The Arab Spring and "the War on Terror"

[chrisp65]

2 minutes ago, blandy said:

That's not tenable, is it?

Even if we assume that everything in your post is fact (I'm unsure it is), the US (or West) "ending" Pakistan - I mean that's not going to go well, is it? It's not credible.

It's far from clear that ISI runs the Taliban. It's apparent that some elements within the ISI are actively supportive, but not the whole service. It's also unclear that Pakistan Gov't/forces etc. actually have control over some areas of Pakistan where the Taliban operate and hide (or hide in plain sight). At various points Pakistan has acted against the Talibans militarily.

Threatening Pakistan's PM or Gov't with "stop those elements of your security forces which are enabling Taliban actions from doing that enabling or we'll end you" just isn't the way to actually solve the problem. Imran Khan isn't an anti-western loon. Removing or ending him or his term in office would be monumentally foolish. it would make the problem worse.

AFAIK "the Taliban" isn't even a single entity. It's a bunch of different leaders and tribes and warlords and wotnot each with their own aims and so on under an umbrella of extreme religious beliefs. Isn't that part of the problem -simpliticallt identify a single entity as the thing to be dealt with, when in reality it isn't like that?

I think as long as there are no people already in the UK with any connections to or affiliations with Pakistan, threatening violence against the Pakistan regime and a little bit of smart bombing shouldn’t have any consequences for us. 

What’s the worst that could happen?

 

 

[Awol]

4 minutes ago, blandy said:

That's not tenable, is it?

Even if we assume that everything in your post is fact (I'm unsure it is), the US (or West) "ending" Pakistan - I mean that's not going to go well, is it? It's not credible.

It's far from clear that ISI runs the Taliban. It's apparent that some elements within the ISI are actively supportive, but not the whole service. It's also unclear that Pakistan Gov't/forces etc. actually have control over some areas of Pakistan where the Taliban operate and hide (or hide in plain sight). At various points Pakistan has acted against the Talibans militarily.

Threatening Pakistan's PM or Gov't with "stop those elements of your security forces which are enabling Taliban actions from doing that enabling or we'll end you" just isn't the way to actually solve the problem. Imran Khan isn't an anti-western loon. Removing or ending him or his term in office would be monumentally foolish. it would make the problem worse.

AFAIK "the Taliban" isn't even a single entity. It's a bunch of different leaders and tribes and warlords and wotnot each with their own aims and so on under an umbrella of extreme religious beliefs. Isn't that part of the problem -simpliticallt identify a single entity as the thing to be dealt with, when in reality it isn't like that?

You ‘end’ a political regime, not a country, and it’s entirely tenable prospect for the US, particularly when combined with India. 

Two years prior to 9/11 when the Kargil conflict occurred between Pakistan (the aggressor) and India, it was the US that persuaded the Indians not to carry the war on into Pakistan to destroy the regime.

With US forces and/or a US backed regime in Afghanistan, and India spoiling for a fight with Pakistan, China a shadow of its current self and Russia still recovering from the USSR collapse, Islamabad was incredibly vulnerable to severe diplomatic coercion. Imran Khan wasn’t in control then, we’re talking about 20 years ago when Musharraf was in charge. 

I’m not going to get into an argument about how much or how little control ISI has over the Taliban, but weaponising militancy (the Taliban in Afghanistan, LeT in India) is the core of Pakistani foreign and security policy - Christine Fair is brilliant on this subject if you’re interested, particularly “Fighting to the End: The Pakistan Army's Way of War”. 

Yes there are a bunch of different militant groups (the Haqqani Network for example) that operate in Afghan with basing in the NWFP, but the Taliban is a cohesive entity with a CoC that ultimately ends in Islamabad. 

[HanoiVillan]

57 minutes ago, Awol said:

The major flaw in post 9/11 strategy was trying to deal with symptoms instead of causes. Islamabad and Riyadh were (are) major sponsors of Islamic militancy as a tool of their foreign policy.

I think this is a key point. It's very telling that neither of these 'alliances' (in fact neither country is covered by a mutual defence pact with America) were affected deeply by 9/11, despite being in Pakistan's case as important and in KSA's case arguably even more important than Afghanistan. It's not that a war with either of these countries is good or even needed; in practice the UK and US are still using their militaries to conduct esp Saudi foreign policy. We could, in fact, stop doing that, or at an absolute minimum use it as a point of leverage.

[blandy]

19 minutes ago, Awol said:

You ‘end’ a political regime, not a country, and it’s entirely tenable prospect for the US, particularly when combined with India.

I really don't think so. All indications from history rather point to the opposite being the case. You (we) can't just "end" a country's government. Inserting puppets to replace them doesn't work. Trying to hold free and fair elections doesn't work. Under no circumstances I can see does it work. It's madness, frankly. Whether it's Libya, Tunisia, Iraq, Afghan... the outcome is never what the aim was.

[Awol]

14 hours ago, HanoiVillan said:

I think this is a key point. It's very telling that neither of these 'alliances' (in fact neither country is covered by a mutual defence pact with America) were affected deeply by 9/11, despite being in Pakistan's case as important and in KSA's case arguably even more important than Afghanistan. It's not that a war with either of these countries is good or even needed; in practice the UK and US are still using their militaries to conduct esp Saudi foreign policy. We could, in fact, stop doing that, or at an absolute minimum use it as a point of leverage.

