Afghan culture and people
POSTED BY: dreamtrove
UPDATED: Sunday, August 30, 2026 16:20
VIEWED: 13932
PAGE 6 of 9
Quote:
Originally posted by Niki2:
Hoo boy, JS, if you wanted cites, I'd have a heck of a time! ;o) Most of it comes from Wikipedia and my own experiences, but I found things that filled in and expanded on several other places, some at About.com, some at others. The history is pretty easy to trace, it's finding details that took a bit.
I agree about no reason to stay, if you don't care about the Afghans and their country...certainly I don't think there's any threat to the US.
I agree with what you said about Obama, and it is a shame. ALl this has pretty much brought our government to a halt, and while it grinds along slowly at the best of times, I hate to see it hampered even more the way it is currently. I, too, wish there was less of a "bring Obama down, no matter what" mentality, and the extremes to which it has brought people. Humans are strange, politics even stranger!
Thanx for your interest, it heartens me that anyoe is interested in this stuff.
Don't kid yourself Niki, most people, including me, cannot write eloquently and interestingly. Your post was terrific. And what's more important now than Afghanistan? On Obama, yeah, I'm just an old softie when it comes to the office of the President, any President. Must be a generational thing I guess. Yeah, I could go on for days about my pre & post-inauguration feelings on Obama, but all that seems to be changing now for some reason. It's hard to tell if he is weak, or if he is being made to look weak. Bush never had as much crap thrown at him, really not until the end of his term, and much was well deserved. After tonite Obama is going to be in need of some support. I will always support my President.
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Niki, here is a couple of BBC articles with local Afghan interviews
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/8387684.stm
" I met Hayit Allah pushing a wheelbarrow close to his mud-wall compound. He was an elderly man with a wiry spryness, and still worked in the dusty fields with his four sons.
He told me that the security situation was good close to his village. But he said that just five minutes' drive away, the villages were all Taliban-controlled.
But he was not worried about it, he said, and believed more foreign troops would be a bad idea.
His neighbour Haji Rabat, also a farmer, endorsed this view. He thought that deploying more US forces in Afghanistan would be a big mistake.
"Every time the Americans send more troops they create more problems with us," he said. "The only way to resolve this conflict is to negotiate with the insurgents." "
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8389255.stm
It seems that there is some debate on how to proceed with the people interviewed as well, other than what is going on doesn't work very well.
Either your with the terrorists, or ... your with the terrorists 
Lets party like its 1939
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Quote:
Originally posted by dreamtrove:
Niki
As for ecology, speaking from a position of science, sure, some ecosystems are more fragile than others. There still in no natural desert. Nature abhors a vacuum, and sorry, even if it were up to debate, which I think it's not, it's definitely off topic here.
DT, this is incorrect - there are lots of natural deserts, particularly along the 30 degree latitude belt in both northern and southern hemispheres. The mechanisms are well studied and well understood. They come in 2 forms: rainshadow deserts in which there are mountains to the windward (these can be anywhere, not just at 30 degrees), and climate-belt deserts located at around 30 because the wind patterns are formed by descending dry air at that latitude, that heats up as it descends and picks up what little moisture is available from land. Afghanistan has aspects of both. The same is true for the US Southwest and northern Mexico; both have shadowing mountains and are in the 30's. The western deserts of Peru/Chile and Namibia are pure climate-belt deserts. Afghanistan may have also been damaged by overgrazing (deserts are particularly susceptible to this), but it started as a natural desert at least as long as it's been at that latitude (many tens of millions of years).
And, the habitat in which a people lives makes a great deal of difference to their culture and ways, therefore being much on topic.
perfessergee
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Perf
As usual, I'm not posting in a void of ignorance. The desert in peru was made by the Wari (huari) empire and its predecessors, as has been much discussed here on this board.
Proof: Their farms and cities are found throughout the desert. Why would they *build* farms and cities in the middle of the desert?
Sorry, that's just a non-fact. I don't care if you have a PhD in geology, I have a 5th grade education and I find this really obvious. Education can be a handicap, but don't post without researching the alternative. I have, BTW: The oldest desert is the Sahara, which started to decline from a rainforest from 3 million BC forward. The remains of the earliest human, Lucy, were founded in the Central Sahara dated around 3 million BC.
