Wars and ConflictsÌý permalink
Afghanistan the unconquerable?
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Message 1.Ìý
Posted by shivfan (U2435266) on Wednesday, 16th June 2010
In the nineteenth century, Britain never really properly conquered Afghanistan. Was it because it was too remote, too wild, and too hard to control? Or was it because the British didn't think that Afghanistan had anything of value worth conquering? Or did the British prefer to use Afghanistan as a buffer state against the Russian empire?
Alexander conquered Afghanistan, and on his death, the Greek state of Bactria was set up in Afghanistan. But that state eventually declined, and it seems that the Greeks - and many others after them - found it was much harder to keep control of Afghanistan than it was to initially conquer it. -
Message 2
Posted by cloudyj (U1773646) on Wednesday, 16th June 2010
In the nineteenth century, Britain never really properly conquered Afghanistan. Was it because it was too remote, too wild, and too hard to control? Or was it because the British didn't think that Afghanistan had anything of value worth conquering? Or did the British prefer to use Afghanistan as a buffer state against the Russian empire?Ìý
Probably a combination of all of those. Strategically there was little to gain from conquoring Afghanistan and real British interest lay more in the Russians not doing so. The buffer state had the advantage of being less threatening to the Russians.
and many others after them - found it was much harder to keep control of Afghanistan than it was to initially conquer it.
Ìý
The really successful conquorers were mainly successful using tactics (mainly involving killing vast numbers of locals - soldiers and civilians alike). Happily such methods simply aren't acceptable today. -
Message 3
Posted by Sixtus Beckmesser (U9635927) on Tuesday, 6th July 2010
I think cloudyj is about right - the fact that, particularly in the rural areas, most Afghan men are trained to fight in what might be termed guerilla fashion. It is all too easy for a relatively small number of tribesmen, manning the passes, to cut off an invading army in the interior of the country.
This is, in effect that happened in 1842, when the British suffered their greatest military disaster in South Asia (at least until the fall of Singapore). To anyone wanting a first hand account of the collapse of the Army of the Indus, I cannot rate too highly Lady Florentia Sale's 'Journal of the disaster' which contains such gems as (if I remember rightly) "Today we forced our way through the Jugdulluk Pass. Fortunately, I was only wounded once." -
Message 4
Posted by rhmnney (U14528380) on Tuesday, 6th July 2010
Seems waring tribes unite to force the invader out, small forces can exert heavy losses on modern armies. On TV saw where a number of Royal Marines were holding a position on the breast of a hill. Wonderful field of view, but what can you do with it? Their resources were limited, they were under constant surveillance, couldn't move, when being relieved or resupplied a danger to the the resuppliers, sort of a 'Mexican Stand-Off'. Modern armies are at the mercy of civilians, civilians unencumbered with military thinking or lack off. Bad as it was those planes flying into the buildings in New York, in military terms that would have been a great victory a master stroke, so simple so cheap and so effective. Time for the military to, 'Hang it Up', we are living in a different world, threats have very little meaning, and as always the innocent take the brunt of the conflict even if combatants. Terrorism the simplest form of warfare.
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Message 5
Posted by baz (U14258304) on Tuesday, 6th July 2010
The alliance needs to attack Pakistan. It's pointless sticking to internationally agreed borders when your enemy doesn't. If Pakistan fails as a state, so be it. We can't allow a corrupt regime like Pakistan to shelter our enemies.
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Message 6
Posted by Grumpyfred (U2228930) on Tuesday, 6th July 2010
Afghanistan is and has been for centuries, a country in name only. It is really a loose federation of tribes who, as we British found out (Twice) and the Russians (Once) will change sides at the drop of a hat. Doubtless when the US learn thesame lesson, they will lead the advance to the borders. They will also have to learn that regardless of what weapons we have there, we are still fighting a 19th century war, with men on the ground being shot at by hit and run gangs. The Afghans realised quite quickly that attacking dug in soldiers with massive air support gets you dead quite quickly. Better to go back to the tried and trusted tactics that have been used against overpowering forces since before the Romans set foot in Britain. Hit and run. A hand full of Apaches tied up thousands of US troops like that for years.
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Message 7
Posted by Spruggles (U13892773) on Wednesday, 7th July 2010
'Sright enough GF.
Only those who have seen the topography of the place can understand the problem of trying to police it. I have the impression that it was not even fully understood by those that ordered the latest invasion. The only way to win is to get the tribal chiefs on your side, but the trouble is they seem to enjoy being brigans. Advance your troops towards a known trouble spot, the enemy fade into the hills. You stay for a while but as soon as you move out they back come again. They know the country and can afford to wait. In the meantime they will continue to harass your troops and inflict casualties. Anyone read 'Playing the Great Game' by Micheal Edwardes? -
Message 8
Posted by White Camry (U2321601) on Wednesday, 7th July 2010
baz,
The alliance needs to attack Pakistan. It's pointless sticking to internationally agreed borders when your enemy doesn't. If Pakistan fails as a state, so be it. We can't allow a corrupt regime like Pakistan to shelter our enemies.Ìý
Or, at any rate, attack the al-Qaeda hideouts in Waziristan.
