language, Samuel Johnson says BLOODY-MINDED is defined as: Cruel; inclined to bloodshed. Herman Melville may have had that dictionary when writing Moby Dick. I just hope British troops & all of the other Allied Forces don't find themselves in another Black Hawk Down like what happened to the American troops in Somalia back in the 1990s.
aaall,
Saudi Arabia is more the actual enemy here - forget baby Hitler and go back a little further and strangle baby al-Wahhab.
Yes, you have to kill the queen bee. Except that the queen bee is morphing.
Rapper Nicki Minaj has cancelled a scheduled performance in Saudi Arabia next week, citing her support for the rights of women and the LGBT community.
Her headline billing at the festival in Jeddah triggered an outcry from critics of the country's human rights record.
Others questioned how her revealing outfits and explicit lyrics would go over in the ultra-conservative kingdom.
Saudi Arabia has been trying to ease restrictions on entertainment and to encourage growth in its arts sector. —BBC
"ultra-conservative kingdom" ...
Nicki Minaj twerking in Saudi Arabia. Did you see the outrage from the Saudi clerics?
No? Me neither. The silence is deafening.
Interesting point, Ahmed. Let me ask Jamal Khashoggi. Moving on, perhaps we should ponder Yemen. Saudi Arabia has long financed extremist and reactionary religious activities around the world. Fifteen of the nineteen folks who did 911 were Saudis and we still don't know the whole story. Should we really draw much from a Potemkin arts project?
aaall,
There's always a power struggle in Saudi Arabia between the House of Saud and the clerics. To understand that, you have to go back to 1979.
The Grand Mosque seizure occurred during November and December 1979 when extremist insurgents calling for the overthrow of the House of Saud took over Masjid al-Haram, the holiest mosque in Islam, in Mecca, Saudi Arabia. The insurgents declared that the Mahdi (the "redeemer of Islam") had arrived in the form of one of their leaders – Mohammed Abdullah al-Qahtani – and called on Muslims to obey him. For nearly two weeks Saudi Special Forces, advised by French commandos, fought pitched battles to reclaim the compound.
Following the attack, the Saudi King Khaled implemented a stricter enforcement of Shariah (Islamic law) and he gave the ulama and religious conservatives more power over the next decade, and religious police became more assertive.
Al-Otaybi had turned against al-Baaz "and began advocating a return to the original ways of Islam, among other things: a repudiation of the West; abolition of television and expulsion of non-Muslims." He proclaimed that "the ruling Al-Saud dynasty had lost its legitimacy because it was corrupt, ostentatious and had destroyed Saudi culture by an aggressive policy of Westernization."
source: Grand Mosque seizure
MbS, yeah that guy, has taken power away from the clerics, jailing one of them for making a Twitter tweet about ending the rift between Saudi Arabia and Qatar.
Saudi Arabia has long financed extremist and reactionary religious activities around the world.
One estimate is that during the reign of King Fahd (1982 to 2005), over $75 billion was spent in efforts to spread Wahhabi Islam. —source: International propagation of Salafism and Wahhabism
Potemkin arts project?
Yes, I thought so at first, but you can only go so far with this before you start to lose followers.
On Afghanistan, here is a quote From Greville Diaries of 180 years ago (November 30th 1842), discussing the British withdrawal after the fist Afghan War:
“In the midst of all our successes (a successful evacuation of British personnel from Afghanistan) , however, the simple truth is that Akbar Khan and the Afghans have gained their object completely. We had placed a puppet king on the throne, and we kept him there and held military possession of the country by a body of our troops. They resolved to get rid of our king and our troops and to resume their barbarous independence; they massacred all our people civil and military, and they afterwards put to death the king. We lost all hold over the country except the fortresses we continued to occupy. Our recent expedition was, in fact, undertaken merely to get back the prisoners who had escaped with their lives from the general slaughter, and having got them we have once for all abandoned the country, leaving to the Afghans the unmolested possession of the liberty they had acquired, and not attempting to replace upon their necks the yoke they so roughly shook off. There is after all, no great cause for rejoicing and triumph in all this.”
