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Afghan. 15th February .
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Message 1.Â
Posted by OUNUPA (U2078829) on Monday, 15th February 2010
Soviets left the Afghan. The guerrilla war against the Russian occupation was won by wonderfully heroic mujahideen behind the Russian lines.
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Message 2
Posted by baz (U14258304) on Monday, 15th February 2010
But didn't it take the mujihadeen at least another year to just take Jalalabad? They weren't much use at anything apart from guerilla tactics.
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Message 3
Posted by Vizzer aka U_numbers (U2011621) on Monday, 15th February 2010
The Soviet occupation of Afghanistan lasted for 9 years, 1 month and 22 days.
The NATO occupation of Afghanistan has lasted for 8 years, 4 months and 8 days.
The NATO leaders still keep trying to convince themselves that they can 'win'. -
Message 4
Posted by OUNUPA (U2078829) on Tuesday, 16th February 2010
No way to 'win' the partizan war only by military means...AlthoughStalin found his own way to handle the task...against the Ukrainian UPAers. He simply sent the biggest part of Ukrainians from Western Ukraine (who supported the Ukrainian Army ) in the Siberia.
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Message 5
Posted by Allan D (U1791739) on Tuesday, 16th February 2010
NATO isn't occupying Afghanistan in the same way as the Soviets did. They are acting in support of an elected government and in alliance with a local army against an insurgency many of which are foreign fighters from various parts of the world. Even the Taliban are based in Pakistan and were originally put in power by the Pakistani ISI. If anyone's 'occupying' Afghanistan it is the Taliban/Al Qaeda.
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Message 6
Posted by OUNUPA (U2078829) on Tuesday, 16th February 2010
The West fights in Afghan for the Russian interests, Allan but not for the 'elected gvt.' And the term itself 8 years of bloody fighting says us that something goes wrong within the scheme of 'foreign fighters from various parts of the world'. Clearly that they are not the Che Ge Varo...whose fight was doomed to fail without the support from the side of the local population.
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Message 7
Posted by Allan D (U1791739) on Tuesday, 16th February 2010
I'm not sure what the Russians have to do with it. The nearest states are Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, thankfully no longer part of the Soviet empire. The "support from the side of the local population" for the Taliban seems to be garnered, if at all, as it was when they ruled Afghanistan with their Arab Al-Qaeda allies, by threats, intimidation and outright brutality. The fact that they regard Waziristan, over the border in Pakistan, as a "safe haven" speaks volumes for their attachment, or lack of it, to the people and territory of Afghanistan.
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Message 8
Posted by OUNUPA (U2078829) on Friday, 19th February 2010
They have to do with it, Allan. It was they who in modern times instigated the process...and the being situation, while West bogged down in Afghanistan, is the better option for Russians - 'partners' of the West. They have free hands to conduct their own operation against Georgia( which is not ready yet
...to join NATO...hah-hah) knowing that West should swallow it without noise. Satan sat behind a stone and laughed. -
Message 9
Posted by OUNUPA (U2078829) on Friday, 19th February 2010
What do you want in Afghanistan ? They live within their own world. I don't believe that the 'students' are a threat for America which stands far far away from Afghanistan. Now I hear hysterical cries about Iran. This is a problem of Israel. And IT really has nothing to do with the rest of the world, including Ukraine...
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Message 10
Posted by Allan D (U1791739) on Friday, 19th February 2010
The words "head", "sand" and "everything will go away" come to mind.
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Message 11
Posted by Vizzer aka U_numbers (U2011621) on Saturday, 20th February 2010
What do you want in Afghanistan ? They live within their own world. I don't believe that the 'students' are a threat for America which stands far far away from Afghanistan.Â
Good point. There were 19 terrorist hijackers on the 4 planes involved in the 11 September 2001 atrocities in America:
15 were from Saudi Arabia
2 were from the United Arab Emirates
1 was from Egypt
1 was from Lebanon
None was Afghan.
If the war in Afghanistan has seemingly nothing to do with the defence of America then it has absolutely nothing to do with the defence of England. The Afghanistan War will go down in history as a rather pointless affair like the Sudano-British War of the 1890s – only longer. -
Message 12
Posted by OUNUPA (U2078829) on Saturday, 20th February 2010
Many things come on my mind, Allan. For example...Every nation has its own heroes. Heroes of nations tend to have enemies among other nations against which they fought... depending of given historical situation. The Mongolian Khans , who brought on Slavs the terror, are the Heroes for modern Mongolians. We have no right to demand from Mongolians ..let they forget them for ever because they killed Slavs.