I recall that a year or two ago the Pakistani army attacked these hideouts and crippled the al-Qaeda operations from there; also, that there was a refugee problem. Does anyone recall what came from those attacks? -
Message 9
Posted by stalti (U14278018) on Wednesday, 7th July 2010
what a good idea - attack another country
we had enough hassle in Iraq - the only way to destroy insurgents is to have troops on the ground
how many more troops should we commit - look how many british troops have died by IED - we dont even kill in response in these cases
i am agreed in one part though - we should withdraw ALL troops on the ground and using intelligence - bomb to the stone age any part of any country that supports al queda
obama has now said us troops will withdraw in 5 years - the taliban has now got a time frame to prepare for
if we leave tomorrow or in 5 years the end result is the same - as soon as we leave the REAL fighters will take over once again
the british in the 1800s the russians in the 1980s/90s both destroyed the afghan regular army - but then the real fighters took over
whats the point of it all ??
st -
Message 10
Posted by U14537043 (U14537043) on Saturday, 10th July 2010
"i am agreed in one part though - we should withdraw ALL troops on the ground and using intelligence - bomb to the stone age any part of any country that supports al queda"
Great Idea, kill em all. Women, kids, old folks, that'l teach em. -
Message 11
Posted by Herewordless (U14549396) on Wednesday, 14th July 2010
We had fought FOUR wars against the Afghans?
First 1839-42 (lost- 16,000 troops & civilians wiped out en route to pakistan)
Second 1878-81 (Won)
Third (as the 'Tirah Campaign') 1897-8 (Lost)
Fourth 1919-21 (Won) -
Message 12
Posted by Sixtus Beckmesser (U9635927) on Thursday, 15th July 2010
The Tirah was not designated as an Afghan War - the 1919 conflict is, by general consent and designation, the Third Afghan War.
SB -
Message 13
Posted by shivfan (U2435266) on Thursday, 15th July 2010
I didn't know about those three wars and the TIrah campaign....
Where can I read some more about them? -
Message 14
Posted by Sixtus Beckmesser (U9635927) on Thursday, 15th July 2010
Hello shivfan,
In addition to Lady Sale's 'Journal of the disaster' that I mentioned in message 3 above, I cannot recommend to highly 'Crimson Snow' by Jles Stewart for an insight into the First Afghan War.
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Message 15
Posted by Colquhoun (U3935535) on Thursday, 15th July 2010
I was told by my neighbour, an old India hand, that in one of the wars the British strategy was to take Kabul then wait for the Afghans to counter attack. The Afghans were then massacred on the plains outside Kabul.
The strategy was to force the Afghans to attack a fixed position because it was impossible to take the battle to the Afghans as they would simply melt away. -
Message 16
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Thursday, 15th July 2010
Surely something has to really exist before you can conquer it.. I am not sure that this applies to Afghanistan.. Having just written about the relative non-existance of France, which was not really conquered by the Germans- its state and over-arching machinery just dismantled itself, almost like Stalin's factories before the German invasion... And like those factories, once the Germans had been driven out France just re-assembled itself like those toys that are so popular in France.
Both countries are no more than a trick of mirrors presenting at times to us the image that we wish to see with them a integral to a community of nations.
Cass
Cass
Cass -
Message 17
Posted by BashfulAnthony (U10740638) on Friday, 16th July 2010
We all know the old saying that those who do not remember history are forced to repeat it (paraphrasing!). Surely that applies to Afghanistan. We cannot win - it is just throwing lives away.
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Message 18
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Friday, 16th July 2010
BashfulAnthony
While I understand what you are saying, I think that to some extent Naomi Klein was correct in the piece that she added to "No Logo" after 9/11. As Michaele Moore found all of a sudden the publishers would not distribute the copies of "Stupid White Men" that had already been printed. The Bush Presidency that seemed to be not actually leading the world anywhere, apart from sold out to the corporate world, suddenly got a task in hand, and there is nothing quite like immediate danger to take the focus away from longer term challenges.
The tragic loss of life in both Afghanistan and Iraq does demand that we can try to say that, even if it is legitimate self-defence, there is some arguable moral justification for killing people in far off lands of which we do know something just so that our comparatively cushy and privileged life (in terms of all previous space and time past, present and possibly future)can carry on as vacuously and self-indulgently as it has.
I have taught too many Muslims who, without being at all radical, compare their ideals with the ones they see around them, and question an assumption that "civilization" and "good governance" are on our side. Since 1945 both of these have meant trying to keep going a "You've never had it so good" culture-- and what good has it done?