Of course it is only SOME Afghans nowadays that will be enjoying liberty, barbarous or otherwise.
Another irony. In a recent revival of Sherlock Holmes set in the present day featuring Cumberbatch and Freeman as Holmes & Watson, Watson could figure WITHOUT ANACHRONISM as a veteran of the Afghan Wars, as in the original stories.
We never learn.
Meanwhile right before our eyes we will be seeing re-runs of the heart-stopping scenes in The Killing Fields as associates of the Americans run and struggle for seats on the last helicopters departing from Phnom Penh as the Khmer rouge closes in. Perhaps the Taliban will be more merciful, allowing them to depart in peace. Let's hope so.
I am at a loss for words in the face of such a misjudgment of the situation by politicians. Now the German foreign minister stammers something about: "Soldiers are on the way"... and " ... what is necessary is being done". I really wonder how far away from reality these people are.
A week ago I watched on the TV channel "ARTE" (German/French TV channel) the 9 hour documentary "Vietnam" by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick. On the eve of the evacuation of the last Americans from the roof of the embassy in Saigon, a request from the Pentagon went to the embassy on the ground asking them to assess the situation. Response: we do not expect the Viet Kong to reach downtown Saigon in the next few weeks. Only hours later, the blue and red flag was flying on the embassy building.
I am saddened and angered by the Taliban victory. Ultimately, Pres. Biden is going to be blamed for underestimating the Taliban strength, and overestimating the Afghan army’s willingness to resist a return to radical Islamic autocracy.
Yet, it was the Afghan army’s responsibility to show a willingness to resist. Without such determination, the U.S. could not fight for them, and had not obligation to do so, if they were not willing to do so for themselves. According to a report on CNN today, they outnumbered the Taliban 308,000 personnel to 58,000 to 100,000 Taliban. They had more modern equipment than the Taliban. The Taliban spokesperson, Shaheen, says that they had the advantage because they were seen as a grass-roots force resisting foreign domination.
But still, given the Taliban’s past history of executing those whom they regarded as irreligious, their oppression of women, their restrictions on speech, etc., one would have thought that secular Afghans would have put up a better fight. If such a civil war were to occur in the U.S. (and who knows, it may), I am confident that those of us who value freedom of speech and equality of women would go into the streets and fight with our fists if necessary. Prof. Wolff, even with his Parkinson’s would do what he could to resist tyranny, even in the face of possible torture. We of the boomer generation were raised on movies which extolled resistance to bullies, like the Magnificent Seven, in which the Mexican peasants finally rise up to join the American mercenaries to rout the Mexican bandits who have been abusing them for years. Why was this spirit missing in the Afghan army personnel? Could it be part of the Islamic culture? After all, the word “Islam” means “submission.” While it is supposed to be submission to Allah, would it not also mean submission to Allah’s spokespeople on Earth, the Taliban?
It is my understanding that we can't analyze the Afghan situation without reference to Pakistan. Pakistan doesn't have a border with Afghanistan, just what is euphemistically referred to as "the line of control." Pakistan is also frequently credited (bad word choice) with creating the Taliban, and training them in the religious center that is Quetta. Taliban fighters withdraw to Pakistan every winter. It is a great system for Pakistan, which exercises considerable influence in Afghanistan, as it guarantees a safe border on one side while allowing the army to focus on India.
As Charles Pigden has noted, we are the latest hegemonic power to have learned nothing from the past, and as aaall has noted, the Saudi's have a big part to play as well. Without regard to cogent analysis, the right is going all out to pin the blame for the fall of Afghanistan to the Taliban on Biden. Leaving movies aside, a villager in Afghanistan was being extorted by government forces during the day, and by the Taliban at night. There never a good option in sight there.
So, what do we gain in our alliance with Pakistan that compensates for its support of the Taliban, its confrontations with India over control of the Kashmir, its own abuse of women who seek education, etc. Avoidance of nuclear war, given Pakistan's arsenal?
Another Anonymous,
The expression, "it is better to die on your feet than to live on your knees", is generally spoken from a seated position.
