and what will they do next time that they haven't been able to do in 20 years and spending almost US$ 4,000,000,000,000 of public money?
build a state that doesn't collapse in 5 minutes after receiving taliban whatsapp messages?
but, yeah, those idiots who were against the war, ay? What were they thinking?
(
cumquat may will not be commenting further on the allegations, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 9:46,
Reply)
Oh, don't get me wrong. I'm in no way in support of the occupation of Afghanistan.
I'm under no illusions about the absolutely monumental fuckup the whole thing has been since day one. We shouldn't have interfered in the first place. We only got involved to begin with because we fabricated an excuse to 'liberate' the country thanks to an ongoing occupation that was also the result of a massive load of fabricated bollocks that (tellingly) nobody has been (or will ever be) held officially accountable for.
I suppose my point was more that as soon as we began occupation, we fucked it for ourselves. It essentially committed us to remaining there indefinitely because absolutely nobody was kidding themselves that the new Afghan government would be able to hold control of the country once the Western forces high-tailed it.
But of course, "KEEP OUR TROOPS IN AFGHANISTAN!" doesn't make for the catchiest of slogans during the occupation, because obviously we don't want those poor Afghanis under the tyrannical rule of the US Government, right?
The whole thing is a fucking shambles.
(, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 10:01, Reply)
your backpedalling after weirdly deciding to have a crack at people who protested makes even less sense
if you accept it was a monumental and unethical fuckup that is not achieving it's aims, that destroying villages with drone strikes after some informer tip off is not going to win hearts and minds, that instead all it produces was death and displacement and a generation of radicalised young muslims who start thinking the taliban aren't so bad after all, then it's absolutely folly to continue it. "sent back in?" "essentially committed?". Christ
there was some ex-general during the early years talking just now about how the afghanis have a history of not liking invaders and that's why we should be surprised at the speed of collapse and we were all "Yes, everyone fucking knew this already. But you didn't pipe up at the time, did you? You just went along with it"
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cumquat may will not be commenting further on the allegations, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 10:31,
Reply)
Where was I backpedaling?
Perhaps I wasn't clear enough:
I was absolutely against any occupation of Iraq/Afghanistan. Wasn't our business. Should have left them to it.
However, the government thought better and decided to invade anyway.
At that moment, we had basically said "Well, we're in it for the long haul, now". Because we knew as soon as we vacated, things would go completely tits up.
We vacated, things went tits up.
Now the folk campaigning for us to leave Afghanistan are going to realise what a bad idea that was and start pleading for a re-occupation.
Essentially, every decision we've made in regards to the conflict has been a massive fucking failure.
(, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 10:43, Reply)
unlike the trans debate, I actually care about this issue
I was in London for the biggest protest march in history. We knew this was the outcome and all I feel now is sadness. I don't even have much stomach to argue with you, but briefly, we weren't preventing the place from going tits up, we were the ongoing cause of it. The country was a basketcase of warlords, IUDs, corrupt puppets, soldier kicking in doors, and death from above because of us. I don't mean to be the one to break it to you, but life hasn't been very good for the average afghani these last 20 years, and it's been because of us. this is why the Taliban has the support and the puppet kharzi in kabul doesn't
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cumquat may will not be commenting further on the allegations, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 10:57,
Reply)
The biggest ever demo was in 2003, two years after the invasion of Afghanistan. It was against the invasion of Iraq.
An IUD is a contraceptive device.
(
Prufrock Lucifer, son of the morning!, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 11:17,
Reply)
pedantry is not the same as insight or intelligence, it's just the scraps you latch onto because you lack the others
anyway, it matters not. the world is how it is because there's enough dickwits that allow it
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cumquat may will not be commenting further on the allegations, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 12:06,
Reply)
Certainly things have been fucking shit in Afghanistan for the last 20 years.
However, to name just one significant improvement, girls were in schools and women in universities. That was not the case before 2001, and I think it’s safe to assume will no longer be the case now.
To quote someone much wiser than I am:
“have you ever considered the possibility that you might be wrong in some of your assertions?”
