Afganistan The grave yard of empires - II

Afganistan The grave yard of empires - I

Operations in Afganistan is creating more impossibilities before US strategists. Bringing peace to this region which is constantly on war is an Herculian effort. One the economic front the Afgan war is becoming more and more costly, but the US administration cant afford a bigger hole in the budget. At the same time War is becoming more and more unpopular in US which is another heaadache for the administration and Obama is forced to announce some pullout date for the US army. But it is not as simple as it seems, it will result in chaos not only in Afganistan but in the border provinces of Pakistan too.

So US finally come up with the idea of surge - the strategy which worked well in Iraq. The surge of more than 30,000 troops, but the idea which is copy pasted from Iraq experiences may seemed well but the copy paste of Iraq results- which is the anticipation of US generals is next to impossible. First of all Afganistan is witnessing war for a number past decades. And these wars are organised and conducted by well trained, dedicated and motivated people of various terrorist groups. And this one is not a conventional warfare, its a gurrilla one combined with occassional suicidal bombings. As US is already announced the pullout dates they can go for a sleep for some time (ofcourse occassionally waking up and creating havoc in Afgan cities) and coming back after the US pull out. The rough Afgan terrain and the absence of basic infrastructure will be another big problem for US.

But its not an impossible task. There are well known examples before them - India. After losing so many persoanals and much bloodshed, Punjab become one of the calm place in India to live. Later Panjab attained high progress in agricultural as well as industrial sector. Kashmir may be one of the most beautiful as well as unsecure place at one point of time, but at the cost of two decades of war and thousands of security personals Kashmir valley is enjoying a relative peace now. same is the case in many north - eastern states of India.

Unfortunately we Indians do not have much options left after the US pull out. We are only engaged in development activities in Afgan, creating roads, schools dams, irrigation projects etc or in other words - we are winning the hearts of common people. Ofcourse we won a lot of good will for the activities there, but we will be forced to pull out from Afganistan after the US gone, if the later stick to their dates. Also our presence in Afganistan become big irritant for Pakistan.

It may be ironic or coincidence but its a fact that Afganistan become a grave yard of Empires. Soviet Union collapsed after the disastrous Afgan invasion even if it was not the main reson. In the same way America is losing its unquestionale power and economic superiority after the Afgan invasion.(Even if it is not the main reson).
 
Sajeev.