I recommend a decent atlas and a pirated PDF copy of Zbigniew Brzezinski’s “The Grand Chessboard.” And a good supply of your mood-altering chemical of choice. I’d suggest a dry red wine of some sort, but I’m no expert.
Afghanistan has a lot of natural resources, mineral mostly; weird metals that are critical to electronics. But more than that, it’s location, location, location. There’s been talk of oil and gas pipelines from Iran to China. And from the -stan countries south to the Pakistani ports on the Indian Ocean. None of that can happen if Afghanistan is a flaming dumpster fire. Also Afghanistan is right in the middle of the -stan countries Russia still considers their area of control, China, Pakistan, Iran, India; with huge-mongous mountains in the way every other way to get from Point A to Point B. There may not be a more strategically-located spot, if one is of a mind to dominate southern Asia.
Syria and Iraq are similarly strategically-located. Libya has a lot of oil, just across the Mediterranean from Europe. After Libya fell, all of a sudden there was a lot of trouble with “Jihadis” in Algeria, also with lots of oil, also just across the Mediterranean; and in Nigeria and Chad. Nigeria has a lot of oil, and there’s talk of a pipeline from Nigeria north to the Mediterranean, crossing…Chad and either Algeria or Libya. Interesting.
Heading East in Africa, there’s a lot of oil in the south of Sudan. Now there’s a totally feckless “independent” state of South Sudan there. And where that oil would want to go to get to market would go through Somalia. Every time anybody gets the upper hand in the chaos in Somalia, the US bombs the **** out of them and the other side gets a lot of weapons. Interesting.
The Chinese had built a lot of oil infrastructure in all those places, and that investment has been among the first things bombed by “Jihadis” whenever they show up. Almost like “Jihadis” hate money. Which they don’t seem to anyplace else; curious. And it’s weird how the “Jihadis” seem to hate everybody the US wants dispossessed.
The strategy is for the US to control Europe and China’s access to energy. Meanwhile, surrounding the EU, Russia and China with little dumpster fires, arming the most unreasonable and violent people in every area, demolishing civil society and making the perimeter of those rivals to US supremacy in Eurasia dangerous and unstable, applying pressure to every fracture line in societies on those areas.
The US can’t just invade Eurasia, but it can splinter it and create so much chaos Russia, China and the EU have all they can handle just staying afloat. That increases internal tensions in those areas, which the US can exploit. The goal is to break up all those nations and associations so the smaller, bickering groupings can be set against each other under the Pax Americana.
Yes, it’s some crazy. But Brzezinski made that his life’s work, and I haven’t seen anything in US foreign policy these past 40 years that doesn’t conform to it.
Can the reason for Afghanistan be so hard to see now ?
US foreign policy supports the workings of a thriving criminal economy in which the demarcation between organized capital and organized crime has become increasingly blurred.
The heroin business is not “filling the coffers of the Taliban” as claimed by US government and the international community: quite the opposite! The proceeds of this illegal trade are the source of wealth formation, largely reaped by powerful business/criminal interests within the Western countries. These interests are sustained by US foreign policy.
Decision-making in the US State Department, the CIA and the Pentagon is instrumental in supporting this highly profitable multibillion dollar trade, third in commodity value after oil and the arms trade.
The Afghan drug economy is “protected”.
The heroin trade was part of the war agenda. What this war has achieved is to restore a compliant narco-State, headed by a US appointed puppet.
The powerful financial interests behind narcotics are supported by the militarisation of the world’s major drug triangles (and transshipment routes), including the Golden Crescent and the Andean region of South America (under the so-called Andean Initiative).
Including Vatican and Royals all over the World. TPTB still believe Slaves and Drugs are the best way to profit & CONTROL.