That was said to me about 40 years ago by a Chilean underground resistance fighter against the Pinochet dictatorship who knew from personal experience what it means to risk your life for a good cause.
s. wallerstein,
I understand that some are willing to make that choice for the sake of survival. But there are many cases in history of people who have been willing to make that sacrifice for freedom – the Chinese protesters at Tiananmen Square and more recently in Hong Kong; the Jewish rebels during the Warsaw Ghetto uprising; those who followed Castro to defeat Batista. And I am confident that if Trump had succeeded in his insurrection and imposed martial law on this country, that thousands would have taken to the streets and risked their lives to resist his turning this country into a dictatorship. Plus, the Afghans were not fighting from a disadvantaged position – they had more personnel, equipment and a modern airforce compared to the Taliban. They had advantages that he Chines rebels did not have.
Regarding Pakistan:
https://pk.usembassy.gov/our-relationship/policy-history/us-assistance-to-pakistan/:
“Since 2009, the U.S. government has committed over $5 billion in civilian assistance to Pakistan and over $1 billion in emergency humanitarian response.
During Pakistan’s 2019-2020 fiscal year, the United States was once again the top donor country to Pakistan of on-budget, grant-based assistance. U.S. assistance to Pakistan is always in the form of grants, which does not add to Pakistan’s debt burden or balance of payments challenges.”
Why do we continue to provide such a large amount of financial assistance to a country which provided a safe haven for our enemy, the Taliban?
Most Americans do not know the history of Pakistan’s formation. It was created in 1947 by the forced partition of India, a partition that was imposed upon India by the Moslem minority population, a population which was not indigenous to India, having invaded India multiple times, beginning in 1398 with Tamerlane, recurring in 1519 with Babur, establishing the Mughal Empire. Under its leader, Mohammed Jinnah, the Moslem minority demanded that, with the departure of the British, India be divided in order to accommodate the Moslems’ desire for a nation of their own in which they would be the majority, a division which Mahatma Gandhi opposed and advocated against, but which Jinnah insisted occur, or, as Jinnah put it, “We shall have India divided, or we shall have India destroyed.” [Freedom at Midnight, Larry Collins and Dominique Lapierre, 1975, p. 36.] The turmoil and hostilities caused by the forced migration of 10 to 12 million people – Hindus and Sikhs forced to move from the Punjab and Bengal into the reconfigured India, and Moslems from India into the Punjab and Bengal – and the armed conflicts and bloodshed that ensued resulted in the deaths of an estimated 2 million people [https://www.quora.com/How-many-Hindu-Muslims-died-at-the-time-of-partition-in-1947], compared to the deaths of approximately 116,100 Jews/Israelis and Arabs/Palestinians over the span of the multiple Jewish-Israeli/Palestinian-Arab disputes and conflicts [https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/total-casualties-arab-israeli-conflict]. This crude comparison of fatalities is not intended to minimize the human tragedy of the loss of even one life to ethnic violence. Nonetheless, one never hears an outcry about the inalienable right of return of the millions of Hindus who were forcibly evicted from their homes in the Punjab and Bengal in order to appease the demand by a Moslem minority for a nation of their own, who, if they did not get their way, threatened the use of violence to destroy India itself.
Another,
In the 29 minutes between my comment and yours, you sought and at least skimmed all those links and then wrote the rather lengthy reply, which at a glance does not reveal grammatical or spelling errors?
If so, wow!!
s. wallerstein,
Thank your for the compliment.
It comes from 40 years of practicing law, reading complicated cases and writing numerous briefs, sometimes one per day for five days in a row. I have become a fairly fast reader and writer. In addition, I have a particular interest in and knowledge of the history of the Middle East.
"Grandad, what do you do when you can't do nothing, but there's nothing you can do?"