Sometimes we have to do something in order to learn from our mistakes, because the idle do not have much capability for changing anything.
Inert matter.
Cass -
Message 19
Posted by BashfulAnthony (U10740638) on Friday, 16th July 2010
CASSEROLEON.
Sometimes we have to do something in order to learn from our mistakes, because the idle do not have much capability for changing anything.Ìý
I think we should have learned all we need to by now, through our own experiences.
In Afghanistan, Ireland and Vietnam we learned that you cannot win militarily, and only can you achieve peace by meeting the needs and aspirations of the people - this takes compromise and patience . All the mayhem in the Middle East is winning nothing for any faction. Ultimately yhey will have to agree to something, and they all know that. so why go on fighting? -
Message 20
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Friday, 16th July 2010
BashfulAnthony
Part of the public reaction to the war seems to me to reflect a conviction that nothing these days is worth dying for, or killing for-- and that usually is a sign of an age that really has nothing to live for-- apart from surviving from day to day-- and that is not living.
Cass -
Message 21
Posted by Spruggles (U13892773) on Saturday, 17th July 2010
Cass,
That's a dangerous statement to make, considering that you will never be asked to put your life on the line(have you carried the rifle?). Every individual has the right to ask why they are expected to surrender their life or spend the rest of their life disabled and being fed with a spoon.
Allow me to inform you that the average working class person in this country has for the last two centuries been doing just that - living from day to day = whilst listening to political lies and being used as cannon fodder so that the rich and powerful can maintain their privileges.
I ain't seen Tony Blair killing Talibans yet ... perhaps he's too old for service, or too busy giving lucrative talks?
Next time there's a war I suggest that we let the rich and the politicians fight it out amongst themselves .. I think they would soon learn the necessity of jaw-jaw.
Mind you, there's always the chance that before the peasant marches off again on another interminable war that they might be blessed by the clergy and promised a place in heaven! -
Message 22
Posted by U14537043 (U14537043) on Saturday, 17th July 2010
Lost in all this (lets get the heck outta here) attitude is the average Afghan people. In particular the Afghan women. How quick we forget, after all we’re ok. Our women don’t get whipped on the streets of Kabul for showing some ankle. Nor do they get a bullet through the head at half time soccer matches. Infidelity in marriage, stone her to death. Meanwhile the guy walks, if he is not in the crowd picking up rocks for himself. Widows not allowed to work by the Taliban. Let them beg on the streets in an effort to feed their kids. And why should Afghan women get an education anyway?
We are in Afghanistan because they gave comfort and shelter to the organization that has killed British and American civilians. The intention is not to kill all the Taliban, however the threat that the prior situation presented must not be allowed to return. One poster said the problem is in Pakistan. He is 100% correct. That is the rats nest that needs cleaned out. That can’t be done from the air. It needs boots on the ground and plenty of them.
We can forget any meaningful help from NATO or the UN. That will take a couple of USMC divisions in conjunction with Brit and Pakistan forces. Let’s get it done and go home. We need a more secure handle on Pakistan Nukes anyway, and the Pakistan military needs purged of the Taliban and Al Qaeda sympathizers. The price for giving shelter to our enemies must be seen by other nations as being bad for their health.
R. -
Message 23
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Saturday, 17th July 2010
Spruggles
To answer your question "yes".. I put my life on the line on a fairly regular basis over at least 24 years of my teaching career. Moroever as still essentially still in touch with the ordinary working class person I was in my childhood, and having assisted and taught thousands of ordinary working class children, and worked with their parents, I must disagree with your generalisation.
It is true, however, that I deliberately came to work in the front line, not then knowing that there would be a place called "The Front Line"-- the place at the heart of the action the crucible of the modern world-- and by definition this is perhaps a place with much more dynamism,momentum and forward energy than most.. I have seen a trailor today for a TV programme based on the idea that London is another country.
Certainly over 37 years of classroom teaching it was very common to have pupils recounting just how "behind the times" and "backwards" the regions where their relatives lived, having just visited.
But the real problem with your "average working class" is that there has been a deliberate and conscious distortion of history to create the legend of what Cole and Postgate called "the frankly pitiable" plight of the common people in the processes of the industrial revolution. This became the common mantra of: (a) the respectable educated and powerful people accustomed to power and influence like Beatrice Webb, and John Ruskin who were inspired by legends like Goethe's Dr Faustus to think of going down into Hell to save the damned or to rescue the suffering from purgatory.
and (B) people who were sucked (perhaps suckered)from other parts of the British Isles who brought with them resentment about English power and what Feargus O'Connor called "warlike natures". This naturally led to threats, and worse of "physical force". Sydney and Beatrice Webb in their classic history of the Trade Unions also saw this revolutionary phase as essentially pitiable.
So what "the working class" needed was ideas like "the gospel of British Socialism" which would enable them to aspire to political power, and have their own leaders imposing their version of "the business of politics" upon the Nation.