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Message 13
Posted by OUNUPA (U2078829) on Saturday, 20th February 2010
Stepan Bandera is a Hero only for Ukrainians but simultaneously he objectively being an enemy for Poles and Russians against whom , wrongly or not , he fought in his time...but Bandera remains to be our hero..
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Message 14
Posted by Mutatis_Mutandis (U8620894) on Saturday, 20th February 2010
To bring a historical context to the debate: We do need to consider a scope that is a bit larger in place and time.
Afghanistan's place on the map has always made it a crossroads where the conflicting interests of different powers meet. But the rugged landscape makes it hard for any power to control and makes major invasions either into or across Afghanistan an unattractive option. The result has always been a mixture of shadow-boxing and small wars-by-proxy. As the Marquess of Salisbury wrote in 1875, "We cannot conquer it -- we cannot leave it alone."
Dost Mohammad Khan (1793-1863) claimed, after being sent in exile to India after a British invasion, that he did not understand why the rulers of so great an Empire had bothered to conquer the poor and barren Afghanistan. That was just rhetoric: He knew perfectly well that he had been the victim of the complex interactions between Russia, British India, and the Sikh state of the Punjab. He did have the last laugh, however, when the British were forced to reinstate him, acknowledging that only Dost Mohammad was able to effectively rule the country and provide some stability.
Sending an army into Afghanistan for major operations has never been a long-term success. However, the other part of Salisbury's dichotomy is also valid -- "We cannot leave it alone." There are alternatives to maintaining a large army there. And they need to be explored, because a collapsing Afghanistan is a source of regional instability. Besides, it would hardly be credible for the other powers, after their very long interference and the steady supply of weapons and money for all kinds of warring groups, to suddenly decline any responsibility for events. -
Message 15
Posted by suvorovetz (U12273591) on Saturday, 20th February 2010
There were 19 terrorist hijackers on the 4 planes involved in the 11 September 2001 atrocities in America:
15 were from Saudi Arabia
2 were from the United Arab Emirates
1 was from Egypt
1 was from Lebanon
None was Afghan. This statement looks quite disingenuous to me on its face. Of course, all 9-11 hijackers are believed to be Al Qaeda members subordinate to Bin Laden. Al Qaeda was housed by Taliban in Afghanistan. I think I remember pretty well before any hostilities had begun in Afghanistan, bush and Blair told them in no uncertain terms to expel Al Qaeda, or else. So, plausible deniability does not apply here at all. -
Message 16
Posted by Vizzer aka U_numbers (U2011621) on Saturday, 20th February 2010
The 11 September 2001 hijackers did not learn to fly aeroplanes in Afghanistan.
They learned to fly in the US. They also met and conspired in Germany. Does this mean that Germany and the US also 'housed' them? If so then does this mean that NATO should also have launched an attack against Germany and the US? -
Message 17
Posted by Allan D (U1791739) on Saturday, 20th February 2010
No, NATO should have a launched an attack against the place where the 9/11 attacks were planned, financed, and the participants chosen which they did.
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Message 18
Posted by Vizzer aka U_numbers (U2011621) on Saturday, 20th February 2010
As the Marquess of Salisbury wrote in 1875, "We cannot conquer it -- we cannot leave it alone."Â
Good quote.
Also 25 years later it was also Salisbury who would bellow that it was "Britain who is to be boss!" when asked what the justification for the Second Boer War was and why the UK couldn't co-exist with the Afrikaners.
With the regard to the Afghanistan quote it must be remembered that Salisbury was prime minister of the British Empire which shared a common border with Afghanistan stretching for hundreds of miles.
Today, of course, the UK is no longer a global imperial power as it was in the 19th Century and the UK is separated from Afghanistan by thousands of miles. -
Message 19
Posted by OUNUPA (U2078829) on Saturday, 20th February 2010
...and Britain has to punish Russia, the place where KGBers-nuclear terrorists planned to poison their traitor in London +several innocent British citizens Allan.