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Prufrock Lucifer, son of the morning!, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 12:44,
Reply)
only if you believe some white picket fence fairytale you were sold. Im sure the spectator would have run an article about how lucky afghani women are because of us
we succeeded in creating a little bubble at enormous expenses, where those lucky few wealthy from corruption could enjoy a sort weird western green-zone shopping mall life, where in the provinces we abandoned all else to their lawless fate, which was our missile and mop up operations and it's really hard to tell who's taliban and who isn't so lets kill them all to be sure, ensuring that fundamentalists would be well supported. It's those same people who are on the tarmac now. And people are scratching there heads and saying "why didn't they support our man?" It's because of what we did, all else is a mirage. There were plenty of people, soldiers, civilians, ngos, talking about how things were actually like, how fucked we'd made things and how little we're liked or supported, but few were listening. We're the good guys, right?
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cumquat may will not be commenting further on the allegations, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 12:59,
Reply)
As bad as things were, I am certain that under the Taleban they will be infinitely worse.
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Prufrock Lucifer, son of the morning!, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 13:11,
Reply)
you're certain, are you?
I guess you must really be in touch what an afghani villager wants out of life and what they prioritise. Strange that they've abandoned the karzai so quickly in favour of the taliban, but you know better. I mean, they're muslims and under the taliban, there's law and protection of property and a means of redress that hasn't existed in 20 years of western shitfuckery and they've repeately said that's why they prefer the taliban when interviewed about it, but they're most likely lying. They probably didn't realise that we were just about to make things great for them instead of treating all of them like potential enemies that we can treat horribly or kill with little accountability, it was going to happen any day now....
I see swagatha went all quiet. lucky you were on hand to pick up the slack
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cumquat may will not be commenting further on the allegations, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 13:28,
Reply)
I guess all those people desperately trying to get on planes to escape the Taleban, like the people your original post was about, aren’t Afghanis.
I guess the streets are deserted in Kabul because everyone is at home, celebrating quietly.
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Prufrock Lucifer, son of the morning!, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 13:51,
Reply)
How do you think the Afghans that didn't actively oppose the post-Taliban government are going to be treated now?
Do you think all will be forgiven?
Are you seriously suggesting that things are going to get better for the majority of the Afghani population now? Just because they all follow the same religion?!
I'm struggling to think of any nations that have flourished under a theocratic government. Can you name any?
The Afghanis were fucked before the Western occupation. They're doublefucked now. I mean, unless the Taliban have had a change of heart and decided that boiling people alive or locking them in cages and watching them burn to death was perhaps a little ethically misguided. I guess we'll just have to wait and see. Maybe they'll just stick to throwing homosexuals from the tops of buildings.
(, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 13:52, Reply)
I remember when they were called the Mujahideen
and in the eyes of the west were brave freedom fighters.
(
Tusk knows where you live, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 14:21,
Reply)
Well they were fighting the Soviets at the time. However sometimes the enemy of my enemy is also my enemy.
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evil_andy Stick stick stick stick sticky sticky stick stick, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 14:26,
Reply)
'...was killed by a hidden IUD'
What a tragic way to die.
(
FeralCatMan Long ads need comments sections, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 19:48,
Reply)
That’s the lot of all those poor ova, never even got the chance to meet the right gamete.
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Prufrock Lucifer, son of the morning!, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 20:38,
Reply)
There wasnt much protest against Afghanistan
Certainly not at the start (just after 9/11). Iraq was when it all kicked off at which point the two conflicts were conflated to some extent.
(, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 10:52, Reply)
they were only conflated as enemies of 9/11 by the US and its allies. the antiwar protesters understood the folly and lies behind both conflicts
the same people who organised the giant hyde park (which we saw all of and were close enough to hear all the speakers, some of whom talked about afghanistan, and lady dynamite singing for some reason) we the Stop the war coalition. they had organised several smaller protest about afghanistan, I attended one, but when blair published his case for war with iraq it got a lot of people mobilised. The afghan conflict started with missile strikes, then a limited operation in tora bora, but it was when they committed a ground task force with really opaque strategic aims that a lot of us, who could see the obvious parallel with vietnam and it's escalation without a clear end game and based on a lot of wishful thinking, became really alarmed enough to protest
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cumquat may will not be commenting further on the allegations, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 12:46,
Reply)
Your friends at the Stop The War coalition have already demanded the UK pay reparations to Afghanistan.
