where do you foresee the money coming from that keeps the taliban in power. China?
Everyone that uses heroin. Afghanistan decades ago displaced the Golden Triangle as the number one exporter of opium in the world and the Taliban taxes most of that.
But yeah, China is utterly amoral in their business dealings and likely move into the business vacuum. Unless an issue arises with Afghan-sponsored Islamic agitation in Chinese central Asia, which I rather doubt. The Taliban have always been fairly insular and xenophobic. They never exported revolution themselves, they just sheltered those who did back in the day.
But Afghanistan is and will remain dirt poor. The Taliban are not going to need many resources to hold power, because nobody in Afghanistan holds many resources. They just need to keep a certain percentage of the tribal leaders happy and most of the rest cowed.
This article suggests there’s some good news:
That’s a lot of evacuees, but it’s unclear how many are Americans, how many are Afghanis, etc.
From what it sounds like a lot were probably Afghan visa holders and maybe foreign nationals. They actually ended up getting 21000 out yesterday–the article you quoted was taken mid-day yesterday and isn’t complete day numbers. We’ve moved a total of around 58000 out now. Of the original 15000 Americans who were in country I haven’t seen a clear number of how many have been evacuated, but I would guess a large % of them.
Something to keep in mind is some of those people may have left outside the evacuation channel and just never notified the government. It’s also unclear what all of the ones who were in country were doing, and how many plan on leaving. Shockingly–not all probably plan to leave. There are likely at least some dual-nationality U.S./Afghan, some of whom may make a deliberate choice to stay in Afghanistan because of familial ties. It’s not inconceivable some number of Americans have some sort of other business or etc interests in country and may choose to stay. That seems crazy, but crazier things have happened. The popular idea is that in a situation like this there’s just going to be some big massacre of all the Americans, but the truth gets more complicated.
It’s 100% due to the fact that successful foreign occupation has a very low batting average in Afghanistan and we didn’t come to that realization soon enough.
Not a safe way to carry people but they basically overtook the plane and the crew wasn’t left with much choice. While this isn’t a weight capacity issue it was dangerous to carry them loose loaded. If they made a steep climb it could have caused them to fall to the back of the plane and cause a weight and balance issue.
Normally you’d center-load seat pallets and use the side seats for a load of 134 people. In a pinch you can load them and strap them down “seat belt style”. This was a cattle car.
Your cite says 800 was an overestimation, but doesn’t provide a better number.
Either way, it still doesn’t brake the world record of 1,088 people on one plane, from 1991.
No. Afghan is an alternate name for a Pashtun/Pashtun. Which as you can seen may make people of Tajik, Uzbek and Hazara ethnicity unhappy. Afghani is a perfectly acceptable term in local language of “citizen of Afghanistan”.
If someone says says “Afghan, not Afghani”, they are likely Pashtun. The reverse, non Pashtun.
The British, for not annexing Kabul ans Kandahar when the could have.
The Afghans, for losing their richest provinces to the Sikhs.
……the Mughals and the Persians for 200 years of fighting over Afghanistan with no settlement.
The Mongols for turning it into barren moonscape.
Great respect to you, but this is horseshit. THe Geneva accords of 1988 which ended the Soviet occupation didn’t cause the Afghan communist regime to fall, they hung on until after the dissolution of the Soviet Union.
The issue was that the ANA non existent. Sure it had many brave men (and some women) but as an institution the military was less an armed forces than just a bunch of people with guns and the same uniform. The US could have built them up. But to somehow thing that an ANA which had turbo prop planes and modified fire fighting Helos as its frontline combat system could have held off the Taliban is laughable
I used the term “proximate cause”, you should probably investigate what that means. You’re talking about longer term cause/effect, and on that count aren’t really in disagreement with me. I’ve already posted previously about how similar things went down over the several years it took for the communist government of Afghanistan to collapse after the Soviet pullout. For example in this post here:
This article is well worth reading.
Was there a better way of withdrawing from Afghanistan?
TL;DR: Yes, Biden should have had contingency plans for dealing with a sudden collapse of the Afghan government. But even so, withdrawal was always going to be messy. You can’t “quietly” evacuate your allies. And once local friends and foes know that you’re leaving, it sets off many other processes over which you have little control.
Thank you! This is great information.
Well you cannot find a hotel room or B&B space in Islamabad and Peshawar.
People have literally had phone calls offering them cash to take on house guests.
August is holiday season normally, people have usually decamped overseas or to the north. Though Covid put a dampener on that last two years, it’s still surreal to see the place so crowded this time of year.
How are they getting there? Are they driving?
Flying from Kabul to Islamabad or driving across Torkham border crossing to Peshawar. At least it’s controlled this time, unlike previously…for now.
I’m beginning to wonder if a surprise counterattack is being looked into? Seize Bagram Airfield and at least take control of Kabul. Then finish the evacuation and get out.
It would cost lives. Biden crossed that bridge with his poor decisions.
The question is who dies? The elderly, women and kids or trained soldiers that can defend themselves?
There’s California school kids and their parents stuck over there.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/two-dozen-california-students-are-stuck-in-afghanistan-as-the-august-31-deadline-to-evacuate-approaches/ar-AANJwmI
Russia tried that already in the 80s.
Turning off the lights out as you slip out the back is generally a pretty good sign you’re not returning.
What, like on a field trip?