>Maybe so. If I understand you correctly you are saying that the >Taliban is not the same as the Northern Alliance, so while we >intervened in Afghanistand it was on behalf of different groups. >This may well be true. I don't claim expertise in Central Asian >history; I was just looking for an alternative to Saddam as an >example. We did intervene though and the attempt at social engineering >does not seem to have advanced the interests of the US. That's my >major point.
The Northern Alliance and the Taliban were at war from 1995 through 2001. Just days before 9/11 Al-Queda on behalf of the Taliban killed the leader of NA, Ahmed Shah Massoud in a suicide bombing. In the initial campaign 6 years ago this weekend the US mainly supplied air support and Special Forces teams to assist the NA in their reconquest of Afghanistan. Unlike the Taliban, the Northern Alliance was mainly made up of Hazeri, Uzbec and Tajik tribal groups. Very different in attitude and beliefs than the more fundamentalist Pashto tribes. > >However, I wish I had confidence that the people making policy for the >country knew better than I did. It seems to me that we are about to >pay the price for the "don't bother me with the facts" attitude of the >Bushies. What I know about the area I know through a study of the >history of the British Empire and they had essentially the same >experience there... chasing people through harsh unfamiliar terrain >that their opponents on the other hand knew intimately. Um not really. The British had several wars with Afghanistan starting in the 1830's. The one that most are familiar with is the Elfinstone expedition what was killed almost to a man. That's the source of the Kipling story The Man Who Would Be King. Lord Roberts (later the commander of British forces in South Africa during the Boer War) led a reprisal expedition that was very successful - essentially destroying the then Afghan forces in a very brilliant campaign. The British left after getting an indemnity (essentially they got about 10 million in gold). The Afghans didn't try anything after that until the 1920's or so when Afghanistan tried to invade the North West Frontier. Then the British Army simply kicked ass. The Afghans could not compete with poison gas and air power. The British occupied the country for 5 years. They left after setting up a monarchy that stood until the 1970's. The other expeditions (1840's, and the 1860's) were also very successful. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| ColdFusion is delivering applications solutions at at top companies around the world in government. Find out how and where now http://www.adobe.com/cfusion/showcase/index.cfm?event=finder&productID=1522&loc=en_us Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Community/message.cfm/messageid:243769 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=89.70.5
