Afghanistan

[M_B]

NATO (and thus Britain) had to go to Afganistan because of obligations to USA as a member of NATO that was agreed to have been under attack (9/11).

Afganistan's government had a choice - hand over Bin Laden or accept that he was acting on their behalf. They chosen the latter, not suprisingly given connection between Bin Laden and Taleban, so they had to face the consequences of their decision.

The problem of Afganistan is that the job was not actually done - Bin Laden was not caught and generally for a few years attention moved to Iraq, so Taleban was able to regroup.

Correct. Fortunately it now means that this project can go ahead aswell. Bonus.

[sasguru]

Correct. Fortunately it now means that this project can go ahead aswell. Bonus.

From that link:

"There is also a question mark over stability in Afghanistan, but interim Afghan leader Hamid Karzai said peace was prevailing all over the country. "

So that's Ok then.

[M_B]

From that link:

"There is also a question mark over stability in Afghanistan, but interim Afghan leader Hamid Karzai said peace was prevailing all over the country. "

So that's Ok then.

Yes indeed. Just aswell we went in to provide the stability.

[sunnysan]

Afghan problem

I think the reasons on the surface are NATO obligations but I do agree that it seems that nobody is actually quite sure why they are fighting and what the bigger picture is.

Having control of Afghanistan would obviously be of huge strategic importance to the US/UK bloc considering its location.

However I cannot see the West ever really controlling Afghanistan as I dont believe that the political will exists, nor that the West has the stomach or indeed the resources to do it.

The way I see it, you have normal rational professional soldiers fighting , georgraphically entrenched, war hardened religious fundementalists who will die for their cause. You cannot reason or negotiate with people who think like this. They only know war, that is all they have done most of their lives

When Russia invaded Afghanistan, it had loads of troops, conscription etc and the advantage of nearly being a neighbour. Even they could not do it so I dont really think that the West can

[AtW]

However I cannot see the West ever really controlling Afghanistan as I dont believe that the political will exists, nor that the West has the stomach or indeed the resources to do it.

Ok, lets see here: USA has got around 15k troops there and UK maybe 5k, these 2 countries provide the bulk of the real action force.

Now USA has got something like 150k troops in Iraq - that's enough force to deal with Taleban, but to do so they need to be pulled out of Iraq (and never get there in the first place), if these troops were left in Afganistan from 2001 until Bin Laden is caught live or dead, including top taleban then current problems would not have happened - it was a crazy strategic mistake to pull out from Afganistan so quickly - repeated on a bigger scale in Iraq.

You talking about USSR there but you don't really know what you talking about - you need to compare current West losses there with what USSR lost, only using official USSR counts (which are reduced) it turns out USSR was losing 10 times more men.

Maybe the solution in Afganistan should be having countless drones that would blow up anything in exclusion zones - anything along border with Pakistan.

[Moscow Mule]

The only solution is to nuke the tuliphole to glass and be done with it.

Preferably from orbit.

[AtW]

No one has ever succeeded in Afghanistan...

It depends on how you define success.

I say if Bin Laden and his boys can't have training camps there or anywhere else then it is success already - also success would be to stop flow of heroin from there, but to win this one you really need to legalise drugs in the West.

[Diver]

All the training camps are now in the tribal areas of Pakistan...

Can't nuke them coz they've got nukes of their own.

Life is so unfair.

Yeh! coz if we nuke them, they will nuke India

[Cooperinliverp00l]

i to loved the seried by Ross Kemp but think it was heavily censored by the producers and military. A lot of the scenes looked really exciting like an advert for the Army and only wish they showed the helmet cams of more soldiers.

I think our boys and girls are doing a great job out there considering the conditions and equipement they have to work with. Do agree that we should start to pull out. But if we pull out where will our troops go ??? not N.Ireland so will there be job cuts ?? maybe that is why they are still over there

R.I.P those who have not made it back

[AtW]

All the training camps are now in the tribal areas of Pakistan...

True, but it happaned only because of a major screwup by USA (Bush/Rumsfeld/etc) which pulled out way too fast from Afganistan.

But in honest I think now it is not as easy for people from the west to get trained there - before the west was basically ignoring the fact of its citizens being trained in those camps, at least now there is some watching going on.