This one's open and shut, but it also is patently obvious: Nature abhors a vacuum because of evolution. If there were no life, lifeforms would evolve to live there. Just look at antarctica, one of the world's most successful ecosystems. Or the Taiga/Tunda, another. What these places have that bodes so well for life is not their natural environment, it's "no humans."
Okay, I'm done now.
Niki,
It wasn't an attack, and snarks don't count. Be civil or don't, the choice is yours, I was only mentioning it as something already discussed for people who want to get along. I think that some posters respond to PN differently, and I understand that, he does spam the board. I am not one of them, however, but that doesn't mean that I won't snark him once in a while. Everyone snarks everyone, it's called having a sense of humor.
Sorry, the holier than thou is starting to annoy me again. Can we get back to Afghanistan please?
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Well Niki
after watching the talking heads on CNN, I'd have to say you are an expert of Afghanistan...
more because I don't think any of those suits are at all believable.
Could have been worse, I might have watched Faux news
Either your with the terrorists, or ... your with the terrorists
Lets party like its 1939
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Quote:
The Taliban most likely would not be a threat to anyone outside the area, and not to us; Al Qaeda has long gone international, isn’t powerful in Afghanistan, is apparently moreso in Pakistan now, and we’re not focused on going after them.
I think I probably agree with this assessment, though it is a gamble. I personally like the idea of fighting hard for a few years to try to improve the status quo (pushing the Taleban back while building up the Afghan security services, tilting the balance of power away from the Taleban), before our inevitable orderly retreat and hope for the best exit-strategy.
But there is another issue here, that hasn't been mentioned. Pakistan has a fight against their own Taleban, and I think the fate of this *nuclear* state is much more important. Would a Taleban-controlled Afghanistan across the (porous) border increase Pakistan's internal struggle?
This isn't addressed specifically to you by the way Niki, I think we're all very grateful for the insight you've already offered, any question in the realm of grubby war/geopolitics or anything, feel free to ignore.
Heads should roll
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Quote:
Niki:
Just a quick aside: I have my own opinions on how much or if the “Clintonistas” run Obama or his government. I can easily see anyone, diplomat, citizen or President, initially reacting as he did against Karzai, then over time accepting that it is he with whom we must deal at this time unless we want to encourage further strife. Just my opinion.
Oh, I'm sure it's a power struggle, but I did watch this one, and it went like this:
Obama to Karzai: you can't take power without the support of the people. We have to hold back on this...
Hillary: We support Karzai
Obama: We support Karzai
Do I hear an echo?
Yes, I know that Obama is trying to be his own man, but when I predicted this fall out when he was running last year, I said any way it goes, Hillary wins, because she knows far more people in DC than Obama does, and so she's going to master the beltway game. That's the real reason Obama has Biden. The difference is, Clintons know how to kick it old school in influence pedalling.
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Thanx for your kind words, JS. Not sure they’re deserved, but thanx. And who knows, maybe if enough of us hang in there long enough, something good will happen, eh?
Gino: Thank you, I found those FASCINATING! And yes, I was pretty sure that opinion is divided all around the country, probably divided for different reasons among urban folk and other reasons for the villagers, y’think? Seems like it would be that way to me. Given everyone views things from their life’s perspective. But they were neat interviews, I thank you for them. I especially got a kick out of the guy who said “"They don't know much about our culture and they can't communicate with the local people." Not much has changed in that respect since we were there, I see…sadly. What I don’t get about that is Why don’t we LEARN??? After sixty years, that statement is exactly the same…
And of course, translators have been fired in huge numbers because they’re gay…sigh…
I’m certainly no expert; my personal knowledge is 50 years old and much has changed. But I do find it irritating that the MSM is what people accept as factual, when the talking heads merely repeat what they’re told—investigative journalism is an endangered species! Some of them STILL can’t pronounce “nuclear”< and nobody seems to want to change that. I just saw "Afghani" used with respect to the people, not the currency, again last night. Sigh...Quote:
No surprise there….probably the same sentiment voiced by almost all places we’ve invaded, don’t you think? “Take your troops out; give us your money”. Pretty natural. And “But many Afghans think that simply pulling out would be a recipe for disaster and that the country would descend into civil war.” Not surprising to find differing views; same thing is true over here.