But in so doing what they needed to do first was to cement their hold over their own constituency. And this they did by creating this idea that working class people had always been downtrodden. It was about the same time that feminists were using history for the same ends and argued that women in history had never had any power. The intention behind this whole idea was there in Marx and Engels "Communist Manifesto", in which they argued that industrialisation finally made it possible for the common people, as an industrial proletariat , to be formed into "industrial armies".. But of course they would need people of intellectaul and material capital to be their commanders and leaders, and much of the army training is aimed at instilling the instinct to do what you are told.
So when the Attlee Government finally got the chance to promote Labour's ideas of a New Society, their work was very heavily based upon the Victorian paternalism that was prevalent at the time of the party's creation. As several writers noted in articles that I used recently written in the 1960's, Britain was by then so "managed" that a US Professor thought that there might be one-paty democracy based upon the Conservative Party. For in truth Labour had shot their bolt and when Harold Wilson disproved Professor Beer's theory, he also proved it, because very shortly after he became PM the Press were calling him the best Conservative Prime Minister of the twentieth century.
In fact my Sixties generation rebelled against some aspects of this over-managed world that we were living in. But nevertheless the cancer of working class hopelessness and dependency on redistributive wealth from the more affluent to subsidise their lifestyles, has a delitrious impact upon the pupils that I taught- who saw no need to learn, and upon "professional politicians" who in that Beatrice Webb tradition justified their existence by the way that "the poor depended upon them".
I recently read the last volume of the Tony Benn diaries, and relented a little. But when I reached the age of 21 at university and he wrote to me welcoming me to the political world, that I had been active in from my earliest years,much of what I knew about him was that he had given up his peerage in order to follow in this branch of the family business, belonging to that Beatrice Webb branch of Victorian prosperous Middle Class.. As a lorry driver's son I knew quite a bit about such people befriending the working class- when it suited them.
Regards
Cass -
Message 24
Posted by shivfan (U2435266) on Sunday, 18th July 2010
Rudolph,
The Afghan people - including the women - are certainly not unanimous in calling for the NATO forces to stay in their country. It's a bit of Western propaganda to say that our army is preventing their women from getting "whipped on the streets of Kabul for showing some ankle." We're imposing our Western values if we think that they unanimously prefer our way of life to their religious ones. In the past, I worked with Muslim women who were quite happy to wear naqibs, and did so of their own choice, despite what the Belgian and French govts will tell us....
We can moralise all we want about their society, but we have to accept facts that it is their own, and if we force change on them, they are going to resent us.
Also, how much has life improved for the poorer Afghans in the past decade of occupation? The military solution hasn't worked so far, and is probably unlikely to do so in the near future. Probably the focus should be on dealing with the inequalities that created extremists, instead of trying to eradicate them. Because if you exterminate al-Qaeda and the Taliban, another organisation under another name will rise from the ashes....
I had a friend who once became a Muslim extremist, before seeing the hypocrisy of their ways, and dropped out. He said that he joined the organisation because of the way the US and Britain unfairly favoured Israel in the Middle East problem, and he said that many others were like him. Until the US addresses that imbalance, they will forever be fighting a losing battle against extremism.... -
Message 25
Posted by U14537043 (U14537043) on Sunday, 18th July 2010
Hi shivfan,
I can't agree with your assessment of Afghanistan and what's been accomplished. I admit we should be much further ahead. Every Muslim country has the goal of driving the Israelis into the sea. As long as there is a United States that's not going to happen. Jews and Christians built The United States. Of course we had people like the Chinese who also made a big contribution. Relatively speaking Arabs are the Johnny come lately to our country. They remain Muslims first and Americans second with little thought of intermarriage. I’m not Jewish but I support Israel and its people 100%.
<>
Using that logic I guess we should have let Germany get on with it when it was your country's way of life that was threatened. I also disagree with your assessment that the UK is biased in favor of Israel.
Cheers,
R. -
Message 26
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Sunday, 18th July 2010
In fact surely in theory at least this is not supposed to be a war of conflict but a war of liberation..
But I used to use in my lessons on the 2ww a Nazi poster issued in the Netherlands during the last phases of the War that, under the heading "Liberators", had some kind of monster made up out of every possible negative image of the USA during the inter-war period.. This obviously played with the Nazi theme that the "master race" had taken up the burden of saving Humankind from the disastrous consequences of the collapse of civilization.
I doubt that this is a struggle that will be ultimately won by overwhelming force.
Cass -
Message 27
Posted by ambi (U13776277) on Sunday, 18th July 2010
"Jews and Christians built The United States."
?
I'd suggest that people of the Jewish faith are relative newcomers to the construction of the United States. The Chinese were and remain comparitively insular, and you forget to mention black Africans who, whether willingly or unwillingly, were in on the act pretty early. -
Message 28
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Sunday, 18th July 2010
ambi
I know what you mean..