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Message 20
Posted by OUNUPA (U2078829) on Saturday, 20th February 2010
And if the Iranian ones are only on their way to obtain the nuclear weapons the Russian terrorists got it already and even put it in use.
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Message 21
Posted by suvorovetz (U12273591) on Saturday, 20th February 2010
They learned to fly in the US. They also met and conspired in Germany. Does this mean that Germany and the US also 'housed' them? If so then does this mean that NATO should also have launched an attack against Germany and the US? Another disingenuous statement. Of course, neither US, nor German government housed them, and certainly neither explicitly vowed to protect them, as Taliban did.
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Message 22
Posted by OUNUPA (U2078829) on Saturday, 20th February 2010
It is still unknown in details who whom 'housed' ( Taliban or Pakistan or somebody else). The fact is that the 'house' of the Russian nuclear terrorists is the Kremlin in Moscow. Any fool knows that.
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Message 23
Posted by OUNUPA (U2078829) on Saturday, 20th February 2010
During the 70s the 'house' for muslims-terrorists from the Middle East was the Crimea and the secret KGB bases where they learned some things...
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Message 24
Posted by Vizzer aka U_numbers (U2011621) on Saturday, 20th February 2010
No, NATO should have a launched an attack against the place where the 9/11 attacks were planned, financed, and the participants chosenÂ
Who says that the planning and the choosing weren’t done in Germany? As for the financing - then for anyone to honestly believe that the funding came from impoverished Kabul would seem demonstrate a level of naivety of quite some degree. For financing try Saudi Arabia and the UAE etc.
So that’s the planning, the financing and the choosing. Let’s not, however, forget the all-important training. Now where was it again that the terrorist hijackers were trained to fly the aircraft? Oh yes – they were trained in the US. -
Message 25
Posted by suvorovetz (U12273591) on Saturday, 20th February 2010
Who says that the planning and the choosing weren’t done in Germany? As for the financing - then for anyone to honestly believe that the funding came from impoverished Kabul would seem demonstrate a level of naivety of quite some degree. For financing try Saudi Arabia and the UAE etc. This line of argument does not exude too much credibility. Taliban had been told to choose between denying Al Qaeda safe-haven or being dislodged from power in Afghanistan; Taliban explicitly refused to do the former. The financing part of your argument has a point, of course. But here is the dilemma: if the point is that Afghanistan war is the losing cause, do you think that messing with the Saudi regime is a feasible alternative at present?
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Message 26
Posted by stalti (U14278018) on Saturday, 20th February 2010
re op
that would be the same heroic mujahideen who are currently fighting the nato army (far more powerful than the soviets) to a standstill
whatever happens - whoever is the enemy esp foreigners - they will not give in
when will we ever learn ??
who actually arms these people now ??
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Message 27
Posted by PaulRyckier (U1753522) on Saturday, 20th February 2010
Message 12 and 13.
Jack,
no that isn't history, just pure jingoism, which has no place in honest history, whatever the "heroes" are considered in one coutry or another. We had on a French messageboard a Pétainist, who wasn't "receivable" for any reasonable argumentation. I still suppose it was the beginning of the end of that messageboard. Even my dear friend the Greek Nikolaos is mostly not compatible with reasonable reaction. It are only "some!" examples because I know them best.
Warm regards from your friend,
Paul. -
Message 28
Posted by PaulRyckier (U1753522) on Saturday, 20th February 2010
Re: message 14.
Mutatis Mutandis,
I thank you very much for this "insightful" message, from which I learned a lot and with which I fully agree.
Warm regards and with esteem,
Paul. -
Message 29
Posted by Vizzer aka U_numbers (U2011621) on Sunday, 21st February 2010
But here is the dilemma: if the point is that Afghanistan war is the losing cause, do you think that messing with the Saudi regime is a feasible alternative at present? Â
That’s only a ‘dilemma’ for neo-imperialists. It is they who seem to think that the UK should constantly be at war in some part of the world or other. That’s their problem.
For the rest of us, however, the British Empire is long over. We English have got more than enough to be getting on with sorting out our own country. -
Message 30
Posted by suvorovetz (U12273591) on Sunday, 21st February 2010
That’s only a ‘dilemma’ for neo-imperialists. It is they who seem to think that the UK should constantly be at war in some part of the world or other. That’s their problem. So, in other words, you don't consider events like 9-11 or London bombings as acts of war. Hence, you rely on police to protect you, I suppose. Good luck. Sometimes one can just hope that most are rational enough not to engage in suicidal moralizing.
