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Now that the taliban have been left an airforce along with armoured hummers, night vision goggles and stock piles of guns and ammunition, rockets etc, how long before they get those birds in the air,
no chance at all, they dont have the equipment or parts to run them. They'll remove the weapons and put them on the back of trucks until the ammo runs out
no chance at all, they dont have the equipment or parts to run them.
That's what everyone thought about Iranian's F14 fleet as well
I mean Bitcoin seems very useful if you want to sell heroin and buy weapons illicitly
Huh, dunno how HSBC will feel about someone muscling in on their patch
(cough, don't tell British Cycling)
how long before..........
Well it took the US/UK 20 years to train the Afghan army, and according to some that wasn't long enough.
So no time soon would be my answer.
Iran is an advanced industrial nation that's half way to having nuclear weapons - not at all comparable to a failed state that's going to struggle to feed everyone.
not at all comparable to a failed state
Iran is an industrial nation now, in the early eighties it was a failing state in the midst of an horrific war with it's neighbour, and the F-14 is one of the most technologically sophisticated airplanes the US have produced, and they still managed to keep it going (often stealing parts from under the nose of the US) the A-29 on the other hand not so much. Plus there's no embargo on parts, Plus ****stan...
I wouldn't be too sure that the Taliban won't be able to keep these going.
OMG, what if someone other than consumptive nations built on global exploitation and genocide get their hands on military aircraft capable of bombing civilians...
There's only one thing for it, we need to up military spending and send the troops in!
(or if sufficient public support can't be drummed up with humanitarian sentiment, we'll have to keep it covert like Operation Cyclone and Timber Sycamore)
Still, in the meantime, the more fuss we create, the less likely anyone is to realize that the translators were left behind because they know too much...
Iran is an industrial nation now, in the early eighties it was a failing state in the midst of an horrific war with it’s neighbour
In the 1970s Iran was the largest economy in the Middle East and had a modern air force, army and navy. There was a huge oil industry with an associated engineering and manufacturing capability, as well as big and well-established universities. Export controls were much looser than they were today, and the Iranians had the benefit of airframes that they could scavenge and staff that had worked on them before. That's just a completely different and superior position to where the Taliban is today.
Obviously if China, ****stan or Russia were to support the Taliban with full technical expertise it would be a different story - but even ****stan prefers to keep its clients on a leash.
There’s only one thing for it, we need to up military spending and send the troops in!
Literally no-one has suggested this.
Literally no-one has suggested this.
Perhaps they didn't have to...
Military expenditure increases in the first year of the pandemic
The 2.6 per cent increase in world military spending came in a year when global gross domestic product (GDP) shrank by 4.4 per cent (October 2020 projection by the International Monetary Fund), largely due to the economic impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic. As a result, military spending as a share of GDP—the military burden—reached a global average of 2.4 per cent in 2020, up from 2.2 per cent in 2019. This was the biggest year-on-year rise in the military burden since the global financial and economic crisis in 2009.
I can see them recruiting some more jihadi Johns from the UK with helicopter and pilot licences, some guy with 50 hrs in a cessna trying to get fighter planes up n running.
No hope getting it started nevermind off the end of the runway, landing it!!!
Still, in the meantime, the more fuss we create, the less likely anyone is to realize that the translators were left behind because they know too much…
Makes you think.
Makes you think.
Do your own research...
Do your own research...
You know who else uses translators? The Mossad...
You know who else uses translators? The Mossad…
Whoa, steady on, thought we were looking for humanitarian solutions...
"Iranian itch" is an anagram of "humanitarian". Coincidence? Maybe...
Interestingly IS has released a press statement calling the Taliban "apostate" for making a deal with the US and accused them of abandoning the Islamic clause
There's no u in Iranian itch, or c in humanitarian. Sorry to be pedantic
You see? Everyone knows how it's really spelled, but if you look in the Oxford English Dictionary, it's not there. Why would they go to the trouble of doing that? Is it anything to do with the last 3 PMs going to Oxford University, perhaps? I'm just asking the question...
Meanwhile, back on topic...
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For years now Afghans have been fleeing their home country
Afghanistan continues to be the prime country with the most refugees under UNHCR responsibility across the globe. There are three million Afghan refugees, one out of three of the total worldwide number. Countries facing conflict and disruption feature heavily in the report and a big trend seen is the number of refugees fleeing to neighbouring countries.
The UNHCR says that "by the end of 2010, three quarters of the world's
refugees were residing in a country neighbouring their own" - neighbouring ****stan and Iran were the refuge for over 2.7m Afghans in 2010.As seen in last years report, developing countries host four fifths of the world's refugees. ****stan, Iran and the Syrian Arab Republic are the top hosting countries globally for refugees.
in no small part due to the unrest caused by the allied invasion
But who can blame them when life is such a worthless commodity?
https://twitter.com/AlanRMacLeod/status/1430510837165445120
Failed Narco-State
That is quite an achievement.
And now the Taliban are trying and failing to maintain order, at the behest of the US government.
Well there is an Indian news report of one of the Blackhawks being flow admittedly just above ground.
The maintenance and parts needed should you hope keep it's flying time in minutes rather than hours.