But strangely enough, in spite of slavery, many African-Americans became Christian.. and it is possible to foresee the Christian community becoming more African than anything else.
The prize-winning biography of Martin Luther King was entitled "Bearing the Cross".
Cass -
Message 29
Posted by baz (U14258304) on Monday, 19th July 2010
Relatively speaking Arabs are the Johnny come lately to our country. They remain Muslims first and Americans second with little thought of intermarriage.Ìý
The women aren't allowed to choose to marry outside of the faith - they would be murdered if they did. -
Message 30
Posted by U14537043 (U14537043) on Monday, 19th July 2010
<<>>
Jewish people are anything but newcomers. Black Americans even as slaves were mostly Christians. Many Chinese Americans marry outside their ethnic background. In California in particular.
R. -
Message 31
Posted by cmedog47 (U3614178) on Tuesday, 20th July 2010
Of course Afghanistan is conquerable. We have the technological capacity to kill all the inhabitants and repopulate it with settlers of our own choosing. We are not willing to do that and in fact never tried to conquer them in the traditional sense of breaking their spirit to fight. Rather we have been trying to befriend them from the very begining by making this war as easy on them as possible.
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Message 32
Posted by Spruggles (U13892773) on Wednesday, 21st July 2010
Cass,
Profuse apologies for the late response but I plead family commitments etc.
I note that the working class have recently distorted history but you must concede that it is our turn! Since 'The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles the recording of history was the province of the rich, powerful and the educated. I submit that these people also distorted the truth to suit their purposes. The middle class has always told the absolute truth about everything?
It is solely the working class that manifests bias?
Have not school children been fed a mixture of half truths and barely concealed myths masquerading as truth for centuries?
I could cite a hundred doubtful 'facts' that were part of my education, not to mention the abuse from so called teachers. The best marginally was six thrashes with a plimsoll across the rear for inattention during a lesson on Elizabethan England.
Don't you just wish for a return to that sort of discipline? -
Message 33
Posted by Spruggles (U13892773) on Wednesday, 21st July 2010
Shivan,
Of course you are right. The are zealots in all religions that spout intolerance and it serves the purpose of the righteous of other disciplines to highlight these factions whilst attempting to hide their own faults.
The law of a country has little to do with foreign states unless it conflicts directly with their own. For example, I find the concept of capital punishment offensive but I would not seek to overthrow the many states in America that inflict this sort of barbarism on its citizens. How many are at this moment sitting on 'Death Row'? Yet justice there says, 'They were not innocent of the law. They knew the law but did not abide by that code - therefore they receive the full weight of that law.' But this is obviously not acceptable logic for women under Islamic law simply because people in the West don't like it. I wonder if there is much between a stoning and being strapped in an electric chair?
WE have always respected and been kind to women in the West haven't we! Why even today in the 21st Century certain factions here dictate on a adult woman's choice of procreation or contraception, even if childbearing may contain a risk to the mother. Was it not was once part of the religious marriage ceremony that 'marriage was meant for the procreation of children - not for man to satisfy his carnal lusts' - I'm not sure if that is still the case - anyone got married lately/ But so much for the freedom of womankind. And such a trouble I remember once when a mother tried to breast-feed her baby in public!
Just the other day supposed enlighten men were seeking to debar women from top jobs in their business solely based on their gender.
I have known a Muslim family living in London for many years. The father is orthodox but his eldest child, a boy, married a white Englishwoman(C.of.E). His eldest daughter married a white Englishman(agnostic) but his youngest child, another daughter decided on an arranged marriage to a fellow Muslim. The father has yet to kill any of his children and seems quite happy with his six grandchildren(to date). -
Message 34
Posted by Spruggles (U13892773) on Wednesday, 21st July 2010
cmedog47,
Well one solution I agree would be to nuke them -but the trouble is it's their next door neighbours - they would not like it up 'em.
I like the idea of replacing the indigenous population with our own kind too - trouble is that after a little while they would sue for independence and we'd have to fight them ... I think we've tried it several times already. -
Message 35
Posted by White Camry (U2321601) on Wednesday, 21st July 2010
Spruggles,
Well one solution I agree would be to nuke them -but the trouble is it's their next door neighbours - they would not like it up 'em.
I like the idea of replacing the indigenous population with our own kind too - trouble is that after a little while they would sue for independence and we'd have to fight them ... I think we've tried it several times already. Ìý
Hm ... a landlocked Anglo-Saxon culture? I just can't see it. -
Message 36
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Wednesday, 21st July 2010
Spruggles
Much to agree with..
As a teacher from the late Sixties I was asked by pupils to slipper them rather than have any other kind of punishment. The key thing was that they accepted that they had erred and that my responsibilities required that I do something about it.. As people on the MB are very aware I can lecture forever. But the boys often had had enough of that from their Mums, and were more resentful of wasting precious time listening, or in fact just being "detained". The slipper was the end of the matter and we both moved on with "the slate wiped clean".