"You do what you can."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JRqB2pm33IM
I recently reread Alessandro Manzoni’s I promessi sposi, traditionally translated as The Betrothed. In some of the later chapters of the book, Manzoni portrays the effects of the 1630 plague on Milan. Manzoni claims that it wiped out three-quarters of the city’s population, though a contemporary estimate, cited in Wikipedia, puts the death toll at nearly half the city. In any case, Manzoni’s account, while a work of the imagination, is based on historical documentation, including most prominently Giuseppe Ripamonti’s eye-witness account, published in 1640.
As described by Manzoni, the reaction to the plague went through several distinct phases. Initially, when news of the plague in the surrounding towns and villages reached Milan, the response was denial, on both the part of the public and the government. When people began to die in Milan, public officials attributed the deaths to some other causes, and doctors who said otherwise were met with hostility. At a certain point, public officials attempted to hide what was happening in the city, but when the evidence of plague at last became overwhelming, they quickly pivoted to finding scapegoats—principally, diabolical anointers who were supposedly painting plague-infested unguents on walls and doors throughout the city. This caused turmoil and panic among the populace, as crowds of people turned on individuals suspected of deliberately spreading the pestilence. Finally, the city became so overwhelmed with death that people were wholly consumed with attempting to survive and function. A special squad of monatti were tasked with removing bodies and transporting the infected to the lazaretto, a kind of elaborate warehouse of the dying. Care and treatment for the sick and dying fell to the city’s monks and nuns, who were the only source of compassion in an otherwise unspeakably grim reality of suffering and devastation.
When I hear frustration about mask-denying politicians and their followers, I sometimes reply, “It just hasn’t gotten bad enough yet.”
Another Anonymous,
CBS News reporter Christina Ruffini tears into spokesman during press conference
If you watch the video on the page, you'll notice her mention "asymmetric warfare" at around the 1-minute mark. In that type of warfare, even a ratio of 20-to-1 against insurgents won't win wars.
Recall how FARC with 17,000 members threatened to roll up Columbia from the ground up. They did it by issuing a simple communiqué. Paraphrasing:
"To the mayors, police chiefs, and judges of Colombia: Resign or die."
The government of Columbia backed down, despite having an army of hundreds of thousands with thousands more paramilitary forces.
Here's a couple of links:
Colombian rebels warn mayors to ‘resign or die’
Rebels' brazen bid to paralyze Colombia
A quote from the above link:
In the past month, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, has explicitly warned local officials – including mayors, councilors, and judges – in 200 towns that they would be declared "military targets" if they fail to step down.
Now, the 17,000-strong guerrilla faction is systematically extending the death threat to every one of the country's 1,098 municipalities, in a concerted attempt to destroy the Colombian state from the ground up. It's an open challenge to President-elect Alvaro Uribe, who won a land- slide election victory in May by promising to crack down on FARC.
Mr. Uribe, who takes office on Aug. 7, has pledged to double military spending and take the battle to the rebels.
But this FARC offensive strikes at the weakest point in the chain of government, highlighting both the frailty of the Colombian state and the challenges which the US-backed government faces in its campaign against the scattered but locally powerful rebel army.
"This is a game of chess: to get the king you first take out the pawns," says Marlio Peralta, who last week resigned as mayor of Santa Maria, three hours north of Hobo.
To 'Another anonymous' re the formation of Pakistan. My uncle, then a young man of about 18, was one of the British soldiers keeping the feuding lines of refugees apart. Somebody threw a brick at him which hit him on the head. He died. We are just a step away from the tragedies of history even if we ourselves are relatively immune (as I have been to date)
Charles Pigden,
That is a tragic story, one of many connected w Partition.
AA refers to Hindus being "forcibly evicted" from their homes in the areas that became East and West Pakistan, but my impression -- and I stand open to correction -- is that it was not so much a matter of forcible eviction as mass population movements in both directions after the two independent countries' (India and Pakistan) establishment was announced. That said, I think it's true that Jinnah and his supporters succeeded in imposing their will.
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Just for the record:
https://mronline.org/2021/08/19/revelations-of-carters-former-advisor-yes-the-cia-entered-afghanistan-before-the-russians-1998/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=revelations-of-carters-former-advisor-yes-the-cia-entered-afghanistan-before-the-russians-1998
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