How hard would it have been to nobble them I'm assuming the US did not leave them with the Afghan air force
I'm sure that's the kind of expertise Mark Thatcher and his South African chums could rustle up if the readies were available.
The maintenance and parts needed should you hope keep it’s flying time in minutes rather than hours.
So, here's a weird thing, one of the more surprising users of Blackhawks is China's PLA (they operate a couple of dozen S-70 variants bought in the 80's..).I wonder if they'd be willing to supply parts? Perhaps even some training?
Stranger things have happened.
So, here’s a weird thing, one of the more surprising users of Blackhawks is China’s PLA (they operate a couple of dozen S-70 variants bought in the 80’s..).I wonder if they’d be willing to supply parts? Perhaps even some training?
Stranger things have happened.
Fair point... it's worth remembering China supplied many of the weapons for Operation Cyclone after the CIA decided it wanted to use AK47s, so as to blur the source of all the arms flooding into Afghanistan.
So, here’s a weird thing, one of the more surprising users of Blackhawks is China’s PLA (they operate a couple of dozen S-70 variants bought in the 80’s..).I wonder if they’d be willing to supply parts? Perhaps even some training?
Stranger things have happened.
They have, but this would be a big suprise. Taliban v1.0 were a total liability as the above article will tell you. Neither China or Russia have any interest in a well armed bunch of fruitcakes on their doorstep especially given both have local issues with islamists. That's not to say they wont tip em a few boxes of guns in exchange for some belt and road bullshit tho. Maaaaaybe at a push some chopper spares, given Taliban v2.0 seems to want to work with other nations. But fast jets? Naaaaaah
But fast jets? Naaaaaah
I don't think there are any are there? I think the Afghan Air Force uses (used?) A-29 Super Tucanos Still, reasonably sophisticated. Mind you, while I don't think they'd be able to operate them at anything like a regular Air Force would, they'd make pretty effective weapons for one way suicide missions, no?
I guess their best bet to get these going again would be to "persuade" the pilots in the Afghan Air force that it's in their best interests to fly for the Taliban, some might even want to.
Fair point… it’s worth remembering China supplied many of the weapons for Operation Cyclone after the CIA decided it wanted to use AK47s, so as to blur the source of all the arms flooding into Afghanistan.
Do you now accept that the US didn't fund Bin Laden and Al Qaeda? Or are you picking and choosing which bits of wikipedia you believe?
they’d make pretty effective weapons for one way suicide missions, no?
Not sure the Taliban are that suicidal, it's ISIS and the loon extreme loons who seem keen on blowing themselves up.
Do you now accept that the US didn’t fund Bin Laden and Al Qaeda? Or are you picking and choosing which bits of wikipedia you believe?
Quite the tangled web...
and to think, that's the same fella (Bandar Bin Sultan) that set the Al Yamamah deal in motion which got Prince Andrew all het up when it looked like the Serious Fraud Office were going to delve deeper.
Wonder what Sherard Cowper Coles, Her Majesty's Ambassador to Saudi Arabia at the time, who successfully intervened to prevent full investigation, before becoming HM Ambassador to Afghanistan the very next year is up to now?
https://twitter.com/mattyglesias/status/1430948603351207939
https://twitter.com/CulRMartin/status/1430952469929078795
There's a sort of mad genius construction to all this from JHJ.
I guess it comes down to whether you see "current affairs" (for want of a better description) as a series of interconnected and directed events travelling along a navigated and purposeful route...Or whether its just hugely complex chaos that no one really understands or has a good handle on all the outcomes, and everyone's just doing their upmost just pretending to keep up with a constantly moving target of unintended consequences.
Given that most of the time organisations like the CIA or MOD have little to no understanding or appreciation of what parts of their own organisations are doing, let alone any understanding of different organisations within their own wider governments are upto; makes the idea that foreign governments have any real understanding of what everyone else's aims, intentions, plans (real or imagined) utter fantasy. IMO.
I'm pretty sure the CIA and ISI have spoken with each other, whether they've told each other what their real plans are or aren't or whether they even agree about their plans are, who they've told within their own govts, and the impact that has in a wider context...I don't think either organisation has a scooby.
That's why David Icke and Bin Laden are so attractive to some people: they both offer a simple explanation for a confusing, complicated, chaotic, and unfair world.
And you know who Icke and Bin Laden both blamed? Makes you think...
Fair number of Afghan helicopters were US supplied Russian ones. Cheap to buy, easier to fly and simpler to look after. I suspect many will be back in the air shortly. Easy targets for drones I’d think.
The other point that one ought to make is that organisations aren't homogenous, they're (obviously) made up of people. Those employees often have little to no understanding of what other employees in that organisations are doing, why they're doing what they're doing, or who's paying for it and why, especially so in ultra secretive organisations like the CIA and whether that opposes or supports other equally oblivious employees in other organisations made up of further employees striking out in the dark with their own sets of instructions, plans and ideas...then add into that individual beliefs, motivations, bribes, friendships, personal deals...
...Chaos
But yeah, here's a photo of Prince Charles standing next to a random Arabic Prince...