As for working class distortion, this was central to the left wing middle class version of the Industrial Revolution..One author that I have asserts that the way that the Irish were treated in the eighteenth century had turned them into a nation of "chancers" and one elderly Irishman that I talk to here in Croydon, who has lots of interesting tales {I keep telling him to dictate them so his daughter could write them into a book} says that in some situations you just have to give them "a bit of the old blarney".
I don't know whether the people of Lancashire were adept at this before the great Irish immigration, but the key documents used in school histories recounting the evils of the Industrial revolution show very obvious signs of a very intelligent and conscious propaganda effort by working people to further their own interests.
The most obvious example was the oft quoted list of inhumane factory rules. This would appear to be the list printed in the Hammonds as the rules that the boss of a works in Tydlesy (?) was alleged to be attempting to impose on his employers c1816-17. The strikers printed copies, which may or may not have had some factual basis, in order to show how shocking they were at the time, and therefore how much their strike deserved public sympathy and support. It therefore can not be taken as in any way indicative of the historical reality-- as is explored in a slim volume that I have entitled "Work To Rule" which includes some of the earliest extant official factory rules, which were heavily based upon the long-standing experience of the naval dockyards, the only kind of works that had perforce to operate on a large-scale in the eighteenth century.
But what annoys me about this kind of distortion, when such material was picked up by people like Engels and Marx, is that it involves portraying the "working class" as helpless and inadequate. Rousseau's people "in chains" and either too witless, stupid or spineless to make their weight of numbers count in order to overthrow their exploiting masters. George Orwell in "Animal Farm" had a stupid cart horse and donkey. Only with the right "handlers" who knew better would they escape from one lot of chains, only to be harnessed to other people's vision of the future.
As for your point about the Chronicles, having read the AS Chronicle I am not sure that I would agree regarding most of its coverage. It was a chronicle that merely lists major happenings, and, though the top people in monasteries were often from the elite [especially in fact the nunneries- "Get thee to a nunnery" was one way to get out of an unhappy marriage one way or another] they were probably fairly mixed communities because brothers with practical life skills would also have been invaluable. The developed Medieval monastery has been well-described as really a small town.
Cass -
Message 37
Posted by Spruggles (U13892773) on Wednesday, 21st July 2010
Cass,
First, I wanted to imply that the Anglo-Saxon Chronicles was a starting point but even that tome has some pretty obscure events taking place doesn't it, which no doubt the contemporary readers accepted as fact.
Working class conditions. In 1962 I was briefly employed in a factory in Barking. It had rats in the Gentleman's toilet and on bringing the the matter to the attention of my employer he promptly terminated my employment - see rats were more important than a junior draughtsman.
I can also inform you that I have good evidence of the other side of industrial relations where management lied too. The following can be vouched for; A certain manufacturer of automobiles(not very far from the above factory) suddenly hit a major snag in the production of their much vaunted new car. To ease their problems they deliberately engineered a strike by cutting out a tea break and then being offensive in the subsequent 'negotiations' with the union. The result was predictable - just before the annual break the workers went on strike. Result - manufacturer sorted out production problem and had factory maintenance brought forward to coincide with the six weeks strike. Of course the national press was full of the terrible financial loss incurred by the company. BUT No mention of the money saved in wages during the strike nor how much was saved by shutting down all but essential services in the factory nor the potential cost of having a workforce idle whilst the production fault was rectified. When the problems were solved the unions were called back to the office and lo! the tea break was reinstated. Of course the workers did not receive their holiday pay either(a loss of eight weeks wager I think). A victory for common sense the press proclaimed!
I have held positions on both sides of the divide Cass, including many years as a Union representative and I can assure you that the workers did not have the monopoly on deceit and deviousness.
Reference the working conditions and the recording of same. People do forget that some aspects of the Industrial revolution did benefit the worker; those now notorious back-to-backs in the industrial north were in fact a vast improvement on the conditions that farm workers of the same period endured; the problem was that they were allowed to continue in use for far too long. Communal toilets for six families are an example of that.
Like most things, the welfare of the worker depended the employer. Some were good and faced their responsibilities, some were completely immune and treated the workforce as slaves.
However, in my lifetime I have seen some pretty horrendous working conditions(the northern branch of my family were all miners)and time spent in 1946 with Uncle and Auntie in Stockton-on-Tees will never be forgotten by me.
'Work to Rule' was simply an attempt to defend jobs where the alternative to a working class family often spelt destitution - but then perhaps you refuse to believe that too.
Incidentally, your quote 'get thee to a nunnery' as I'm sure you are aware is often quoted from Hamlet, and is still on some state school curriculum, however, few children are aware that Shakespeare refers in this instance to the Elizabethan slang meaning 'brothel'.
