Old news but just watching the BBC news on this. Thinking Ok we went into this conflict on the aftermath of 9/11. to get ride of Osama bin Laden and to dismantle al-Qaeda. Just thinking with the loss of NATO life there and now we are leaving the country. What will happen in the future. My mind feels we started something thats not going to be easy to stop. Will we have in a few years Iraq where Nato is being asked to come back in as the Afgan people are being killed by militia. With the Soviet war in Afghanistan in the 70's-80's and other civil wars plus Anglo- afghan wars (which I know little about). Do we ever think that Afghanistan will have a strong Army/police and leader who can prevent Nato from returning. Just wanted to see what others feel about this issue at the moment
All George (Massive twat) Bush's war on terror has achieved is to make the world even less stable. Just looks at what's going on in Iraq as we speak and the fact the many Islamic groups are weeping across Africa. Troops will leave Afgan and with 12 months Taliban, Isis or some other blood crazed group will sweep through stronger that before. So 10+ years of western troops and countless losses for nothing Us infidels should never have gotten involved, best thing we could have done is to leave them to kill each other. Harsh but true
Afghanistan will always be Afghanistan, unless it can find some way of creating wealth and employment without the poppy trade. The original aims, ie removal of Al Qaeda, could have been resolved years ago but Bush Jnr decided to try and fix Bush Snr's cock-up of not sorting Saddam in 1991. Instead of completing the Afghan situation he diverted attention and resources to Iraq, and in doing so allowed the Taliban et al to regroup and recover. Of course Tony B-liar being a lap dog to Bush, and B-liar wanting "his war" like Maggie did with the Falklands meant that we got involved. As for it being part of the "War on Terror" following 11/9, well maybe if the Yanks hadn't funded, supplied and supported terrorists for decades, including PIRA/INLA, then maybe the situation wouldn't have been as bad in the first place. Sadly as is normally the case it is the people on the ground who have to bear the burden created by politicians.
It's only the main body of troops that will leave, there will be training teams for years to come mentoring the afghan army and police, the same as we are doing in Iraq and other places over the years
Job quarter done ,leave billions of pounds worth of goodies laying around and you will have the best equipped enemy in the world .RIP all the brave men and women lost over nothing .
Iraq currently being a prime example...no doubt all the excess ordinance/equipment that was left buried in the desert by the coalition forces has been dug up and given a wipe over and is now jostling about in the back of a converted Toyota pick-up heading for Baghdad
Two words...........POWER.....VACUUM That's what NATO keeps leaving. Nobody can match NATO for firepower. That's why the Taliban have been totally unable to shift the invaders out of their country despite more than 12 years of trying. They've slowly tried to peck them to death but they've been facing overwhelming force. Now that the troops are leaving they're facing an Afghan army and Police force that is totally incapable of keeping them in check. Exactly as has happened in Iraq.
My personal view..I'm probably going to get stick for this... However...soap-box here we go... The western cultures, UK/US etc...should have stayed out of the middle east, as those countries have historically always been hot-beds of tribal/ethnic/religious upheaval and conflict. By our interventions through "The War on Terror", all we have done is poke a hornets nest and opened up a religious can of worms that goes back eons, giving the fundamentalist and extremist groups, who whether we like it or not, come from some of the wealthiest countries on the planet, a common enemy to rally the diverse peoples under one religion against. But unlike times gone by, crusades etc, they now have the means to fund and bring the fight to the western cultures around the globe, and also put up a complex fluid fighting force unrestrained by agreed convention as NATO is, as their fight is stirred by the fervour of altered scripture, that the majority believe to be the truth and the rest use as a convenient excuse for killing freely. Of course "The War on Terror" was/is and excuse for the US government to establish or try to establish forward operating bases closer to China, who they see as the biggest single threat to them both financially and in military power and to a lesser degree Russia. Of course middle east oil is another factor, at least in the case of the Iraq conflict. The western financial meltdown, thanks to greedy banks, has now bitten the UK/US where both countries are cutting military spending and troop numbers. With all the recent news of "British" nationals being "radicalised" and going to these areas, getting trained and armed, maybe it's time to fully pull out of these places. The fractional fighting will always go on as it always has, no amount of "policing" will stop it. Our best interests are served by tightening border controls, if people leave to "visit" these areas, then "if you could leave your "British" passport at the gate as you go" policies should be put into effect. Clamp down on arms dealing and sales by western manufacturers, I know that a lot of arms are made in the "eastern pact" areas of the globe that get used, but every little helps.