napalm poppy fields means napalmed women and children.
Decriminalizing heroin locally probably wouldn’t move the needle much in that part of the world.
A lot of money was spent on trying to eradicate poppy crops but the OP’s kept failing for various reasons (Ariel bombing was one of them). The main issue was that farmers had been growing it there for a very long time and it’s the best source of income for many parts of Afghan, so not only did the Taliban want to keep it but so did the local civilians.
Destroying these crops only pissed off the locals and this really doesn’t help when trying to fight a counter-insurgency war.
Growing poppies was illegal but no one actually gave a fuck as it was so profitable so decriminalising it wouldn’t have made any difference.
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From the various news sources, seems the Taliban is readily taking over the country again.
They already have. Now the spin machines of the administration and media are working overtime.
The Taliban moved much more quickly then I expected. I would have expected Kabul to hold out a couple more months before it fell. Now lets hope that the Taliban has decided its in its interest* to let the Americans evacuate everyone through Kabul airport. Otherwise they could shut down the runway with artillery trapping the American rescue force in place.
*getting money from the international community.
There have been reports that some commanders were bribed.
What a waste. Hopefully the world won’t see the barbarity towards women and girls of twenty years ago. I have little faith.
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While I do not “blame” Biden for “losing” Afganistan, I blame him and his administration for fucking up the evacuation. It appears from CNN that we are not taking locals out through the airport. Either because we don’t have the capacity, or perhaps because we have a side deal with the Tailiban to keep the airport open for foreigners in exchange for not taking afghanis out. I am speculating here but it seems logical. A lot of people who helped us there are trapped in Kabul and I do not think it will end well for them. Either being shot or thrown in prison.
Once again, @#$%
Unlike say Bangazi, this was far more predictable, and on the radar screen at the top of the administration.
And yes I hold this administration to a much higher predictive standard then me, a shlub from Connecticut who has no special access to intell about afganistan.
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This is not to excuse the Trump administration from creating conditions that ended up promoting this result. I also do not think that they would have been less chaotic since chaos was their typical M.O. and Jered would have handled this as he normally did, poorly 
but its hard for me to believe that the Biden Administration could not have done a better job.
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Pretty good article here. I’ve had conversations with a family friend from Pakistan on why. Tribalism and lack of education / jobs is his thought on why people join the jihadist groups.
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That’s a great article. It explains a lot.
The Taliban are probably heavily kitted out by China, Russia and have all of the logistical support in terms of heavy weapons that they needed to accomplish with a year and a half of organizing.
IIRC the new Taliban “president” for lack of a better word was in Beijing just a week ago. It should be interesting to note that the Pakistani Taliban and the Indian Government were blamed by Pakistan for a bombing that killed a bunch of Chinese nationals working on the Belt and Road Initiative. I’m curious to know if the Indian government accusation has any merit in reality but it’s not very well reported on in English speaking media compared to the deluge of reportage in China. China also claimed they needed to beef up their military in response to increased Taliban activity around the same time but have been actively gladhanding the Taliban simultaneously throughout.
China is going to want to fold the Afghani Taliban into their Belt and Road Initiative which is mostly a front for Chinese Hegemony that both Russia and Middle Eastern nations are eying with increasing suspicions for good reason. China is extremely protective of any perception of hostility toward it’s people. If the Taliban can’t keep their dick in their pants with the BRI it could certainly become their problem quickly.
The PRC gov is keen to portray itself as the world savior right now but without the US there to be the boogey man the Taliban’s toughguy tribal rhetoric lends itself easily to any upstarts that pathologically look around for fights to pick on what they perceive is their territory.
Alternatively, bet is that China will take an active role in steering hostility toward anyone but themselves, especially NATO countries. Russia isn’t keen on the B&RI and China is already sending subtle signals that it doesn’t want Russia’s version of “help”. Much like Alexader the Great, China sees the Silk Road as their path to world domination.
Otherwise the fact that the Afghan Taliban moved so quickly sounds a lot like a like the entire Afghan military was thoroughly eaten through with corruption, which really doesn’t feel very shocking all things considered.
Honestly, Biden whiffed it but the 18 month lead time on planning the offensive given in the deal where the last administration agreed to a withdrawal date gave our geopolitical enemies in the area all the time they needed to help plan the invasion.
Biden’s big mistake was in honoring the agreement time table. Perhaps he should have waited until the weather was coldest to put the kibash on the rapid advance.
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Perhaps now PRC has a real islamist army on their border they will be incentivised to stop genociding on the Uyghurs?
Dude, you’re so naive sometimes.