A rich vein is Elizabethan slang.
Regards. -
Message 38
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Wednesday, 21st July 2010
Spruggles
I am well aware- and was at the time- of the "them and us" culture of the England of Fifties. My point is that in the period after 1870- and this is most notable in the Labour movement -(see the Webbs)- there was a great drive amongst "thinking classes" to identify the underlying group struggles which lay at the basis of what science was telling about the Struggle for the Survival of the fittest.
Now what was quite particular about some of the industrial areas particularly the cotton ones in Lancashire and Clydeside is that many of those pushed and pulled into the new industrial world came with traditional ideas of feud and conflict, many from the Highland clearances and others from Ireland where conditions especially for RC's were intolerable. Of course many employers and businessmen, like the Gladstone family, also came from similar backgrounds of strife and clannishness, as opposed to English Commonweal.
When I was writing about this many years ago I entitled a section "The Red and the Green", highlighting how the Irish immigration impacted upon Lancashire- in particular through an Irish recognition of similarities between this new Capitalism and the kind of imperialism and colonialism that their countrymen had experienced for a century and more. The conditions of alienation between employer and hired hand was something that they knew. And someone in political exile from a police State, like Marx could also bring an imprint of his own experience of alienation and resistance struggle...
I subsequently found and read a novel by Irish Murdock entitled "The Red and the Green " that is all about the Easter Uprising.. Her husband and biographer John Bailey (?) noted that the Irish question was the only matter that Iris could not approach with the objectivity of an Oxford philosophy don.
Struggles and alienation there certainly were; and neither side was innocent. But the successful period of the mid-Victorian era when there was palpable progress was a period of partnership and cooperation at various levels. The "New Model Trade Unions" and the Cooperative Movement were just part of this period when "working class" people, like others in society did a great deal to improve standards in many ways.
But it was the 1870's that saw a new mood, a new paranoia and a widespread feeling that only through massive group identities could individually feeble people cope with the challenges of life. Militancy, conflict, and militarism became the norm and the histories created this need to struggle against enemies that were either immortal, or must be eliminated. Even in fiction Sherlock Holmes had his Moriarity.
But English wisdom had known for centuries that "A house divided will fall".. The divisions of nations, races, sexes, religions and classes
destroyed any meaningful hope of overall human progress: and has left Humanity just hanging on in, at best, what J.K. Galbraith called "The Culture of Contentment".
Regards
Cass -
Message 39
Posted by BashfulAnthony (U10740638) on Wednesday, 21st July 2010
In the nineteenth century, Britain never really properly conquered Afghanistan. Was it because it was too remote, too wild, and too hard to control? quoteÌý
It's clear that armies, however powerful, will not subdue a guerilla campaign. We have seen it many times - in Vietnam; the Russians here in Afghaniatan; and now ourselves. It would be better to come to some sort of agreement now, before more lives are lost needlessly, on both sides. -
Message 40
Posted by giraffe47 (U4048491) on Wednesday, 21st July 2010
Unfortunately, you can only 'come to some agreement' if both sides want to, and have some common ground to agree on. We 'came to some agreement' at Munich in 1938, the USA 'came to some agreement' with N Vietnam, etc, etc. Agreements mean nothing, unless both sides have a vested interest in keeping them.
Can we achieve any progress towards our 'war aims' (whatever they might be!!) in Afghanistan? I doubt if it even matters, as the people we are supposedely fighting can simply drift away to some other country. As long as we interfere in Middle East affairs there will be some people who will be willing to take up arms against us, and carry the 'fight' unto our doorstep.
Given the presence of Israel and the presence of oil, I think we (or more especially the USA) will be there for a long time to come, and given the attitude of "Good Ol' Uncle Sam" to "Al-gebra", etc, I can't see much chance of a peaceful next decade.
They didn't learm much from 'Nam, and it'll take a while for any lessons to sink in about this one as well. -
Message 41
Posted by BashfulAnthony (U10740638) on Wednesday, 21st July 2010
giraffe47,
Can we achieve any progress towards our 'war aims' (whatever they might be!!) in Afghanistan?Ìý
And that of course is the crux of it. Whatever our supposed "aims" are, they can never be achieved, because we cannot defeat an "invisible" enemy. Since we will not manage to find any common ground with the Taleban, we should just leave, as the Russians did. And I don't detect any dire consequences to them because of their withdrawal. -
Message 42
Posted by cmedog47 (U3614178) on Wednesday, 21st July 2010
Sruggles
Regarding "after a little while they would sue for independence and we'd have to fight them " I think that is only true if they followed independence by another attack on our homeland.
Many of the posters here are already thoroughly defeated, defeat being an emotional state involving the loss of the will to continue to fight. We have not defeated Afghanistan. We never tried. We tried to achieve a range of objectives by much more limited means.
