No, any war against Afghanistan would not be easy. The trouble is that
the entire region is unstable. India/Pakistan, China/India,
China/Russia, China/Tibet, and Pakistan/Afghanistan are just the well
known enmities. Eurasia is a scattering of former SSR's. Would they
welcome a US-led attack? Assuming they would, N.B. that Afghanistan has
defeated three invasions over the last two centuries, including the
last one by the same Red Army that dismantled Hitler. It is landlocked,
so US naval might would mean nothing. Even if we crushed the Taleban
regime, the resulting power vacuum would destabilize the entire region
and lead to further bloody wars, and untold streams of refugees. All
this in a region where extremist, fanatic groups are doing everything
they can to obtain weapons of mass destruction.
War is not an answer. Apprehending bin Laden and his network, one by
one, is the best answer.
Andrew Hagen
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
On Thu, 13 Sep 2001 07:55:28 -0700, Michael Perelman wrote:
>A war on Afganistan would be easy in the sense that the US/NATO military
>powers could overwhelm theirs, but creating a stable government would be
>difficult.
>
>On Thu, Sep 13, 2001 at 07:37:07AM -0700, Jim Devine wrote:
>> At 12:14 PM 09/13/2001 +0300, you wrote:
>> >It seems that we have some way to go before the recognition of imperial
>> >decline sinks in. Until then we're going to be subject to ever-more
>> >frenetic efforts to impose the US power elite's sovereign will upon all
>> >and sundry.
>>
>> I am not convinced that "imperial decline" is real. That kind of process is
>> reversible. Also, what specifically do you mean? The US industrial economy
>> may be in decline, but its military and financial might are undimmed. The
>> US/NATO as a whole is still pretty strong. The transnationals are running
>> the world economy. Etc.
>>
>> Also, the little fragment of radio news I've heard suggests that US/NATO is
>> going to go to war against Afghanistan, with Russia's support. That would
>> be an easy victory -- but then the US/NATO would be trying to run one of
>> the poorest and most disaster-struck countries around, while fighting a
>> guerrilla army, involving a lot of experienced fighters from the armies
>> that beat the USSR.
>>
>> Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] & http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~JDevine
>>
>
>--
>Michael Perelman
>Economics Department
>California State University
>Chico, CA 95929
>
>Tel. 530-898-5321
>E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
>