The Taliban doesn’t give a shit about that. This is about power. That’s all it ever was for any other religion. There is no united front. People fill in the blanks in their morality with what their avarice and then use lies to trade on the morality of the masses as a way to control them. That’s the screed of every totalitarian nation on Earth, theocracy or not.
You don’t hear Saudi Arabia or Iran (edit: or any other Muslim theocracy) bitching do you?
For a little Chinese money they’d let every other muslim in the world burn. Shit, just for a chance to have the control of Saudi Arabia or Iran over the religion they’d probably dance a jig around the fire.
Any group that gets in the way of the gravy train is going to get policed unless the cabal that leads the Taliban suddenly sees profit in causing problems with China. NATO nations find victimizing non-combantat civilians distasteful but the Taliban, Russia and China will trade on that shit all day if it puts the most dollars (or rubles or yuan) in their pocket.
(edit) Seriously, Iran sees itself as the Sunni (edit: yes, I know I got it wrong. Shia, not Sunni but the difference only affects the bottom line) leader of the world and they haven’t said a god damned thing in support of the majority Sunni Uyghur. Resounding silence. They’re not pissed at Israel for being Jews despite the rhetoric. That’s just incidental. The anti-Semetic rhetoric is political currency to get the mob angry, just like it’s always been. They’re pissed at Israel for having a more dangerous military. I’m sure there’s an element of bigotry in the command but notice how these things never seem to be a big problem when there’s a profit to be had.
Really, man.
People are so simple minded sometimes it drives me mad.
Russia wants world domination.
China wants world domination.
The caliphate countries want world domination.
NATO and the US have had the closest thing to it and they see our power as an existential threat.
We’re in the way. People used to understand that. After WWII we rolled back our role and despite having the military power to smash Russia and China and every other hostile nation in the way we decided not to. It’s not our way despite the exceptions to every rule. We want peaceful trade and world security. I’m not saying shit doesn’t go wrong but our vision of peaceful coexistence includes equity and theirs includes downhill river of their shit and uphill march of serfs and looted resources.
Our number one goal needs to be pulling back business resources from China and containing Russia but as their economic power falters their expasionist hunger and willingness to openly support terrorism, expansionist wars, proxy wars, puppet state coups, shooting wars and nuclear exchanges will grow.
The name of the game in China and Russia (and the rest of their allies of which their should be a surprising number) right now is to make NATO reprisals for their aggression on their neighbors as difficult as possible.
If you want to see just how bad it really is pay closer attention to their moves in countries like Madagascar (particularly their last few elections), South Africa (seriously, fucking look), Nigeria, Hungary, Belarussia, Georgia, Ukraine, Syria, Iran, Vietnam, the Phillipines, Myanmar and North Korea. That’s not as sexy as the blame America/domestic political opponents for everything that goes wrong everywhere but it’s a lot more educational. They are moving out in the open and nobody is paying any fucking attention because they’re all busy fighting against/for shit stain demagogues in their own country. They offer a kind of profitable refuge for corrupt totalitarian nations that NATO does not. We turn up our noses at atrocities while they just arm the most easily bought side with help loaded down on the bet that it will cause problems for the US.
Groups like the Taliban take the help, takes the guns, takes the money, takes the Russian spy satellite intel, takes the logistical, tactical and strategic planning assistance as long as it puts them into a better position and even if they immediately turn around and bite the hands that feeds them countries like China and Russia reason that the addition of a hostile unstable violent nation to the stage is a net win no matter what happens because they have less to lose than we do.
They, China, have been out in the open, especially on the African continent for decades. Insidiously with little attention and no reaction from the rest of the world.
This pandemic continues to show the weakness of the worldwide supply chain. Get out of China.
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If the other NATO countries don’t follow suit it won’t help. We can’t even get Germany to stop trading gas/petroleum for money that goes straight to feeding and incentivizing regional Russian annexation. If they don’t cut that shit out and Russia gets a good strangle hold back in the Balkans they’ll have a lot more to worry about than economic drag from high energy bills.
It’s a clusterfuck.
It’s not just NATO.
But, we digress. The women and children of Afghanistan, along with any males who helped us, are in a dangerous place.
Iran is Shiite, militantly so, and has tried numerous times to wipe out Sunnis. The Ayatollahs also believe that any non-Persians are at best second class. So I really don’t think they are going to overly care if the Chinese kill off some non-Persian Sunnis.
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I fucking keep getting shias and sunnis backwards.
It’s not that I don’t know the difference, I just keep switching the names in my head. In my brain Wahabis and Salafis keep getting switched because the differences seem so meaningless. I know there is a difference but it seems meaningless given they both conduct themselves the same way.