Karzai abandons Taliban peace talks

We need to find out how to get into Pakistan and dismantle ISI.. They are almost like their own little shadow government, and they have way too many resources at their disposal.

I think you guys are over-simplifying Pakistan into "terrorist harbouring land".

It's more like this:

• Pakistan has the largest number of refugees in the entire world shoved into their country, primarily from Afghanistan and amongst those groups are things such as the Taliban, as well as Al Qaeda cells
• ISI and CIA worked together to build up the Afghan Mujahedeen against the Soviets but after the Americans pulled out, Pakistan was left holding the ball on a country slipping into utter chaos and civil war (directly leading to the refugee problem of today), so to say the least, Pakistanis are unhappy about that
• ISI decided to back the Taliban to power to establish a stabilised region and to curb the refugees, while getting a friendly regime in place
• US invaded Afghanistan and restarted the entire refugee flood problem, now Pakistan is in a state of virtual civil war as a direct result of the US-led War in Afghanistan, and while Pakistan understands that NATO did not intend for that to happen, that's the situation we are in today
• To say the least, the entire Pakistani public hates US to the very core for causing all these problems but the government still has to deal with it but they don't want to have a massive conflict on their hands because they're afraid that India would take advantage of moving military assets off the Kashmir border
• ISI got most of their power by backing the Taliban, Karzai is a total piece of shit in Afghanistan and all the elected officials are either drug lords and warlords (most of whom commit tax evasion, disappearing of dissidents, sex slavery, child trafficking), so when NATO forces leaves, guess who has to pick up the slack again?

So you have these factions:

• Democratic parties: Want a good relation with USA, want domestic population to support them... what do voters want? protection from scary India, no civil war, end relations with the USA
• ISI: put back allies in place in neighbouring countries that they can support, afterall, when the US leaves again, Pakistan is the one that has to face all the consequences, not the USA
• USA: wants to get rid of terrorist groups that are poised against the US, so Pakistan lets the US go in with drone strikes (which normally would be acts of war) but there's no easy way for US forces to wipe these cells out... at least not with just hard military power

I fully understand that and would have made the points myself, but I didn't wanna turn this into a thread about Pakistan when one already exists.

So give them what they want. We don't really need their help to win Afghanistan, and I don't want "allies" that would kill us on a heartbeat if they could...

They may not want it, USAF, but they need it. Pakistan is failing. If we remove ourselves from the equation it WILL collapse and it and Afghanistan will go down together in flames. The problem with this scenario is of course, the loose nukes and loose army that would come about in the aftermath. Nevermind what the neighbors would do....

edited 2nd Oct '11 11:48:33 AM by FFShinra

Loose nukes are the only reason I wouldn't advocate leaving Pakistan in the dust.

Given that the US left them holding the bag last time, and you're effectively advocating leaving them to it again, abandoning them now would be an utterly scummy thing to do. Thats why the US HAS to at least secure Afghanistans stability.

edited 2nd Oct '11 1:18:54 PM by GameChainsaw

I'm afraid my possible sympathy for them just got drowned in the idiotic talk of "death to India... for something!"

We're straddling the border of the topic here...

To get back to the topic, what good does it do to not continue peace efforts? Surely there are still factions of the Taliban that can be sheared away...

^ The problem is the Taliban are fairly decentralized (and what centralization exists is not found in Afghanistan), meaning Karzai could get a peace deal out of one group but then suffer terrorist attacks and an invasion of a town by another and since they all carry the nebulous name Taliban there's no credibility in the peace group saying "It wasn't us".

edited 2nd Oct '11 2:39:54 PM by MajorTom

Not really.. the Pashtun's take on Hanafi Islam is so outside the norm that it would be like saying the Waco siege in Texas was a breakdown of peace in the Christian world.

Of course, but then the party made peace with is out of the way and one can focus on the ultraloyalist factions.

Indeed, making peace with any amount of Taliban is that much less Taliban to fight and more resources to put against ones that will fight to the death.

http://www.boston.com/news/world/asia/articles/2011/10/03/afghanistan_urges_pakistan_to_take_steps_for_peace_talks/

Now its not so much that Karzai is only talking to Pakistan, it seems he wants Pakistan to poke the Taliban into talking.

Sigh.

Oh, it gets better. Karzai went to INDIA and secured a "strategic partnership."

First thought: haha, Pakistan's policy (past or present) of supporting the Taliban has driven Afghanistan right into the arms of India.

Second thought: Pakistan and India having a proxy war via Afghanistan? Looks like those cold-war era policymakers remembered and decided to bring back more than just the black and white "they are the enemy!" mindset.

Third thought: Oh shit, now that the actual Afghan government is allied with India, those same cold-war policymakers (who view everything through the "we're at war with India!" lens) have no reason not to back the insurgents in Afghanistan.

Does my analysis look reasonable?

Almost, you only said "Oh shit" once, your analysis needs more "Oh shit".

^^ So in all cases Pakistan is screwed then? Favorable outcome.

I hope you meant screwed in the limited scope of Afghanistan, and not screwed in general, because Pakistan has 175 million people and nuclear material, and it would definitely drag Afghanistan down with it (probably even damage India on the way out, just through porous borders and refugees).

Well it's a sensible policy from Afghanistan's point, they need a friend and India is the stronger friendlier regional power. It's only an "oh shit" from the broader, idealistic perspective of "man I wish Afghanistan and Pakistan could work together," which probably wasn't going to happen anytime soon regardless.

edited 4th Oct '11 9:26:25 PM by deathjavu

I agree with Tom (yes it is minus 40 here in hell, why do you ask?).

I wonder if India will give Afghans some of their old equipment to use as part of the deal. I know it only said training, but who knows...

Considering also the other central asian state India has made nice with (Tajikistan) allowed them an air base, I can't help but wonder the future scope of this. All quite promising of course, since while the Russians aren't exactly jumping for joy that India has a base to the north in Tajikistan, they don't look worried enough to stop from cooperating with India. Delhi is on good terms with Tehran too, so essentially this deal has the possibility of unifiying all but one of the major players in this...

On the other hand, increasing the Paranoia Fuel of such an unstable power as Pakistan might have its...drawbacks.

EDIT- Half-ninja'd.

Also, Afghanistan has never had that great of a relationship with Pakistan except under the Taliban, and even THEY had reservations, particularly with the Durand Line. That the two could work together was always pie in the sky.

edited 4th Oct '11 9:25:11 PM by FFShinra

Actually, I can see it getting worse than that.

India is allied to Afghanistan.

Pakistan is allied to China.

So Pakistan steps on Afghanistan, India steps on Pakistan... China steps on India, and suddenly its WW 1; Eastern Edition.

Piece of advice: if India and China go at it, everybody else stay the fuck out.

You forgot one. The Russians are allied to India.

As for China, there was a recent article stating that they didn't want to end up like the other powers so they're staying the hell out of Afghanistan aside from trying to make some profit. So if Pakistan goes into Afghanistan, they do so with both eyes open knowing that China isn't gonna back them up (India isn't likely to make this a total war either, and would probably use its assets in Tajikistan and Afghanistan to simply deter Pakistan and force it back to its side of the Durrand Line, much like they did during the Kargil War) unless their interests are directly threatened.

edited 5th Oct '11 8:10:39 AM by FFShinra

Yeah, if Russia, China, India, and Pakistan all go at it, definitely stay the fuck out.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/8809301/Hamid-Karzai-Plot-to-kill-president-foiled-by-Afghanistan-intelligence.html

On top of all the other madness around.