Yeah, the “developer” tag under his username leads me to believe he probably thinks this board is about some kind of video game “mod” hahahahaha what a maroon. No but seriously, it isn’t.
In reality it’s about presenting any random viewpoint and defending it beyond any reasonable purpose.
We are in the “Massdebating Hall”, are we not?
LOL Thanks for a good laugh mate 
The World according to the Republicans actually
We’re smarter than you think
Just read this.
lulz, I’m a democrat normally.
he probably meant Nationalists and doesn’t realize both political parties have them
Patriots*
real Americans!**
hypocritical*** Americans
SwampFox
[color=black]vidjay game joke
shrug I thought that the Taliban were creating trouble for the pipeline. If that trouble was created by their mere existence, then that must have been what my lecturer was referring to.
My point, however, still stands. My idea was that the US didn’t invade where it was impossible to install a pipeline in Afghanistan. If that was because of a perception of instability, then the US still didn’t go in there to restore stability, as it did with 1st (or 2nd, depending on your numbering) Gulf War in Kuwait. I thought it was because the Taliban were stirring shit up. Either way, the US didn’t go in to ensure that the pipeline was created.
I don’t see how those two statements are inconsistent. It was invaded because Afghanistan was a hub that AQ used to set up its international system of terrorist cells. Now that those cells are, to a large extent, autonomous and disconnected, cutting out the heart probably wont do much. It may, however, prevent the dissemination of orders to those particular cells, but it wont prevent those cells from doing their own thing.
Furthermore, even if OBL now has no impact on how those international cells operate, it was the fact that OBL took responsibility for 9/11 attack that prompted the invasion. Putting aside how AQ operates on a broader level, the invasion of Afghanistan was justified by the fact that we would capture OBL. The perception was that he was the leader, and with him the rest would fall; that hasn’t (and won’t) happen, but that was the reason given.
I believe my point made sense; Afghanistan was an opportunistic base OBL used for recruitment, training and education. He then sent those recruited, trained and educated operatives out to spread his word to others, so that they could set up cells in other countries. Those cells were kept distant from each other, such that one could never contact another, but I have no doubt that OBL was still issuing orders. Given the availability of technology, relatively isolation can be maintained while orders can still be delivered (see: internet anonymity).
Yes, except that the Russian image of government was that of an oppressive, totalitarian state. The Americans are, at the very least, trying to create a democratic government.
What you aren’t looking at is the period after the collapse of the Russian-supported Afghanistan government and before the installation of the Taliban as the dominant force in the country. During that time, the US-supported mujahideen groups began fighting each other, trying to assert dominance. What resulted was essentially a rape of the country, with everyone fighting everyone else. The war dissolved into “identitiy politics” (as opposed to national politics), where each group wanted to achieve superiority for itself, rather than striving for the betterment of Afghanistan as a state.
This resulted in a massive internal collapse of Afghanistan. This was where most of the destruction of infrastructure occurred. This was where the country literally tore itself apart, and this paved the way for the Taliban to come in to take control. The ensuing conflict was equally due to the US policy of funding and arming the mujahideen with literally no safeguards as it was to the Russians propping up a puppet government in a buffer state.
Actually I thought that the OP was referring to why we invaded. I think the reasons as to why we invaded and why we’re still there are, actually, quite similar.
Your Russian propagandist counterpart would say “The American image of government is a corrupt capitalist banana republic, we are at least trying to create a government where everyone in society is equal.” It’s transparently meaningless rhetoric in both cases, it doesn’t change the facts on the ground (I.e. the Karzai government uses death squads, rigs elections and is massively corrupt) Didn’t Orwell say something to the effect of “to the Nationalist, there is no crime no matter how heinous which does not change its character completely when committed by “our” side.”
How am I not looking at that, when my whole argument is that it doesn’t make sense to call fighting caused by the installation and collapse of the Russian puppet government in Afghanistan a “civil war.” That is propagandistic because it ignores or denies the tremendous influence of foreign powers.
Well in the basic sense a civil war is just an internal battle between rival factions of the same country, regardless of how they’re influenced.
We went to Afghanistan to stop the Communists
The Russians never really had any particular objectives for Afghanistan except for using it as a bolster to Islamism. There was somewhat of an education effort within the country, but it wasn’t pursued very effectively.
And yes, the Karzai government isn’t perfect by any stretch, but without it there would literally be nothing but anarchy. I actually think a much better policy would have been to work with the Taliban. Instead, the US just decided to kick them all out. I guess you work with what you got at the moment.
But I don’t see how its not. To me, ‘civil’ conflict simply means conflict that is confined to the area within a country’s boundaries. After the collapse of the Russian government, it was a situation of Afghans fighting Afghans in an attempt to gain supremacy. Before that it was a war against the Russians; then it became an anarchic civil conflict as various different groups tried to assert control.
I understand that the word “civil” tends to inspire visions of solely internal conflicts, but regardless of the policies leading up to the war, and the ongoing effect of the various states’ actions, after the Russians and the US withdrew and lost interest, the conflict became truly ‘civil’ in nature.
Afghanistan isn’t actually a country, though.