Perfectly put. Successive US and UK governments have lost their understanding of how to employ the fear of abandonment as a tool of coercive diplomacy. 

14 hours ago, blandy said:

I really don't think so. All indications from history rather point to the opposite being the case. You (we) can't just "end" a country's government. Inserting puppets to replace them doesn't work. Trying to hold free and fair elections doesn't work. Under no circumstances I can see does it work. It's madness, frankly. Whether it's Libya, Tunisia, Iraq, Afghan... the outcome is never what the aim was.

I wasn’t suggesting creating some enlightened liberal democracy because, as you rightly say, cultures are different and liberal democracy only functions in specific cultural conditions. 

But history is the record of political regimes being destroyed and their leaders killed. The overthrow of the Taliban by military coercion, created an opportunity to deploy diplomatic coercion to change the behaviour of Pakistan and Saudi. 

For political and commercial reasons it was expedient to look the other way, pursue an astrategic course in Afghanistan, and the actively self-harming policy of attacking Iraq. 

Our leaders have been fundamentally unserious for two decades. They’ve blundered around like elephants with no coherent approach to making strategy, sapping the military and economic strength of our respective countries, while squandering the moral authority gained from defeating communism in Europe. 

 

[HanoiVillan]

 

[Genie]

I was reading yesterday that the US has spent about 1 trillion dollars in Afghanistan. 
A trillion dollars, plus all the dead and injured servicemen and women… for what?

[Awol]

49 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

 

Tom Newton Dunn, strategist extraordinaire.

Tangentially he illustrates the disconnect between political ambitions and military realities. The UK lacked sufficient deployable forces to hold Helmand Province, which wasn’t stabilised until the US put in an additional force of Marines more than twice that of the UK contribution. 

One province. Now Tom wants the UK to lead a coalition of the even more incapable to pacify the whole country? Utterly, stunningly delusional. 

[NurembergVillan]

28 minutes ago, Awol said:

Tom Newton Dunn, strategist extraordinaire.

Tangentially he illustrates the disconnect between political ambitions and military realities. The UK lacked sufficient deployable forces to hold Helmand Province, which wasn’t stabilised until the US put in an additional force of Marines more than twice that of the UK contribution. 

One province. Now Tom wants the UK to lead a coalition of the even more incapable to pacify the whole country? Utterly, stunningly delusional. 

I often appreciate your ability to summarise a conflict I don't understand into a couple of sentences that I do.

Gracias!

[Chindie]

1 hour ago, Genie said:

I was reading yesterday that the US has spent about 1 trillion dollars in Afghanistan. 
A trillion dollars, plus all the dead and injured servicemen and women… for what?

Excellent shareholder returns.

[maqroll]

Afghanistan is so far away from Arab countries. Wrong thread,  IMO!

[sne]

37 minutes ago, maqroll said:

Afghanistan is so far away from Arab countries. Wrong thread,  IMO!

Booo! Aren't you supposed to be American? They are obviously all the same  

[OutByEaster?]

55 minutes ago, maqroll said:

Afghanistan is so far away from Arab countries. Wrong thread,  IMO!

It does border Iran. Is that far away?

 

[maqroll]

4 minutes ago, OutByEaster? said:

It does border Iran. Is that far away?

 

Well, Iran isn't Arab. I always think of Afghanistan as Asian. 

 

[maqroll]

I'm being pedantic, I know.

It is a tragedy what is happening there, and the USA will take the blame as it should.  

Not sure what the answer is, but fewer US foreign occupations is a good thing long term. 

This swift ascendancy by the Taliban proves the worthless ineffectiveness of 20 years of American operations in Afghanistan and American militarism and "nation building" in general.

Time will tell if Putin sees an opportunity. He'd be smart to avoid the temptation. 

 

[Rugeley Villa]

Putin needs to look back at history if he ever fancies a pop at Afghanistan. It’s Lose/Lose for anyone to go there . Way too volatile a region. 

[HanoiVillan]

Just looking back at the history of the American evacuation of Saigon for obvious reasons, and I had not seen the incredible name for that operation before: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Frequent_Wind

[sne]

Taliban's have already surrounded Kabul and blocked all the ways out of the city apart from the airport. Fighting in the outskirts but the government are going Baghdad Bob, probably to try and avoid panic.

Not a fun place to be atm.

[SuperTed]

11 minutes ago, sne said:

Taliban's have already surrounded Kabul and blocked all the ways out of the city apart from the airport. Fighting in the outskirts but the government are going Baghdad Bob, probably to try and avoid panic.

Not a fun place to be atm.

Don’t think it will be long until their Goverment, much like the Yemeni Government, serve as proxies in a neighbouring nation

Americans/British and their warmongering eh

[sne]

1 minute ago, SuperTed said:

Don’t think it will be long until their Goverment, much like the Yemeni Government, serve as proxies in a neighbouring nation

Americans/British and their warmongering eh

Really would not want to live in a China supported Taliban ran country