The United States and United Kingdom are working together to provide Australia with nuclear-powered submarines, CNN reported on Wednesday, September 15, 2021 (read story here). Australia has a small navy, with fewer than 20 large combat ships, which includes 6 diesel-powered submarines (details here[...]
Archive for the ‘Foreign Affairs’ Category
September 8th, 2021 - 8:53 pm § in Foreign Affairs, Politics
Rumors about U.S. military gear in Taliban hands are greatly exaggerated
Trump claims the U.S. left $83 billion of military equipment in Afghanistan. That’s the total U.S. military aid to the Afghan government over the 20 years of American involvement. Only $18 billion of that was equipment. The rest went for paying Afghan soldiers and contractors; buying uniform[...]
Canadian election: Could Trudeau lose?
He sure could, the polls suggest. As of Saturday, the Conservatives led the Liberals, 35.5% to 33.4%, although by Sunday this had dropped to 34.9% to 33.0%, demonstrating the volatility of public opinion a little more than two weeks before the September 20 nationwide election for seats in Parliament[...]
The Afghanistan Papers
With U.S. troops now completely out of Afghanistan, most Americans don’t want to hear about that country anymore, much less read an entire book about our war there went awry. Nobody learns anything from the mistakes of the past anyway. So this posting will be very short. The Afghanistan Papers[...]
August 30th, 2021 - 9:37 pm § in Foreign Affairs
Is a bloodbath coming in Afghanistan?
“With the U.S. military now out of Afghanistan, the task of evacuating tens of thousands of Afghan allies left behind falls to nongovernmental organizations and international aid groups — who say they are unable to tell them where to go next,” NBC News reported on Monday, August 30, 2[...]
August 26th, 2021 - 1:37 pm § in Foreign Affairs, Politics
Lindsey Graham’s stupid idea
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) isn’t the dumbest Republican senator. That would be a contest between Ron Johnson (R-WI) and Tommy Tuberville (R-AL). But Graham is no military strategist. He did serve in the military. After graduating from law school, Graham joined the Air Force and was commissione[...]
August 24th, 2021 - 7:24 pm § in Foreign Affairs
Will the Taliban endure?
Andrew Latham, a Canadian academic (c.v. here) who teaches at a Minnesota liberal arts college, doesn’t think so. His argument is the Taliban are a “constellation of factions and tribes, drawn from different ethnic and linguistic groups” that will dissolve in the absence of a commo[...]
August 19th, 2021 - 3:14 pm § in Foreign Affairs
Panjshir: Afghanistan’s anti-Taliban redoubt
The Panjshir Valley “is a natural fortress … no government – foreign or Afghan – has ever taken and held it by force. Panjshiri leaders have always made it clear … the valley is part of Afghanistan on its own terms.” There’s only one road in or out, and it’s a chokep[...]
Afghan debacle increases risk of war between U.S. and China
A couple days ago I wrote (here), “I’m concerned about a couple of things. One is whether our withdrawal from Afghanistan will be interpreted in Beijing as a lack of resolve and embolden China’s dictator to attack Taiwan.” I wasn’t imagining things. And it didn’t take lon[...]
August 14th, 2021 - 8:26 pm § in Biden, Foreign Affairs
Assessing Biden’s decision to give up Afghanistan
Let’s start with the country itself. Afghanistan isn’t a nation; it’s a place, a chunk of real estate, that’s home to some 28 tribes. The largest of these is the Pashtuns, about 40% of the population, who occupy a large area that straddles the fuzzy border between Afghanistan[...]