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"Can the US and Allies defeat the Taliban?.."
2 Comments - Show Original Blog
Roger Cave said...
Hi, I'm a military writer and huge reader of miltary books.
Can we win in Afghanistan? History tells us no. I'm a UK citizen and this is the fourth time the UK has had troops in Afghanistan. The previous three occasions were in the late 1800's and we walked away on each occasion.
Part of the problem is there's nothing to keep uss there (Oil Gas etc, although there are reports of possible finds). Secondly there is no such thing as an Afghan. It's an old tribal country where somewhere in excess of 30 lanuages are spoken. So if they're not fighting foreign invaders, they're fighting each other.
Nobody has ever stayed in Afghanistan, look at the Russians. They just gave it up as a bad job.
I certainly do hope we can turn things around, but it could take an awful long time, and more men.
How we do conflate issues with our western arrogance! Why is it the responsibility of the US and Britain to change Islamic culture? If Afghan society decides on Sharia law then that's surely the business of the people of the countries concerned.
If the Afghanis want a traditional society within which females are not educated then so be it. It's most certainly a form of cultural idiocy and backwardness, but it's simply not our concern. Religion in general is poisonous: just as the US was on the way to becoming a scientific backwater under Bush, so Islamic states head ever deeper into cultural and societal regression. Let them! If Muslims don't force creationism and stem cell research on Christians, then let Christians not enforce female emancipation on Muslims.
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