Given Afghanistan is now under control of the Taleban, they are literally asking the U.K. to pay a political organisation that amongst other things opposes democracy in any form, denies females access to education, and stones and beheads people they don’t approve of, like gay people for example.
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Prufrock Lucifer, son of the morning!, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 13:08,
Reply)
how many chinese made items do you have in your home, prufrock
I mean before I get into the complex subject of ethics in multilateral relations, I'd want to gauge whether you're an unknowing or knowing hypocrite. Actually, fuck it. dealing with you is just parsing one stupid argument after another, the same kind of stuff I heard in the march to war. It's depressing.
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cumquat may will not be commenting further on the allegations, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 13:47,
Reply)
When losing an argument, try whataboutery, in fact fuck it, just resort to a non sequitur.
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Prufrock Lucifer, son of the morning!, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 13:53,
Reply)
Jesus fucking Christ.
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evil_andy Stick stick stick stick sticky sticky stick stick, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 14:27,
Reply)
Just because a dickhead tells you a good idea doesn't make it a bad idea.
So if war is bad, the fact that you're being told it's bad by someone you otherwise disagree with on some related topics shouldn't blind you to the fact that war is indeed bad.
Of course, usually we all get that bit wrong. If Jonathan King told me that eating food was necessary for health, for example, I'd probably be wondering what the ghastly trick was.
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Invisible Wizard - 13th Level Scrote, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 17:54,
Reply)
I’m not opposed to anti-war sentiment, in certain contexts I might disagree with it, but I don’t object to it as a standpoint.
I do object to giving a barbaric and tyrannical regime like the Taleban cash compensation in any context. That’s what STW are calling for. Not food and medical aid, but cash reparations.
War is bad. That much I have learned.
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Prufrock Lucifer, son of the morning!, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 18:40,
Reply)
There's people who were against the war starting, and there's the people who supported it at first but wanted out after years of bloodshed
Kind of like Vietnam again, except I feel like the original antiwar folks mostly gave up, leaving a strange sort of Republican antiwar group leading the protest.
I daresay this isn't news though. Just wanted to get my own thoughts in order. As you were.
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Invisible Wizard - 13th Level Scrote, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 12:42,
Reply)
I protested against the Afghanistan and Iraq wars
but once we'd committed it stood to reason that we'd have to pull a Germany/Japan and stay there forever.
Sadly, unlike in Japan/Germany we decided the best policy was to act as terrorists.
The empowerment of women, the return of music and culture, both excellent. Worth the price? It might have been arguable up to a couple of weeks ago, but now it's all gone to shit.
(
brb man-child cuck corporate supplicant fuck, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 15:30,
Reply)
I don't think you understand how to use the word analogy.
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brb man-child cuck corporate supplicant fuck, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 15:55,
Reply)
Will you tell me what my Germany/Japan analogy is?
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brb man-child cuck corporate supplicant fuck, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 17:47,
Reply)
I first met my wife at an anti war protest in the 2000s.
The popular opinion pendulum swung so far behind the various wars in the decade after that, we ended up a bit scared to mention it in public.
It all seems a bit cirular and repetitive. I'll be getting my 1990s clothes out the back of the wardrobe soon, I reckon.
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Invisible Wizard - 13th Level Scrote, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 22:10,
Reply)
You shouldn’t be shy about mentioning that.
It’s certainly a lot more wholesome than “We met at a VD clinic.”
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Prufrock Lucifer, son of the morning!, Mon 16 Aug 2021, 22:27,
Reply)
I know I *shouldn't* be shy about it
- but as much I as try not to, the company I work for means I spend a lot of time working with ex-military types and defence contractors.
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Invisible Wizard - 13th Level Scrote, Tue 17 Aug 2021, 9:35,
Reply)