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Message 31
Posted by Vizzer aka U_numbers (U2011621) on Sunday, 21st February 2010
The 11 September attacks took place in the US. I've already highlighted the nationalities of the hijackers. None was Afghan.
If the US wants to claim that that constituted an ‘act of war’ against the US by Afghanistan then that's up to them. What I reject was the invocation by the US of Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty in order to get other NATO members (such as the UK) to join in with the illegal aggression. What a grotesque charade that was.
I also note that more than 8 years after NATO’s invasion and occupation of Afghanistan not a single Afghan has been arrested and stood trial charged with complicity in the 11 September attacks. Not one.
As for the 7/7 bombings then all the terrorists involved were UK citizens. Again – none was Afghan. Furthermore the 7/7 bombings took place in 2005 (i.e. 4 years after NATO invaded Afghanistan) and so the suggestion that the occupation of Afghanistan in 2001 somehow made England a safer place was patently disproved. This was particularly so considering that no such atrocities (such as the 7/7 bombings) had occurred in England before the invasion. -
Message 32
Posted by suvorovetz (U12273591) on Sunday, 21st February 2010
If the US wants to claim that that constituted an ‘act of war’ against the US by Afghanistan then that's up to them. What I reject was the invocation by the US of Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty in order to get other NATO members (such as the UK) to join in with the illegal aggression. What a grotesque charade that was. I'm not going to keep commenting on you muddying the water as to nationalities involved - this issue is as simple as I put it two posts earlier, and no amount of horse waste could change it. As for the Article 5, I'm glad that you brought this up. Because, it's been an issue ever since it was used as the pretext for the US bombing of Serbia back to the stone age, which did not benefit the United States in any way, shape or form whatsoever. So, you can't have it both ways. And if the EU is not happy, NATO could be dissolved just as fast as it had been formed.
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Message 33
Posted by Vizzer aka U_numbers (U2011621) on Sunday, 21st February 2010
I can't see how I'm supposed to seeking to 'have it both ways'. I've been opposed to all of Blair's illegal wars of aggression - starting with the attack on Yugoslavia in 1999.
As a point of information, however, Article 5 was not invoked at that time. What NATO did in 1999 was to not only violate the UN Charter but also violate NATO's very own Charter. So - yes - since then NATO has been seriously compromised in terms of legal credibility.
As a further point of information also it's not up to the EU to dissolve NATO. For example there are countries within the EU such as Sweden, Finland and Ireland which are not members of NATO. Similarly there are NATO states such as Norway and Turkey which are not members of the EU. -
Message 34
Posted by suvorovetz (U12273591) on Sunday, 21st February 2010
I can't see how I'm supposed to seeking to 'have it both ways'. I've been opposed to all of Blair's illegal wars of aggression - starting with the attack on Yugoslavia in 1999....
As a further point of information also it's not up to the EU to dissolve NATO. Well, it appears that you have a real dilemma after all. You have my deepest sympathies. -
Message 35
Posted by OUNUPA (U2078829) on Monday, 22nd February 2010
I guess, Paul, it is none of my Goddamn business to tell Frenchmen whom ( a hero or a criminal ) for their nation was Petain.Let they decide themselves. These are their own 'private matters'. Only fools know all and like to pop their noses in the holes claiming that they have the right to do so because they saw 'the driving maps'. But men KNOW where they are -even when they're 'would be' lost, Paul...Truly yours Jack.
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Message 36
Posted by Mutatis_Mutandis (U8620894) on Monday, 22nd February 2010
So, in other words, you don't consider events like 9-11 or London bombings as acts of war. Hence, you rely on police to protect you, I suppose.Â
The distinction between "war" and "police action" is a complex one. Historically, the distinction was often mostly one of linguistics and legalities. Police action might very well involve combat, and even the employment of heavy bombers, as the RAF demonstrated during the Malayan Emergency. Technically speaking, even the Korean War was a police action, not a war.
Of course there is a strong legal(istic) side to the issue. If there is full-scale warfare on a battlefield, a declaration of war is hard to avoid, but irregular warfare, terrorism, and insurgencies create a grey area. A declaration of war may be desirable because it gives the government extra powers, but governments may also want to avoid asking one, if they think that there is a risk of losing that vote.