“Jawed advocated a complete withdrawal of foreign troops but would like continued international support for the Afghan government.”Quote:
Some very cogent, informed opinions there---all those interviewed except the first one were students; the first one was a farmer. Not surprising, the number of different views; interesting, how good a grasp they have on the situation. I guess not surprising, since if you live there, you see it right in front of you all the time.
“Although they do enjoy public support in the major cities, it's a different story in remote areas. They should try very hard to avoid civilian casualties from now on and not undertake air attacks until they are certain of the target.”
_____
“It makes you wonder: foreign troops are great in number, well-armed and well-equipped. They've got the best tanks and weapons and yet they can't defeat the Taliban.
The Taliban can go anywhere and do anything they want. They go to a village, they open fire on a convoy and they use the villagers as a human shield. But there are no soldiers or police in the village to protect the residents. And that's the problem: every town and village should have it's own protection.
The question now is not how many extra troops will be sent but what role they'll play.”
______
“Afghanistan is a developing country. We need a good security and we need our own army to be well-equipped and well-trained.
But before we have the capability to safeguard our security situation ourselves, we first need help from foreign countries to train our army and police. This is the only way we can ensure better security and peace in Afghanistan.”
______
“The increased number of troops will backfire unless they can hold areas that are secured. Once an area is secured, it should never be ceded back to the Taliban.
But providing the Afghan security forces with tactical training is not enough. Most people think that the US and the UK contribute towards the suffering of ordinary people by teaching our security forces to be lethal without teaching them the responsibilities that come with it.”
Perfesser, thank you for your post. I believed that was the case, but I haven’t the knowledge to explain exactly why. I really
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Niki
Actually it was the position being taken, and the issue was Peru, but:
Quote:
The idea that the 2,256,936 miles (6.2 million kilometers) of Australian desert ... was created by man is something I find difficult to accept.
And yet it happened. (I think that # is high, but it depends on the definition)
Not arguing the point, the conventional wisdom on this one just doesn't jibe with the nature of nature. I don't know why people persist in this belief, which, from what I read, the Africans put on the same level as Creationism.
This isn't a criticism of anyone, I'm only pointing it out because I think that it's a very dangerous belief. If there is a cataclysm is about to strike, not to think pro-actively about it would be a mistake.
Re: Afghanistan, I'm chicken little just here to tell you that the sky actually *is* falling. Maybe I'm wrong, but can you afford to take that chance?
More to the point: Using simple logic and laws of mathematics and physics, you can actually predict the layout of the universe and everything in it without too much difficulty. Understanding the underlying logic behind natural events, evolution, and the pervasive life forms of the planet takes only a smidgen of understanding. It's overwhelmingly obvious that this does not predict a desert.
It does predict some fragile ecosystems, simple human farming and animal herding is enough to kill such environments.
Again, to the specific example of Australia, I just did a cursory search, and the fossil record indicates that the land seems have been relatively fertile for the billions of years prior to the arrival of humans around 60,000 years ago. The ecosystem slowly declines, and collapsed between 14,000-7,000 years ago. It's important to remember that Australia, like the rest of the Earth, wasn't settled once by one group of human, but several times, in this case, three times prior to the modern era. One of those cultures, I would hazard a guess, brought with it some very destructive agricultural practices.
I humbly suggest you examine the possibility that the Afghan ecological decline is the result of some practices of people living there now, just in case... Because if I'm right, then some major technological solutions may be needed, or massive famines will set in.
Also, consider this: If the environment is stretched to the breaking point, and the infant and child mortality is as high as you say, if we introduce healthcare which stops that mortality, the resulting population explosion will cause a systematic collapse unless we also introduce some ecological measures
All of which is far more important than whoever is nominally in charge.
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ummm... While I agree with you it's possible for natural deserts to exist (I live in a grassy one, there's a more traditional looking one to the south of me caused by the Sierra Nevada rain shadow and a shit ton of eroded Jurassic sandstone), I'd wouldn't be so quick to call Iran and Afghanistan a natural desert. You might wanna check out this link about ancient Sumeria.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer#Decline
The land is still pretty much ruined, there's not much can grow there. Primitive agriculture techniques and grazing herd animals can cause quite a bit of ecological damage, especially in arid terrain.
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