Our problems lie with both the objectives and the means. We had good success when our objective was limited to driving out of power the authors of the attack on us. No other objective was needed but we set out on that path anyway. The Russians attempted to make them modern communists ruled from Kabul. We then attempted to make them modern democrats ruled from Kabul.
Our means was to not crush the populations spirit with hardship, starvation, indiscriminate death and suffering, but to make friends by protecting them from the privations of war. So far from being defeated, their animal spirits to resist what they find objectionable remained intact. They had already shown that they object being made into a modern anything ruled in any manner from Kabul. So why did we do it? It wasn't necessary to make sure were were not attacked from Afghanistan any longer.
All we needed to do is kill our enemies there and otherwise leave the people alone.... alone to grow opium, to keep their women barefoot, to live their lives just as they wish, but to kill without remorse and with a frightening level of meanness any who feel they must attack us.
When we "conquered" our enemies in WW2, it was after years of raining the fires of hell down on their innocent children and by the time the end came, they were happy to submit to a foreign administered peace. Humans are humans everywhere and we could do the same thing to the Afghans if we needed to and could muster the necessary level of meanness as we did then---they are not unconquerable. But we don't need to do that to achieve our necessary objectives in this war.
I think one of big mistakes, emblematic of many others, is to supress the opium trade. Rather we should enter the business and become the buyers and cut the Taleban out. We shouldn't try to force anyone to be loyal to Kabul. -
Message 43
Posted by giraffe47 (U4048491) on Thursday, 22nd July 2010
I'd agree about suppressing the opium trade. We are only driving the people into the arms of the Taleban if we stop them growing it without replacing the income in a realistic way.
Humans will always feed their bad habits in some way, so banning things has never really worked. It only makes them more desirable, more profitable, and benefits only the most evil members of society. I'm sure Al Capone just loved prohibition!
Lets legalise it, tax it just enough to make smuggling it unprofitable, and buy all we can get at source. Undercut the Mafia, the Taliban, the druglords, and go into business.
Nothing run by the Government ever works, so we may even reduce drug addiction as well! -
Message 44
Posted by shivfan (U2435266) on Thursday, 22nd July 2010
That's a bit of a blinkered approach, Rudolph....
Life has moved on since the days when all Middle Eastern countries resented the imposition of Israel on the region. Bor example, countries like Egypt and Turkey have practically accepted the existence of Israel now.
I can't quite see how Jews can be credited with the creation of America any more than other immigrants. With regards to Muslims not intermarrying, I have quite a few Jewish friends, and they have no interest in marrying outside of their Jewish faith. Muslims are quite capable of contributing to Western society as well, if you'd just give them a chance. Here in England, a Muslim man married an English woman, and they had a son who went on to captain the England cricket team. His name is Nasser Hussain....
<quote>Every Muslim country has the goal of driving the Israelis into the sea. As long as there is a United States that's not going to happen. Jews and Christians built The United States. Of course we had people like the Chinese who also made a big contribution. Relatively speaking Arabs are the Johnny come lately to our country. They remain Muslims first and Americans second with little thought of intermarriage. I’m not Jewish but I support Israel and its people 100%. -
Message 45
Posted by White Camry (U2321601) on Thursday, 22nd July 2010
BashfulAnthony
It's clear that armies, however powerful, will not subdue a guerilla campaign. We have seen it many times - in Vietnam; the Russians here in Afghaniatan; and now ourselves.Ìý
Not with conventional tactics and strategy, no. However, while the French and Yanks were cocking things up in Indochina and Algeria, the British showed how it was done in Malaya and Borneo.
It would be better to come to some sort of agreement now, before more lives are lost needlessly, on both sides.Ìý
If the Taliban are up for an agreement which excludes any al-Qaeda from Afghanistan then, yes, we ought to consider it. -
Message 46
This posting has been hidden during moderation because it broke the in some way.
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Message 47
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Message 48
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Message 49
Posted by stalti (U14278018) on Saturday, 24th July 2010
hi rudolph
agreed malaya and borneo were very different
got any facts to prove the british moved out before the insurgency was over and our ozzie cuzzens sorted it out ??
(not that they werent capable - after all Bar wrecking is a dergee course in Australian universities lol)
st -
Message 50
Posted by shivfan (U2435266) on Monday, 16th August 2010
What is the situation in Iraq now? In the cities, residents of the country get only three hours of electricity a day. In the provinces, it's even less. The security situation is worse than it was under Saddam. There is a hung parliament in Iraq, and neither party seems willing to negotiate. You can't impose western democracy on a Middle East country, and suddenly expect them to behave like David Cameron and Nick Clegg.
So, if the Americans aren't able to bring an element of stability to Iraq, how are they going to do so in a mouch more mountainous and remote country like Afghanistan?
Quite frankly, the West seems to have bitten off more than they can chew when they decided to invade Afghanistan and Iraq....
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