There may also be political credibility at stake. For example, the insistence of the British government on treating captured IRA members as common criminals, not as prisoners of war or as political prisoners. This was deeply resented by convicted IRA terrorists, who felt that they deserved a special status, and went on a series of hunger strikes to get it.
On the ground, there sometimes is very little practical difference between a police action and warfare, but at other times the linguistics can be important because of the mindset that they generate. The terminology of "war" has the risk of triggering heavily asymmetric warfare, with large forces being launched at targets that can simply vanish and pop up elsewhere. The terminology of "police action" favors smaller, directed strikes that may often be a much more efficient counter for guerrilla operations. -
Message 37
Posted by OUNUPA (U2078829) on Monday, 22nd February 2010
Many Soviet soldiers who fought in Afghan were muslims from the southern states of the 'ussr'-Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Tadjikistan. Many of them deserted to the mujahideen...the Commanders told them, Allan, the Americans were there...they thought they were coming to fight the Americans...mujahideen sent the 'soviet muslims' to learn about Islam in Nuristan.
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Message 38
Posted by PaulRyckier (U1753522) on Wednesday, 3rd March 2010
Re: Message 35.
Jack,
thanks for your answer. I noted your statements.
Warm regards from your friend,
Paul. -
Message 39
Posted by PaulRyckier (U1753522) on Wednesday, 3rd March 2010
Re: Message 36.
Mutatis Mutandis,
interesting message as all of yours.
Yes, "politionele akties" (police actions), the Dutch also called the actions against the revolt of the later Indonesia immediately after WWII.
Kind regards and with esteem,
Paul. -
Message 40
Posted by OUNUPA (U2078829) on Thursday, 4th March 2010
Okay, sidekick. You see...in 2004 we were too naive...I even could not imagine some things. Now I am not surprised very much to hear about the German !!!!!! 'jury' and Ivan Demjanuk. Well, take
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Message 41
Posted by Nik (U1777139) on Sunday, 7th March 2010
Eeeeeeeee the "heroic Mujahedins" are exactly the " heroic Talibans", they are one and the same thing and they are largely a US creation. USSR's intermingling in Afganistan was more half-hearted than the one the Americans do now - they went in sending a very low quality and lowly armed USSR army simply to support the Afgani communist party to rise on the government. They did not plan to integrate Afganistan in USSR, just being present there. A next step would be to provoke problems in Pakistan and try to get an access to the Indian ocean, something that could provoke a major war.
The Talibans never won over Russians. They simply attacked Russians killing 1 Russian soldier at a rate of 50 dead Talibans - about the same rate Americans "suffer" if we count the private armies together with the official US army (which simply keeps off the trouble staying inside camps and paying the Talibans not to attack whenever possible). US's like USSR's point is simply to maintain their army there. Nothing to do with Afganistan iteself but lot to do with China, India and Iran. -
Message 42
Posted by OUNUPA (U2078829) on Monday, 8th March 2010
The leader of Resistance Masud never been a 'creation'...only then came on stage the creations. They killed Masud and claimed that it was they who won the war.
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Message 43
Posted by suvorovetz (U12273591) on Monday, 8th March 2010
There's a lot of confusion about who created whom. Nik has a propensity for following urban legends and discarding credible sources on this kind of stuff. Taliban was never the sole, nor even the biggest part of anti-Soviet forces - not the force, mind you - in the 80s. As far as I know, Taliban is actually Pakistan ISI's baby. And, of course, Americans did not create anybody at all. They just poured money and equipment to the takers they had identified as worthy.
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Message 44
Posted by OUNUPA (U2078829) on Tuesday, 9th March 2010
You're right Suvorovetz. And Masud was a real partizan but not a 'creation'. Russians firmly believed that the Masud's mujahideen were in dissaray after their offensives and the Panjsheri would forsake the mujahideen ...and flock to the side of pro-Russian Gvt. The both suppositions were completely wrong and the mujahideen were still determined to fight. It was clearly one of Masud's great strenths...and one of the Russians' most serious weaknesses, that the Afghan Army and Ministry of Defence were riddled with mujahideen agents. Here, anything the Russians told their Afghan allies was immediately leaked to Masud.
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