Several of the “right wing” talk show hosts went down this path today – the SEAL helicopter being shot down is proof that withdrawing our forces isn’t going to work, and we need to bomb the crap out of Afghanistan and crush them.
A couple weeks ago, I made that point – sort of. The difference is I said that’s what we should have done 10 years ago. In the year following 9/11, most of the world would have looked the other way at pretty much anything we did to Afghanistan.
But it’s not 2002 – a lot has changed since then:
– We facilitated installing a corrupt government in Afghanistan, that has threatened us with non-cooperation if we try to do anything aggressive
– Russia sent the tanks into Georgia and toppled the government that was letting us use their air bases
– We chewed up a large amount of our military equipment and troops launching a war in Iraq
– We know know (or admit) that Pakistan was never our ally is the force behind the Taliban
– The President of the United States doesn’t have a clue
If you want to “Bomb the Taliban”, those bombs have to come from somewhere. Logistics are a huge problem in Afghanistan. NATO has been trying to restore the rail link from the North, but it’s politically dicey – the countries the trains would have to go through are not particularly friendly and there is the problem of which gauge of railroad the country will have – European, Russian or Pakistan
Afghanistan is landlocked. The only substantial road into the country from the ocean goes through Pakistan. If they don’t let us use their point and their roads, that’s not a way to get “bombs” to Afghanistan.
Iran could be a way to get supplies to Afghanistan, but we aren’t on very good terms with them.
Afghanistan is now a NATO operation, not a US Operation. Most of NATO is pulling out their operations.
A map is worth a 1000 words. Let’s look at the options:
– the country is roughly 600×400 miles in size. It has very few roads and no useful railroads.
– Iran shares a long border and has access to the Arabian Sea / Pacific Ocean. They are not particularly our friends. Want to start another war to topple Iran? (I’m hearing rumblings we are planning to do just that)
– Pakistan – has bottled up most of our supplies in port, and attacked trucks transporting fuel and other supplies through the Khyber Pass
– The mountain area to the NE of Kabul is the disputed Kashmir region, a source of constant friction between Pakistan and India, and China would kind of like them too.
– The water area to the West of Turkmenistan is the Caspian Sea – it’s an inland sea with no connection to the ocean. You aren’t going to get an aircraft carrier there
– Tajikistan – Tajik is an ethnic group which have a significant presence in Northern Afghanistan. They wouldn’t object to the country being split up and getting that part of Afghanistan, which was an artificial creation of the European powers to begin with
– Uzbekistan – the Uzbeks are another distinct ethnic group. Uzbekistan is also landlocked – they have no access to anywhere unless you transit through Kazahkstan and Russia. If Russia isn’t on board, this is a “no go” option. For now, Russia is allowing “non-lethal” cargo to come in through Latvia and crossing Russia via rail – a trip over the Northern Distribution Network that takes a couple weeks and has very limited capacity
– Turkmenistan – they have access to the Caspian sea, but that doesn’t go anywhere useful
So unless Iran or Pakistan is helping us, everything pretty much is going to have to be flown in on cargo planes, including fuel – but who is going to let you cross their air space? Iran? Pakistan? China? From Baghdad to Kabul is about 1500 miles IF you flew in a straight line over Iran.
Missiles are available. There may be some satellite based weapons that Alex Jones is familiar with. It might behoove us to focus on the positive aspects of the ‘religion of peace’; we could have a National Day of spiritual attainment and reach out to the Mohammedans that way.
Art is right, we have wasted to much time and money. 2002, we could have tested the neutron bomb there and like he said, the world may have looked the other way.
You just can’t bring a 5th century country into the twenty-first century and say here is democracy. Hajee has no concept at all of self goverment. Most of those farmers and tribal guys have no idea there is a whole world of people out there. They just know their 40 mile radius and that’s it.
Women will never have rights, no matter how many schools you build. Hell, female news reporters there have to wear almost a berka(sp?). Sharia will not allow it. We have not made any progress, and the Russians are laughing their asses off at us.
Its to late to bomb it into the Stone ages, they are already there. I would have hated that innocent animals and a few people that had no desire to be in the Taliban, would have been killed, but we can’t do what we are doing. This is no win.
Maybe we should send them Andy Willoughby and the three step plan? They could then make money and see the world.
I listened to most of the two hour presentation of the Center for Strategic and International Studies about the Northern Distribution Network – the rail link NATO and the US are trying to get running through Uzbekistan and/or Turkmenistan. It’s hard not to fall asleep…
But partway through the presentation, they make the same point you did, except in more detail and they have direct access to the players involved. The Russians are laughing their asses off at us – we are almost completely dependent on them to get our supplies into Afghanistan – and if Pakistan closes the door on us, all the more so. The Russians remember well that it was Reagan who used support for the Taliban to force Russia out of Afghanistan and ultimately contributed to the end of the Soviet Union. Payback is a bitch.
They also dealt with the subject of using Iran as a supply route. At some point, they said the US won’t use Iran to get supplies into Afghanistan, but they can’t tell other members of NATO what to do *wink wink*.
GPS guided missiles only work against stationary targets. That’s why we are using the Predator drones. But they need a base, support staff and perhaps most important – accurate targeting information.
We can’t bomb them. Our leaders need the money and resources to purchase patronage votes they don’t deserve from people WE don’t deserve.