Mind you, while I don’t think they’d be able to operate them at anything like a regular Air Force would, they’d make pretty effective weapons for one way suicide missions, no?
Do the Taliban have a history of suicide missions? Genuine question, I wasn't aware they had, I thought IEDs where their preferred way of killing people.
Terrorists place bombs on the ground, the good guys drop them from the sky.
Do you now accept that the US didn’t fund Bin Laden and Al Qaeda? Or are you picking and choosing which bits of wikipedia you believe?
According to a much respected former UK Foreign Secretary, who wasn't noted for being a conspiracy theorist, the US funded Bin Laden and Al Qaeda.
His exact words :
Bin Laden was, though, a product of a monumental miscalculation by western security agencies. Throughout the 80s he was armed by the CIA and funded by the Saudis to wage jihad against the Russian occupation of Afghanistan. Al-Qaida, literally "the database", was originally the computer file of the thousands of mujahideen who were recruited and trained with help from the CIA to defeat the Russians. Inexplicably, and with disastrous consequences, it never appears to have occurred to Washington that once Russia was out of the way, Bin Laden's organisation would turn its attention to the west.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2005/jul/08/july7.development
Do the Taliban have a history of suicide missions? Genuine question,
I don't think they have (as far as I know) I don't know if that's some ideological belief or whether they've just never had airplanes available to them to use. Let's hope they don't start, eh?.
I don't think there's evidence for bin Laden being funded directly by the CIA. The evidence says he fought with the mujahedeen who were being supplied weapons by the Chinese and ****stanis, and the money to buy them came from Saudi Arabia and the US (via the CIA) and I don't think Cooks article says any thing other than that, although you can read it either way.
Edit: and that's not evidence, that's just Cook's version of events
Osama bin Laden was always an extremely big player in the Afghan jihad. He wasn't some minor individual who the CIA inadvertently funded, trained, and armed.
I don’t think Cooks article says any thing other than that, although you can read it either way
Cook could not have been more crystal clear in what he meant, I can't see how it could be read "either way".
The shoulder-mounted stinger missiles were the jihadists most prized weapon, in fact nothing typifies more the Afghan jihad than photo of a traditionally Muslim dressed man with a stinger missile on his shoulder.
They weren't supplied by either China nor ****stan.
https://www.chicagotribune.com/nation-world/sns-worldtrade-missiles-lat-story.html
Sure, but the Evidence shows that analysts in the CIA knew who bin Laden was, what he wanted, and who he blamed for Muslim suppression, so the idea that..
Inexplicably, and with disastrous consequences, it never appears to have occurred to Washington that once Russia was out of the way, Bin Laden’s organisation would turn its attention to the west.
Is not the whole story, as some people in the CIA knew exactly that's what he'd do. It was just that it was in their interest of some people within the CIA at the time to supply the mujahedeen with weaponry to **** about with Russians and that's what they did. They may have read him wrong, or not paid attention sufficiently well, or underestimated him and all those things, but the idea that bin Laden worked for or was handed wads of cash by the CIA is for the birds.
Cook could not have been more crystal clear in what he meant, I can’t see how it could be read “either way”.
Try harder, you're not that stupid
According to a much respected former UK Foreign Secretary, who wasn’t noted for being a conspiracy theorist, the US funded Bin Laden and Al Qaeda.
He's simply wrong, just as he is wrong about the origin of the name Al Qaeda (unless you think Robin Cook knows the history better than Bin Laden himself). http://edition.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/asiapcf/south/02/05/binladen.transcript/
Cook's unsourced assertion - in an comment piece banged out in less than 24 hours after 7/7 - goes against the twenty years of research that we now have.
People should read Steve Coll's excellent book on the Bin Ladens, which describes in detail how OBL gathered money from Saudi donors (but not the state) and distributed it in Afghanistan. It also details the limited extent of OBL's involvement in the contracting business and his knowledge of engineering (which puts paid to a lot of the early myths presumably spread by OBL himself of OBL driving diggers through Tora Bora and importing bulldozers from "his" company). There's plenty of detail about the family's real estate investments in Florida too...
Inexplicably, and with disastrous consequences, it never appears to have occurred to Washington that once Russia was out of the way, Bin Laden’s organisation would turn its attention to the west.
"Washington" does lots of inexplicable things (dissolving the Iraqi army) with disastrous consequences (Iraqi civil war, ISIS).
I don't know why my Chicago Tribune link doesn't show any text, presumably it's a paywall thing.
I can read the whole article but I guess this paragraph sums up my point.
Taliban forces in Afghanistan still have about 100 U.S.-supplied Stingers, according to U.S. intelligence estimates, and the weapons are potentially well suited to destroy the helicopters that are expected to soon begin ferrying U.S. special forces into the country.
Written 20 years ago.
you’re not that stupid
Thanks for suggesting that my stupidity is limited, but how can you be sure?
Btw there's well researched books which claim that man-made climate change is nonexistent.
Apparently there's even books which claim that the moon is artificial and not natural.
It understandable that for some people the reality that Al Qaeda is the monster which the West created is too much to accept. Also understandable is that some people will be busy writing books to shift the blame.