With the death of Pope Francis, the world loses not only a church leader but also a moral compass
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Afghanistan, graveyard of the empires
Drawing on his own experiences travelling the country during its 14 years of socialism under siege, NICK WRIGHT writes that the idea of Afghanistan as an ungovernable maelstrom of chaos is a purely the creation of Western imperialism
The air raids, drone strikes and military excursions over the years have embittered Afghans to the various occupying powers and in many cases government forces and clan militias swiftly reached local deals, essentially power-sharing arrangements which reflect long-standing local realities
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“A WAR begun for no wise purpose, carried on with a strange mixture of rashness and timidity, brought to a close after suffering and disaster, without much glory attached either to the government which directed, or the great body of troops which waged it. Not one benefit, political or military, was acquired with this war. Our eventual evacuation of the country resembled the retreat of an army defeated.”
Thus, in 1843, GR Grieg, chaplain to the British Army wrote of the empires’s catastrophic defeat in the First Afghan War as an expeditionary force of 4,500 military personnel and over 12,000 camp followers fled Kabul to Jalalabad. Barely a handful survived.
The regional balance of power fell to the Russian empire and in 1878, the British invaded again and again in 1897. Britain went to war in Afghanistan again in 1919.
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