Key Afghan City in Danger of Falling to the Taliban
Source: NY Times
Government reinforcements arrived Saturday in Lashkar Gar, the capital of Helmand Province, but people were fleeing their homes and a hospital in the city had been bombed.
By Thomas Gibbons-Neff and Taimoor Shah
KABUL, Afghanistan An important city in Afghanistans south was in danger of falling to the Taliban on Saturday as their fighters pushed toward its center despite concerted American and Afghan airstrikes in recent days.
Reports from Lashkar Gah, capital of Helmand, a province where the Taliban already controlled much of the territory before their recent offensive, were dire: People were fleeing their homes, a hospital in the city had been bombed, and government reinforcements were only now arriving after days of delays.
We are just waiting for the Taliban to arrive there is no expectation that the government will be able to protect the city any more, said Mohammadullah Barak, a resident.
What comes next in Lashkar Gah is anything but certain the city has been on the brink of a Taliban takeover off and on for more than a decade. But if the insurgent group seizes the city this time it will be the first provincial capital to fall to the Taliban since 2016.
Lashkar Gah, the besieged capital of Helmand Province, in May this year.Credit...Jim Huylebroek for The New York Times
Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/31/world/asia/afghanistan-taliban-lashkar-gah.html
orangecrush
(19,151 posts)samsingh
(17,548 posts)the taliban will take over much of the country
Russia and China will split up influence in the rest of the country
orangecrush
(19,151 posts)sprinkleeninow
(20,079 posts)-misanthroptimist
(764 posts)maxsolomon
(32,918 posts)And many will be killed by it if they had anything to do with the government or the US or aren't Pashtun, and there will be a massive refugee crisis.
None of us can stop the inevitable, but that doesn't mean it isn't a tragedy.
-misanthroptimist
(764 posts)There are many tragedies in the world. For instance, over 600k Americans have died in the past 18 months or so. The overwhelming majority of them could have been prevented. I even knew some of them. That type of tragedy clearly is our responsibility.
Afghanistan, not so much. (Never should have been there in the first place.)
maxsolomon
(32,918 posts)i care about both of those things: theocratic repression and a massive global death toll.
they're not mutually exclusive.
call me a hawk, but Al Queda's nest had to be removed. should we have stayed? moot now.
-misanthroptimist
(764 posts)I didn't ask you to care about what I care about or use what I care about to excuse what's happening in Afghanistan.
So, it's not whataboutism. It's insteadofing. And I stand by it.
maxsolomon
(32,918 posts)Again, YOU asked why you should care.
Historic NY
(37,449 posts)we should have never gone there.
maxsolomon
(32,918 posts)we should have left them unmolested at tora bora?
that wasn't a binary choice. there were costs to action and inaction. it was bush's choice, and so was iraq. he chose poorly. what could have been in afghanistan without invading iraq we'll never know. that broke the region apart.
Polybius
(15,184 posts)People are oppressed in North Korea as well.
maxsolomon
(32,918 posts)Can't even bring yourself to care in and abstract way. Pretty fucked up thread.
Polybius
(15,184 posts)I just don't think we should do anything about it militarily.
maxsolomon
(32,918 posts)because some of it is going to be:
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/31/world/asia/afghanistan-migration-taliban.html
you break it; you buy it.
christx30
(6,241 posts)thousands of lives, and trillions there. How much is enough?
We would never change the minds of the religious extremists in the Taliban. Nothing short of a complete cultural change would do it. We could accomplish that like we did in Japan. Firebombing their cities and tribal areas, and dropping two nukes. Wanna do that?
Polybius
(15,184 posts)With or without the US invasion, the Taliban would still be there. They suck, I hate them, but glad I don't live there.
samsingh
(17,548 posts)will be stoned to death.
and the taliban will create an environment to attack other countries
-misanthroptimist
(764 posts)It was happening in Afghanistan before we arrived, too. It was happening while we were there. It will happen without us there.
It is not our duty to fix everything everywhere. Even if it was, we simply lack the ability. Bad things are going to happen elsewhere in the world. Our primary duty should be to make sure that they don't happen here.
samsingh
(17,548 posts)or hunger
shootings
all things happening all the time
-misanthroptimist
(764 posts)When they happen 7500 miles away we should condemn them and leave them to the locals to solve unless there is an extremely good reason to get involved.
Devil Child
(2,728 posts)Deployment of troops from Western nations will not transform a culture which birthed the Taliban.
JI7
(89,151 posts)The reason we have to leave is becsuse of the role of Pakistan which is preventing us from improving things which has mostly left us stuck there with threats to US.
But without Pakistan things could get better there .
Skittles
(152,918 posts)just checking
-misanthroptimist
(764 posts)If so, we're going to lose a lot of people. That's too much work for most of us.
The Taliban suck. Putin sucks. Winnie-the-Pooh in China sucks. A lot of people in a whole lot of people suck. They do awful things to other people. There's little to nothing I can do about it. And in many of these places there's not a lot my country can do about it.
Skittles
(152,918 posts)-misanthroptimist
(764 posts)I'm reminded of the Simpsons' episode where Lisa yells to Smithers, "I found an injured shrew!" This after bringing him assorted injured wildlife.
There's no shortage of things to be upset, angry, sad, and even outraged about. Which particular ones bother us as individuals is...well, individual. Even being upset with someone who doesn't share your concerns is legitimate.
As is not giving a shit about what goes on in Afghanistan.
HUAJIAO
(2,362 posts)But you can still care about it.
However, I see you don't.
-misanthroptimist
(764 posts)I don't have an infinite capacity for caring about things. No one does. So, things that happen thousands of miles away to people I don't know in a culture radically different from my own and with few if any ramifications for those closer at hand (who I *do* care about) seems to be a rational place to stop caring.
Honestly, I doubt that very many here do care in any meaningful way.
spike jones
(1,653 posts)It is like the Christian Protestants and the Christian Catholics killing each other five-hundred years ago. There are no good guys in a religious war, just dead people. Religion poisons everything.
JI7
(89,151 posts)Pakistan is the reason we left. But US did make things better for people there while we could.
spike jones
(1,653 posts)Pakistan is over 90% Islam. The US did make it better but, no matter how long we stay, they are still going to fight after we leave.
Both countries have Islam as their official religion. No separation of church and state. A sin is also a crime. IMO that is the root of most all the problems in that region.
-misanthroptimist
(764 posts)I'm afraid that that is too often the case. It doesn't have to be that way. (And I'm in my fifth decade of atheism.) If religion was used by individuals as a way for them to understand the universe, there would be little problem. Unfortunately, that internal belief gets imposed on the external world where it has no real place, conflicts arise, and...religious wars, inquisitions, etc.
samsingh
(17,548 posts)seems like a cold answer from an ayn rand mindset
the same ayn rand who had to survive on welfare because she was incapable of actually doing anything for money
Skittles
(152,918 posts)I absolutely do not care to hear any further opinions from someone who doesn't care.
-misanthroptimist
(764 posts)One foreign policy difference makes someone a Randroid in your world? That's some industrial grade purity testing, that is!
Igel
(35,173 posts)The Hazara suffered fairly stiff ethno-religious persecution under the Taliban in the past.
riversedge
(69,537 posts)roamer65
(36,738 posts)The Taliban will piss them off and in they will go.
Just like the Vietnamese had to do with Pol Pot in Cambodia in 1979.
maxsolomon
(32,918 posts)Have you seen much sabre rattling out of Iran to that effect? I could see them intervening to prevent a genocide of Shiite minorities.
Patience does have its limits.
twin_ghost
(435 posts)It is time to let Afghanistan lead it's own history.